Jean Messagier (1920-1999) was a French painter, sculptor, printmaker and poet who emerged as a pivotal figure in post-war European art. Associated with the Second School of Paris as well as lyrical abstraction, he deliberately broke away from his expressionistic form of Post-Cubism.

This vibrant 1961 painting captures Messagier during a pivotal moment when he was establishing his reputation as a key figure in lyrical abstraction. Messagier often makes his colours so bright that they almost seem transparent and uses wide brushstrokes to paint his impressions of France-Comté's landscapes. The swirling composition in luminous yellows, greens, and blues demonstrates the dynamic imprint of the brushstrokes, turbulent and interlacing, moving across the canvas in vast convolutions that would become his signature style. Rejecting rigid delimitations between abstraction and figuration, this work embodies the experimental spirit of an artist who famously declared that he does not find, but searches.