AB-62A-1962-010 — Untitled (c. 1962

Technical information

Title: Untitled
Date: c. 1962–1963
Technique: Mixed media
Dimensions: 50 × 65 cm
Location: Private collection

Biographical / historical context

Within segment 62A, the year 1962 corresponds to a hinge zone: Plastic Mutation gradually moves away from the dark densities at the end of MP3 and opens toward a clearer register of membranes, reserves and interconnections.

This sheet stands at that inflection point. It preserves the idea of an organism in formation, but the matter lightens and, on the surface itself, reveals the first internal networks that will become one of the structuring motifs of the 1963 cycle.

Formal / stylistic description

On a barely greened beige ground, softly nuanced, very pale organic units stand out like diaphanous pockets embedded in a matrix. The forms are not isolated: they touch, overlap and respond through narrow passages, prompting a reading of circulation rather than juxtaposition.

An extremely fine white line—sometimes slightly raised—runs along certain contours and discreetly connects compartments. Two warmer, pink-to-orange zones act as centres of intensity: one at the top concentrates a reddish roundness; the other, at lower left, diffuses a deeper warmth within the membrane.

Worked through rubbings, scrapings and deposits, the surface remains fragile, almost milky, as if the organism were forming by appearance and effacement.

An oblique dynamic crosses the composition: broad white reserves stretch across it, and a very light vertical zone on the right acts like a wall or threshold. This more atmospheric than monumental organisation lends the work a rare luminosity within this segment, as if matter were lit from within.

Comparative analysis / related works

Through its clarity and the predominance of white reserves, the work stands out within the 62A cycle, more often dominated by compact masses and dark tensions.

It can be set against works such as Foetus or Fossil Dream, whose density and mineral gravity are clearly attenuated here.

It nevertheless extends the membrane logic present in earlier 62A works, while pushing further the transparency and the idea of network. In this sense it functions as a threshold: a direct precursor of the white structures and luminous circulations that become fully established in 1963 research.

Justification of dating and attribution

The dating c. 1962–1963 is supported by a set of plastic criteria: a very light palette with limited contrast; white networks present but not yet systematised; and mixed-media work combining deposits, rubbings and scraping reprises, characteristic of an experimental phase at the end of 1962.

The “63” inscription visible at the bottom of the support can be read as a studio marker or later annotation rather than a strictly autograph date, especially as the work does not display the heavier pigment density or more mineralised architecture found in many 1963 sheets.

Attribution to Breuillaud is consistent with his formal vocabulary of pockets, nuclei and flows, and with his specific way of inscribing internal drawing into the matter itself.