“The complete and definitive work of art is created beyond one's individuality... The universal transcends such a level. Mere spontaneity has never created a work of art which possesses a lasting cultural value. The method leading to universal form is based upon calculations of measure and number.”
Quote in his article 'Elementarism', as cited in De Stijl – Van Doesburg Issue, January 1932, pp. 17–19
1926 – 1931
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Theo van Doesburg 46
Dutch architect, painter, draughtsman and writer 1883–1931Related quotes

refering to his art-gift Jorn made the Mmseum Jorn (1962); as quoted in Silkeborg Kunstmuseum — Jorn Samling by Troels Andersen (1973)
1959 - 1973, Various sources

Tradition and the Individual Talent (1919)
Context: What happens when a new work of art is created, is something that happens simultaneously to all the works of art which preceded it. The existing monuments form an ideal order among themselves, which is modified by the introduction of the new (the really new) work of art among them. The existing order is complete before the new work arrives; for order to persist after the supervention of novelty, the whole existing order must be, if ever so slightly, altered; and so the relations, proportions, values of each work of art toward the whole are readjusted; and this is conformity between the old and the new.
The Oxford History of the Classical World (with John Boardman and Oswyn Murray, Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1986) p. 3

Quoted in Frankenberry The Faith of Scientists: In Their Own Words (2008), p. 336

Letter to H. E. Kramer, 14-11-1927, as quoted in: Bram van Velde, A Tribute, Municipal Museum De Lakenhal Leiden, Municipal Museum Schiedam, Museum de Wieger, Deurne 1994, p. 46 (English translation: Charlotte Burgmans)
1920's

14 June 1853
Correspondence, Letters to Madame Louise Colet

“He gave man speech, and speech created thought,
Which is the measure of the universe.”
Asia, Act II, sc. iv, l. 72
Prometheus Unbound (1818–1819; publ. 1820)