AB-MP2-1957-005 — Red Landscape (1957)

Technical information

Title: Red Landscape
Date: 1957
Technique: Oil on canvas
Dimensions: 46 × 55 cm
Location: Private collection

Biographical / historical context

Made in 1957, Red Landscape belongs to the MP2 cycle, a period in which Breuillaud radicalises his equivalences between landscape and pictorial construction: space is no longer given by a horizon, but by the distribution of masses, rhythms and chromatic tensions.

The term “landscape” refers here to a sensation rather than a description. The work explores the idea of an incandescent field, where chromatic heat becomes the motor of the composition and transforms forms into floating signs.

Formal / stylistic description

The painting is dominated by a red–orange expanse that seems both support and matter: it envelops the forms, absorbs them, then lets them reappear in places. Curved ribbons and islands of cooler colour (greens, blues, mauves) emerge like underlying strata.

Construction relies on successive overpaintings: certain zones appear “scraped” or reworked, revealing modulations and transparencies. Small dark punctuations and greenish or bluish edges punctuate the red field, like snags that prevent the surface from closing into monochrome.

Space remains deliberately unstable. The curved bands suggest a wave-like movement, while oblique planes and disjoint flats introduce a sense of depth without ever constituting perspective.

Comparative analysis / related works

Within the 1957 corpus, this canvas stands out for its near warm saturation, whereas other works in the MP2 cycle retain a cooler ground (blues, violets) more clearly separated from the forms. Here, the dominant colour acts as a climate, unifying the composition.

Compared with Barbarian (AB-MP2-1957-004), segmentation is less “jointed” and more fused: form dissolves further into colour, in favour of a modulated red continuum. This variant underlines the flexibility of Breuillaud’s method, capable of alternating between construction by facets and enveloping chromatic field.

The 1958 works devoted to Vines in Autumn prolong certain solutions: arcs and ribbons persist, but they are progressively ordered into more legible signs of motif, whereas Red Landscape remains on the threshold of a purely atmospheric abstraction.

Justification of dating and attribution

The dating to 1957 accords with the painting’s place within the MP2 cycle: intense chromaticism, segmented curved forms, and a method of overpainting that builds depth by strata rather than by drawing.

The signature is visible on the reproduction. Attribution rests on the coherence of the facture (modulated flats, reworkings, coloured contours) and on its immediate kinship with the other 1957 compositions preserved within the corpus.