Untitled

Technical information

Title : Untitled
Date : c. 1950
Technique : Oil on canvas
Dimensions : 38 × 61 cm
Location : Private collection

Biographical / historical context

This composition belongs to Breuillaud’s Provençal investigations around 1950, when landscape is no longer merely a descriptive motif but a field for experimenting with the structure of planes and the rhythmic organisation of forms.

The theme of harvesting (most likely olives) makes it possible to introduce repeated gestures and bent postures, which dialogue with the branching of the trees and with the relief in the background.

Formal / stylistic description

In the foreground, several stylised olive trees are built up as polygonal volumes; their sinuous trunks form a dark framework that breaks the field into facets.

Three figures occupy the harvesting space: two bent silhouettes close to the ground, and a third figure raised on a ladder, as if suspended amid the foliage. The heads are reduced to light blocks and the clothing to compact masses (blue, black), without anecdotal detail.

The ground, broadly orange, contrasts with the bluish greens of the vegetal canopy; on the horizon, red and violet hills close the scene, while a band of blue sky stabilises the composition.

The paint handling is relatively smoothed and laid in as patches; the energy comes above all from the contours and the interlocking of surfaces, in a “mosaic” logic.

Comparative analysis / related works

Through its construction in interlocking planes and its warm/green palette, the work is close to the Provençal landscapes dated around 1950 in the PR2 series, where the olive tree becomes a structuring motif (arabesque trunk, foliage in geometric masses).

The “figure + tree” device (bent postures, the action of gathering) echoes several peasant scenes within the corpus, where Breuillaud uses rural labour as a pretext for pacing simplified silhouettes.

Justification of dating and attribution

The palette (earthy oranges, bluish greens, violets), the simplification of the figures, and the faceted spatial organisation correspond to the Provençal phase of 1950, when the artist intensifies the synthesis between natural setting and an almost Cubist construction.

The attribution is consistent with Breuillaud’s manner: structuring contours, “cut-out” forms and a clear hierarchy of planes, without any search for illusionism.

Provenance / exhibitions / publications

Private collection.