Material Oil on canvas
Dimensions 96.5 × 129.5 cm
Price Price Upon Inquiry
Status Vetted

About the Work

Painted in 1949, shortly after Jean-Paul Riopelle’s arrival in Paris in 1948, ‘Composition’ is one of the few pieces that mark a transition between his loose brushwork abstractions of the 1940s, often aligned with Abstract Expressionism, and the mosaic style for which he would become globally recognised. By 1949, Riopelle was abandoning the brush in favour of the palette knife, using it to sculpt and construct dense surfaces of interlocking colour which are widely admired for their sculptural quality. ‘Composition’, at the cusp of this moment, is remarkable for how freely paint moves across the surface, more instinctive and unrestrained at this point in his practice. Through the dense impasto, saturated colours accumulate in distinct layers. With paint built up pigment by pigment rather than pre-mixed, the full intensity of individual hues is preserved.


‘Composition’ bridges two chapters of the artist’s creative life, offering a window into the evolution of one of the 20th century's most expressive painters. This painting is defined by the distinct physicality of Riopelle’s process. Interestingly - and rather unusually - the white pigment on its surface applied directly from the tube. With the canvas positioned vertically while Riopelle worked, it would appear that a large volume of paint was thrown and dragged repeatedly across the canvas. This direct interaction with his materials would remain at the core of Riopelle's practice for years to come.

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