Mondrian, who had escaped to New York from Europe after the outbreak of World War II, delighted in the city's architecture. He was also fascinated by American jazz, particularly boogie-woogie, finding its syncopated beat, irreverent approach to melody, and improvisational aesthetic akin to what he called, in his own work, the "destruction of natural appearance; and construction through continuous opposition of pure means—dynamic rhythm." In this painting, his penultimate, Mondrian replaced the black grid that had long governed his canvases with predominantly yellow lines that intersect at points marked by squares of blue and red. These atomized bands of stuttering chromatic pulses, interrupted by light gray, create paths across the canvas suggesting the city's grid, the movement of traffic, and blinking electric lights, as well as the rhythms of jazz.
Considered Mondrian’s masterpiece, Broadway Boogie Woogie is a shimmering combination of multi-colored grid lines, complete with blocks of color, all in the primary palette. This piece represents another development in the unique style of the artist, which may have been the most profound. After the abandonment of representational forms in 1913 and the reconciliation of his spiritual concerns with his aesthetic, Mondrian had finally developed the transition of solid black lines to lines consisting of multi-colored, vibrant hues, creating an entirely new feeling. This painting represents Mondrian’s seminal work as an artist, and unlike much of his work, is not entirely non-representational. One can see the grid of the Manhattan city streets and feel the beat of the boogie woogie music of which Mondrian was so fond.