Theo van Doesburg (Dutch pronunciation: [ˈteɪɔ vɑn ˈdusbʏrx], 30 August 1883 – 7 March 1931) was a Dutch artist, who practised painting, writing, poetry and architecture. He is best known as the founder and leader of De Stijl. "‎Dutch painter, architect, designer and writer. He was officially registered as the son of Wilhelm Küpper and Henrietta Catharina Margadant, but he was so convinced that his mother’s second husband, Theodorus Doesburg, was his father that he took his name. Little is known of his early life, but he began painting naturalistic subjects c. 1899. In 1903 he began his military service, and around the same time he met his first wife, Agnita Feis, a Theosophist and poet. Between about 1908 and 1910, much influenced by the work of Honoré Daumier, he produced caricatures, some of which were later published in his first book De maskers af! (1916). Also during this period he painted some Impressionist-inspired landscapes and portraits in the manner of George Hendrik Breitner. Between 1914 and 1915 the influence of Kandinsky became clear in such drawings as Streetmusic I and Streetmusic II (The Hague, Rijksdienst Beeld. Kst) and other abstract works. With the mobilization of the Dutch forces following the outbreak of World War I, van Doesburg was sent to Tilburg near the Belgian front. His first marriage was already in difficulty, and in Tilburg he met Lena Milius, who became his second wife (1917). In 1915 he met the painter Janus de Winter, who became the subject of a second pamphlet by van Doesburg. De Winter was a mystic and Theosophist who worked mainly in watercolours and pastels. His influence can be seen in van Doesburg’s expressive and highly charged pastels and self-portraits of this period including Despair (1915; The Hague, Rijksdienst Beeld. Kst). Also in 1915 he discovered the work of Piet Mondrian... [Allan Doig From Grove Art Online]" http://oseculoprodigioso.blogspot.nl/2014/08/doesburg-theo-van-neo-plasticism.html?view=sidebar undefined

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