Geometric
Art built on precise lines, angles, circles and polygons, from ancient ornament to modern abstraction.
162 works · 10 related artists
About
Geometric art favours shapes that could be constructed with ruler and compass. The impulse is ancient: Greek pottery of the Geometric period (about 900–700 BC) wraps vessels in meanders and zigzag bands, and craftsmen across the Islamic world developed intricate star-and-polygon patterns for tile, wood and stucco. Monir Shahroudy Farmanfarmaian drew on that heritage in her mirror mosaics.
In modern art, geometry became a foundation for pure abstraction. Kazimir Malevich's Suprematist squares and crosses of 1915, Piet Mondrian's grids of the 1920s and the Bauhaus teaching of Josef Albers each offered simple forms as a universal language. After 1945 the idea spread widely: Victor Vasarely built optical effects from modular units, artists in São Paulo, Buenos Aires and Caracas developed Concrete and kinetic art, and Minimalists reduced sculpture to cubes and beams. Look for clean edges, measured intervals and shapes that seem planned rather than improvised.
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More in Visual Qualities
Glittery
Grid
Highly Detailed
Highly Ornamented
Irregular Curvilinear Forms
Irregular Linear Forms
Layered Images
Linear Forms
Marbleized
Metallic
Mimicking Ruined Materials
Mirrored
Pastel Colors
Patinated and Oxidized
Patterns
Pixelated
Primary Abstraction
Primary Colors
Psychedelic
Radiating Lines
Raw versus Finished
