Technical information
- Title : Dissolution of Forms
- Date : 1974
- Technique : Oil on canvas
- Dimensions : 94 × 100 cm
- Location : Private collection
Biographical / historical context
In 1974, Breuillaud pushes his series of “blue scenes” very far—true paintings of vision in which space becomes a fluid medium. Based in Vence, he turns the interior landscape into a theatre of apparitions: bodies, totems, stars, plants, and animals merge into a single pictorial matter, as if narrative were built through metamorphosis rather than action.
The nearly square format (94 × 100 cm) signals a more monumental ambition than the oils on paper of 1973. The canvas allows certain zones to be thickened, reworked repeatedly, and depth to be constructed in layers, while retaining the character of a waking dream in which the human figure dissolves into the element of colour.
Formal / stylistic description
The painting is organised around a large blue-green field, modulated by darker swathes that frame the scene. A nude, reclining, luminous figure occupies the left foreground, as if laid on a platform or slope. To the right, other vertical presences, more evanescent, emerge through reserve and glazes, while a pale disc in the distance suggests a star or light source.
The pictorial writing blends transparencies with denser accents: transitions are often fused, but fine lines scratch the contours, specifying a hand, a head, a gaze. Breuillaud plays with temperature contrasts, setting cold blues against greenish touches, and installs zones of “floating” in which forms seem to dissolve and then recombine.
Comparative analysis / related works
The work directly belongs to the 1974 “blue scenes” through its principles: levitating figures, the presence of a distant star, and an alternation between dense zones and zones of effacement. It may be compared in particular to more vertical compositions of the same year, where silhouettes multiply and drips become structural axes; here, balance relies more on the tension between a reclining body in the foreground and standing presences at a distance.
The canvas nevertheless retains traits inherited from works on paper: the importance of the underlying drawing, a taste for embryonic forms, and the use of the eye as an anchoring point. It appears as a synthesis: the gesture remains supple and “graphic”, but the scale gives the scene a more architectured gravity.
Justification of dating and attribution
The 1974 dating is supported by the maturity of the dispositif: distant star, atmospheric depth built through glazes, and figures more clearly hierarchised between foreground and background. The format (94 × 100 cm) corresponds to a more ambitious production on canvas attested in these years, and the treatment of blues—saturated then velvety—is typical of this sequence.
Attribution to André Breuillaud rests on constant stylistic markers: elongated anatomies, incised contours, ocular motifs, and the ambiguity between human, animal, and vegetal. Overall coherence with other known “blue scenes”, together with the indicated provenance, stabilises the identification.
Provenance / exhibitions / publications
Vence. Private collection.
© Bruno Restout — Catalogue raisonné André Breuillaud