Piet Mondrian

Piet Mondrian (7 March 1872 – 1 February 1944) was a Dutch modern artist of the De stijl group. His early paintings show abstract landscapes in post-impressionist and cubist style.
As his career went on, he started to paint in a more abstract style. 
Mondrian painted about 250 of these geometric abstracts, from 1917 to 1944. Mondrian called his style “neoplasticism”.
Escaping in 1940 from a Europe at war, Mondrian spent the last four years of his life in New York City. His paintings of that time express exuberance at city life. In his final painting, "Broadway Boogie Woogie" (painted around 1942 or 1943), the checkerboard lines, previously black, are now painted blue, gray, red and yellow. The yellow was apparently inspired by New York’s Yellow cabs.