Composition VI

Blocks of saturated color crowd together in an arrangement of rectangles and rounded forms, with red, yellow, blue, green, pink, orange, and white pressed edge to edge across the surface. Nothing resolves into a figure or a scene; the shapes simply overlap and interlock, pulling the eye from one block of hue to the next. The painting was made in 1916 by Patrick Henry Bruce, rendered in oil, and it is held today at the Museum of Fine Arts, Houston. Bruce, born in 1881 and died in 1936, was an American painter associated with cubism. One detail worth noticing is how the curved shapes break the grid of straight edges, softening the geometry just enough to keep the composition from feeling rigid, as warm oranges and pinks push against cooler blues and greens throughout the canvas.