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Lot Essay
Executed in 1964, J'accours is filled with action and movement. The rushing implied by the title appears to apply equally to the jittery figure represented and to the artist himself, whose art is filled with bustle and energy. J'accours is part of Dubuffet's Hourloupe series in which he developed a new style and form of representation that revolutionised his artistic output and would remain his instantly recognisable trademark style until the end of his career. This revolution had begin in a very simple way: Dubuffet had been on the phone in 1962 and, while chatting, had made various scribbles and doodles on scraps of paper. He was intrigued by the potential of these simple morsels of paper and the simple lines upon them and created first a form of collage, eventually enshrining the style in large oils such as this. There is an implication of the automatic in the manner in which the lines are presented, and even in J'accours, the jigsaw effect of the various fields give a sense of collage and assembly rather than the simple act of painting. At the same time, the vague sense of logic and coherence appears ungraspable, giving the viewer an intense sense of the maniac and paranoiac styles that were so important to Dubuffet's art, making his painting appear as a raw and pure draught of unadulterated life and perception.
The blue and red lines that form so much of the structure of the figure in J'accours are themselves a reminder of the simple origins of this artistic style: he had begun with biros, and these colours recall that. This adds an air of humility to the work, making it seem both accessible and simple, the strange cobbled-together figure packed with fun, movement and even perhaps some of the distraction that had initially spawned this style. In using scraps and scribbles in his art, Dubuffet remained true to the Art Brut for which he had become so renowned. Indeed, through the Hourloupes, Dubuffet breathed new life into what was becoming, after twenty years of production, too recognisable a technique. Here, the mingled and muddied kaleidoscopic colours of his earlier, textural paintings are replaced by contrasts. The dark background throws the largely white figure into relief. Where many of his earlier works appeared to have adopted almost earthy colours, here the red and blue sing out from the canvas, made bold by the lack of gradation, by the simple contrasts. These lines make J'accours an incredibly strong piece, filled with life, perfectly translating Dubuffet's own infectious enthusiasm.
The blue and red lines that form so much of the structure of the figure in J'accours are themselves a reminder of the simple origins of this artistic style: he had begun with biros, and these colours recall that. This adds an air of humility to the work, making it seem both accessible and simple, the strange cobbled-together figure packed with fun, movement and even perhaps some of the distraction that had initially spawned this style. In using scraps and scribbles in his art, Dubuffet remained true to the Art Brut for which he had become so renowned. Indeed, through the Hourloupes, Dubuffet breathed new life into what was becoming, after twenty years of production, too recognisable a technique. Here, the mingled and muddied kaleidoscopic colours of his earlier, textural paintings are replaced by contrasts. The dark background throws the largely white figure into relief. Where many of his earlier works appeared to have adopted almost earthy colours, here the red and blue sing out from the canvas, made bold by the lack of gradation, by the simple contrasts. These lines make J'accours an incredibly strong piece, filled with life, perfectly translating Dubuffet's own infectious enthusiasm.