AB-MP3-1959-007 — Untitled (1959)

Technical information

Title: Untitled
Date: 1959
Technique: Oil on canvas
Dimensions: 92 × 73 cm
Location: Private collection

Biographical / historical context

The work belongs to the MP3 phase (1957–1959), marked by the rise of a pre-organic form: the figure is no longer a descriptive body but a presence constituted of masses, thickening, traces and zones of erasure.

The painting retains the verticality of a “character,” yet iconographic identity dissolves in favour of a construction through matter, chromatic halos and contour tensions.

Formal / stylistic description

The composition is centred on a vertical form occupying the median axis, like an upright silhouette. This main form divides into three nuclei: an upper ovoid volume (head/mask), a narrower middle volume (torso), and a lower volume widening the base.

The whole is bordered by lateral halos or “patches,” like coloured membranes that surround and prolong the figure. The palette is dominated by warm ochres and yellows, overlaid with pinks, reds and violets. Cooler areas (blue-greens, muted blues) appear as edging and reprises, especially along the silhouette’s borders and within certain peripheral zones.

Space is deliberately flat: no constructed depth; everything is played out in superimposed layers and variable pigment intensity. Matter is very present: moderate impastos, granulations, rubbings and visible reworkings. Surface accidents (small dark lacunae, black points or abrasions) punctuate the field and reinforce the idea of a form in the process of appearance/disappearance.

The touch alternates spread brushings and more incisive interventions (edgings, striations), producing an irregular pictorial “skin.”

Comparative analysis / related works

The work shows clear affinities with the MP3 corpus: the emergence of a vertical “body-sign,” closer to an organism than to an anatomical figure; a warm chroma (ochres/pinks) modulated by cold infiltrations; the importance of peripheral zones as membranes or energy fields framing the central form; and the dissolution of contours into passages and halos.

It is distinguished by the strong legibility of the central axis (totemic/presence effect) and by the stability of the composition, which maintains an almost frontal verticality despite the fluidity of its limits.

Justification of dating and attribution

The dating to 1959 is coherent with: (1) the pre-organic morphology (figure-organism), (2) the primacy of matter and layering, (3) the warm palette modulated by violets and muted greens, and (4) the absence of spatial construction in favour of a flat field where the form “emerges.”

The work is signed and dated “59” on the front, confirming the dating and attribution.