M. H. J. Schoenmaekers
Dutch mathematician (1875–1944)
Mathieu Hubertus Josephus Schoenmaekers (13 December 1875, Maastricht – 18 December 1944, Laren) was a former Catholic priest, philosopher and theosophist who developed an esoteric philosophy called Christosophy. Active in early 20th-century Dutch intellectual and artistic circles, he was also a theorist of Formative Mathematics, whose ideas on geometry, colour, and polarity influenced Piet Mondrian's art theory of Neoplasticism and the De Stijl movement of Theo van Doesburg.
Personal life
Mathieu Schoenmaekers was the son of Joannes Hubertus Schoenmaekers, a shopkeeper, and Hubertina Elisabeth Antoinetta Eberhard. His mother died after he was born, and so he was raised by his paternal grandparents, who were strict Catholics and convinced him to become a priest.
He married Marie Eugénie Hubertine Dehaime (1880–1908) on 8th September 1904. They had a son. After the death of his first wife, he married Jacomina Jacoba Mallée (1885–1966) on 25 November 1910. They had no children.
Education
In 1896, he attended the Universitas Gregoriana in Rome, where he studied theology and philosophy. He was ordained in 1899, and received a doctorate in philosophy that same year.
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Biographical claims are most persuasive when dates, appointments and relationships can be traced to records created close to the events described. The source revision retrieved here is dated Mar 28, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q629307. VIAF identifies the subject as 28740666. The Library of Congress control number is n93029016. 4 of 4 selected statements include explicit references; 1 carry qualifiers and 1 use preferred rank. The first chronological checks are 1875, 1944, 1880 and 1908.
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This entry incorporates text from “M. H. J. Schoenmaekers” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.