by Tom Gurney
Tom Gurney BSc (Hons) is an art history expert with over 20 years experience
Published on June 19, 2020 / Updated on September 29, 2026
Email: tomgurney1@gmail.com / Phone: +44 7429 011000
About the painting
A man in a dark coat and bowler hat stands on a tiled floor with one hand resting at his hip. Piet Mondrian's Portrait of Egbert Kuipers is a full-length image made about 1900–01, catalogued by RKD as A113 and listed at The Israel Museum, Jerusalem, accession B75.0138. Its sitter, Egbert Roels Kuipers (1828–1892), had died several years before Mondrian painted it. The portrait belongs to Mondrian's early professional work and is separate from his portrait of Kuipers and Jantje Wiegersma together, A114, now at the Fries Museum.[1][2]
At a glance
- ArtistPiet Mondrian (Piet Mondriaan, 1872–1944)
- TitlePortrait of Egbert Kuipers (1828–1892)
- DateAbout 1900–01 in the RKD catalogue
- Catalogue numberRKD A113
- MediumOil on canvas in the RKD-derived catalogue image record
- Dimensions82.5 × 51.5 cm in that image record
- CollectionThe Israel Museum, Jerusalem, as listed by RKD
- Museum numberB75.0138 in RKD's current entry
- Related distinct paintingRKD A114, Egbert Kuipers and Jantje Wiegersma, Fries Museum, Leeuwarden[1][3]
Portraits of Egbert Kuipers around 1901
Contents
- What does the portrait show?
- Who was Egbert Kuipers?
- When and why did Mondrian make this work?
- How is A113 different from the Fries Museum double portrait?
- Where is the original portrait?
What does the portrait show?
Egbert Kuipers appears standing almost from head to foot. His dark bowler hat, jacket, waistcoat and trousers make one large vertical shape against a brown interior. A white shirt collar and small light area at the hand interrupt that darkness. One arm rests at his side; the other bends outward at the hip. The pose looks direct and self-possessed, with the body angled slightly while the face turns toward the viewer. Rectangles and horizontal lines in the floor and background give the figure a physical setting.
 The Red Tree Piet Mondrian.jpg)
The painting is muted overall. Browns and charcoal tones dominate the walls and clothes; brighter light is concentrated in the face, collar, hand and floor near the feet. Mondrian uses this distribution to keep attention on the sitter without isolating him against a blank backdrop. The room's surfaces are visible but subordinate. A small web image cannot resolve every brushstroke or the precise texture of the original, yet the figure's pose and tonal arrangement remain clear.
Kuipers is not shown in a decorative costume or a formal official setting. The hat and outdoor coat suggest an ordinary, respectable public appearance. The Fries Museum notes that in the separate double portrait A114 he also wears a bowler hat and outdoor coat, contrasting with his wife's indoor clothing. That interpretation supports the general reading of his attire, but the two paintings must retain their own descriptions: the present A113 image shows Kuipers alone.[2]
Who was Egbert Kuipers?
The Fries Museum identifies the sitter as Egbert Roels Kuipers, born in 1828 and deceased in 1892. It describes him and his wife Jantje Tjeerds Wiegersma (1828–1914) as a Frisian couple who moved with their children to Amsterdam in 1882, during an agricultural crisis in Friesland. Those details provide a documented social setting for a portrait made around 1900. They also establish that Mondrian could not have painted Kuipers from life at the recorded date.[2][1]
The museum says the double portrait A114 was probably commissioned by one of the couple's sons around that son's wedding, and that Mondrian used a photograph of Egbert for its deceased male figure. This is valuable evidence about A114. It is tempting to apply the same precise commissioning story and source photograph automatically to A113, but the cited Fries Museum text does not separately document how this single-sitter Israel Museum canvas was commissioned or whether Mondrian used the same photograph. The secure statement for A113 is that it was painted after Kuipers's death; its exact source image remains unconfirmed here.[2]
This distinction is more than a technicality. A photograph-based posthumous double portrait can explain why the man's clothes and pose appear as they do in A114. If the same explanation is claimed for A113 without a source, it risks turning a plausible relationship into an invented fact. The article can still use the documented Kuipers family history and compare the two works while keeping the production history of the individual portrait open.
Watch: Piet Mondrian
See his studio, the move toward geometric abstraction and the rhythms of his New York paintings.
Piet Mondrian: Abstract Painting as We Know It
Curator Michael White explores the paintings and Mondrian’s studio as an abstract space.
