The Tower of Batz

About this work

Jean Metzinger painted the tower at Batz-sur-Mer in Brittany in a Divisionist technique — but unlike Seurat, who scattered tiny points, Metzinger laid down large square strokes, all of roughly the same size, at shifting angles. The standard description of them is a mosaic-like lattice of squares or cubes. Five years later, Cubism came out of that stroke.

This is the third case in the exhibition where the source already thinks like mosaic, alongside Kusama and Chagall. Metzinger painted cubes; Rami Alon made them real cubes.