India Ink By André Masson

André Masson (1896–1987) India ink on paper Signed lower right This India ink drawing fully testifies to the teeming universe of André Masson, a major figure in Surrealism and later in lyrical abstraction. The line, remarkably free, seems to unfold like automatic writing: sinuous lines, organic forms, and hybrid silhouettes emerge in a single breath. The composition is constructed from an entanglement of nervous lines, sometimes fluid, sometimes hatched, which evoke vegetation, telluric forces, and fragments of bodies. In the center, one can distinguish animal or mythical forms—horses, moving figures—emerging from a dense graphic substance. These appearances, typical of Masson's vocabulary, oscillate between abstraction and figuration, in a poetic ambiguity. Here, Masson explores what constitutes the strength of his drawing: • the spontaneous gesture, stemming from surrealist automatism; • the perpetual transformation of forms, as if the motif generated itself; • the energy of the line, lively, rapid, sometimes almost calligraphic; • the organic relationship between void and fullness, between breath and density. This work testifies to the vitality of Masson's gesture, and to his ability to create images that are both enigmatic and profoundly alive.