Watch on YouTubeWhen and why did Mondrian make this work?
RKD dates A113 about 1900–01. Its Amsterdam figures section places it next to A114 and amid other portraits Mondrian made in the years around 1898–1901, including family members and private sitters. This catalogue grouping shows that portraiture was a substantial part of his early practice. It does not supply a signed day or a named commissioner for A113.[1]
The Fries Museum explains that after Mondrian's Amsterdam academy training and the end of his study support, he earned money through drawings for scientific publications, portraits and landscapes. The Kuipers double portrait comes from this period before Mondrian documented his development as thoroughly as he later did. A113 similarly belongs to the world of early commissioned or saleable representational art, but the present sources do not prove the financial terms of this particular portrait.[2]
It would be misleading to describe a c. 1900–01 portrait as a direct study for Mondrian's famous red-yellow-blue abstractions. The work is concerned with likeness, character, dress and setting. At the same time, its careful distribution of dark and light shows the artist organising a picture, not merely copying an appearance. The figure's strong vertical presence and the floor's horizontal divisions are visible formal facts; they need not be turned into a claim about a fully formed later theory.
How is A113 different from the Fries Museum double portrait?
RKD gives the single figure A113 to The Israel Museum and the two-person picture A114 to the Fries Museum in Leeuwarden. The Fries Museum acquired A114 in 2022 and describes it as a 1901 portrait of Egbert and Jantje. It has exhibited the couple's painting with Frisian dress and historical material to explain Jantje's widow's cap and the family's identity. None of that changes the ownership or subject count of A113.[1][2]
The double portrait has a special compositional story. According to the Fries Museum, Egbert's outdoor hat and coat appear beside Jantje's black jacket and Frisian widow's cap; the museum reads the work as a partly posthumous family image and identifies a photograph as Mondrian's source for Egbert. The standalone A113 portrait concentrates all attention on the deceased man and gives him a separate, full-length interior setting. The shared sitter makes comparison fruitful, but the paintings are not two names for one canvas.[2]
There is also a naming wrinkle: the museum sometimes uses “Kuiper” in Dutch prose for the family while RKD's A113 English title uses “Kuipers.” The life dates, spouse and A-number help identify the sitter despite that spelling variation. This page follows RKD's title for the single portrait and gives the fuller name recorded by the Fries Museum where biographical context is discussed.[1][2]
Where is the original portrait?
RKD's digital catalogue lists The Israel Museum, Jerusalem, inventory B75.0138, for A113. This establishes the collection identity. It does not establish that the painting is permanently displayed in a particular gallery today; visitors should check the museum's current information before planning a trip specifically to see it. The related A114 is the work at the Fries Museum, not this one.[1]
The site's existing 400-pixel portrait image matches the RKD catalogue reproduction for A113: the single man in a dark bowler hat and coat, standing against a brown interior with one arm bent. It was retained after the local cloud file became available. The public-domain Commons version was used only as a visual cross-check, so no new media licence or replacement file was needed.[3]
Mondrian artworks directory
Frequently asked questions
Did Mondrian meet Egbert Kuipers to paint him?
Is the painting at the Fries Museum?
When was this portrait made?
RKD dates it c. 1900–01, after the sitter's death in 1892.[1]
How is the sitter dressed?
He wears dark outer clothes and a bowler hat, with one hand at his hip. The broad dark figure is set against a brown interior.
Discussion
How does the face emerge from the dark coat?
Reader Insights
What do the bent arm and standing pose suggest?
How does A113 differ from the Kuipers–Wiegersma double portrait A114?
How does A113 differ from the Kuipers–Wiegersma double portrait A114?
Join the Conversation
Share what you notice in this painting below.
References
- RKD – Netherlands Institute for Art History, Mondrian catalogue of Amsterdam figures, A113 and A114: date, sitter, collection and Israel Museum inventory B75.0138. View source.
- Fries Museum, “Reunited by Mondrian,” on its separate A114 double portrait, the Kuipers–Wiegersma family, the sitter's death, source photograph and museum acquisition. View source.
- Wikimedia Commons, RKD-derived A113 catalogue reproduction and object metadata for oil on canvas, 82.5 × 51.5 cm, used for visual cross-check. View source.
- Lead image credit. Piet Mondrian, Portrait of Egbert Kuipers, c. 1900–01, RKD A113, The Israel Museum, Jerusalem, B75.0138. RKD-derived image data records oil on canvas, 82.5 × 51.5 cm.
