AB-MP3-1965-002 — Brownian Motion (1965)

Technical information

Title : Brownian Motion
Date : 1965
Technique : Oil on paper
Dimensions : 50 × 65 cm
Location : Unknown

Biographical / historical context

In 1965, at the core of the “Mutation Plastique” plates (MP3), Breuillaud favours paper to test a drier, more immediate writing, capable of registering the instability of forms. The title, borrowed from the idea of incessant microscopic agitation, serves here as a metaphor: not a scientific programme, but a way of naming the inner mobility that runs through his organisms.

After the great membranous gestations of 1963–1964, matter is no longer only an envelope; it disintegrates, collides, and recomposes in spurts, as if drawing sought to capture the very energy of transformation.

Formal / stylistic description

On a uniformly rubbed grey-black ground, a swarm of organic elements occupies the entire field without a resting point. Rounded masses, appendages, and serpentine segments interlock into an unstable continuum, while the paper’s reserve—left vivid and glossy—sculpts volumes as if swollen with air or liquid.

The line, sometimes incised and sometimes softened, connects these fragments through a nervous mesh that suggests both conduits and bundles of tension.

To the right, a more compact form—almost an open muzzle—introduces a note of threat; elsewhere, bright cavities and small spheres punctuate the movement, like nuclei or internal chambers.

The whole gives the impression of a weightless milieu where each figure shifts, contorts, and drifts, carried by continuous agitation.

Comparative analysis / related works

This sheet belongs to the core of MP3 works of 1965 reproduced by Pillement, and it dialogues closely with The Reverse Side of the Mirror (AB-MP3-1965-001) through its saturated world of forms, while pushing further the idea of dispersion.

Compared with Arcana (AB-MP3-1965-003), more dramatized and more anthropomorphic, Brownian Motion favours the drift of fragments and the absence of a stable centre.

The large luminous reserves and the circulation of lines announce, in germ, the heightened nervousness of 1966 works, when networks become more “electrical” and silhouettes more aggressive.

Justification of dating and attribution

The 1965 dating accords with the medium (oil on paper) and with the granular aspect of the dark rubbing, characteristic of MP3 sheets from this year.

The presence of a fine linear network, incised into the matter, and a deeper black than in 1964 works confirms a tenser, more mobile phase.

The title and the formal typology—agitation, fragmentation of units, drifting volumes—fully belong to the series’ logic, and the signature visible on the reproduction supports the attribution to Breuillaud.

Provenance / exhibitions / publications

Reproduced in Pillement, Visages du Monde, 1967, in the “Mutation Plastique” section. Current location undocumented; probably in a private collection.