AB-MP3-1965-004 — Mother-of-Pearl Night (1965)

Technical information

Title: Mother-of-Pearl Night
Date: 1965
Technique: Oil on paper
Dimensions: 65 × 50 cm
Location: Unknown

Biographical / historical context

Mother-of-Pearl Night belongs to the group of MP3 plates of 1965 in which Breuillaud seeks, with very spare means, to produce an inner light.

In these monochrome works, the dark matter is no longer merely a background: it becomes a nocturnal envelope from which white—through reserves and scraping—emerges like nacre.

Within the series, the work stands out for its hieratic character and for the assertion of a central figure, as if the organic experiment suddenly condensed into a presence.

Formal / stylistic description

Inscribed within a large oval, the composition functions as a dark shell whose interior seems illuminated.

At the centre, an anthropomorphic silhouette stands with arms outstretched, the body reduced to a few luminous masses that appear to radiate into the black.

Around it, secondary forms—heads, embryonic volumes, animal outgrowths—surface along the periphery, sometimes sharply defined, sometimes almost dissolved in the rubbed matter.

The contrast between the thick, velvety white zones and charcoal greys produces an effect of cold light, as if the sheet carried a glow beneath the skin of the black.

Fine incisions scattered across the oval draw a network of fissures and conduits that unifies space without sealing it, strengthening the impression of a silent, sacred inner chamber.

Comparative analysis / related works

By its oval structure and the primacy of light over dark, Mother-of-Pearl Night dialogues with The Reverse Side of the Mirror (AB-MP3-1965-001), while more clearly asserting a central presence.

Unlike Brownian Motion (AB-MP3-1965-002), dominated by agitation and drift, this plate imposes an almost ceremonial immobility.

It also differs from Inner Space (AB-MP3-1965-005), more populated and more narrative, by concentrating tension on a single axis.

This hieratic figure announces certain more monumental apparitions of 1966, when Breuillaud will reintroduce dominant forms within broader membranes.

Justification of dating and attribution

The 1965 dating is legible in the medium and format (oil on paper), as well as in the dark rubbing and luminous reserves that characterise the MP3 plates reproduced at the end of the 1964–1965 period.

The modelling remains soft and not fractured, situating the work within MP3 rather than the more aggressive tensions of MP4 (1966).

The signature visible on the reproduction reinforces the attribution.

Provenance / exhibitions / publications

Reproduced in Pillement, *Visages du Monde*, 1967, within the MP3 plates series. Current location undocumented.