Bb Major - Variations 20 — Acrylic on Paper by Arnaud Quercy

About This Artwork

This painting maps a piano étude onto color. Arnaud Quercy takes the Bb Major triad — the notes Bb1, Bb2, F3, D4, F4, D5, and D6 — and assigns each a position in a chromatic range. Violet moves toward gray, orange shifts toward red-orange, and red-violet moves toward red. The work belongs to the Bb Major series within the Harmonic Crossing collection, which uses the cycle of fifths as a structural framework for color research.

Warm, light tones drawn from a yellow-orange range fill most of the painted surface. Against this ground, reds and deep red-violets appear across substantial areas, moving from burnt sienna through very dark red and dusty mauve. A red-orange tone holds a secondary presence, while a cooler gray sits in a smaller zone. Pure orange appears in two distinct concentrations — one softer and diffuse, one more saturated and direct — visible in the two curved forms that anchor the center of the composition. These forms read as interlocking half-circles, one facing up and one facing down, set against vertical bands of violet, lavender, and deep rose. A near-black horizontal strip closes the lower edge. The paint is applied in flat, opaque layers of acrylic, with visible brushwork on the orange areas and clean edges elsewhere.

The work measures 21 × 30 cm on paper and weighs 0.1 kg. It is the twentieth variation in the Bb Major series. It was created on October 2, 2026, at the Rue du Dragon studio in Paris and shown the same weekend at Les Portes du Dragon, the open studio event at Art Quam Anima, Paris, running from October 2 to 4, 2026. The certificate number is 20261002-0195. The work is currently available.