From the edition of 75, plus proofs. Signed and numbered in pencil. Published by Karsten Schubert, London.

Executed in 2015, Bagatelle 3 revisits the monochrome vocabulary central to Bridget Riley’s early explorations of optical movement. Its restricted palette concentrates attention upon the interaction of shape, interval and contrast, demonstrating the continuing possibilities of black and white within her mature practice. The work extends a sustained investigation into how carefully organised forms can generate an unstable visual experience.

Triangular elements, some defined by straight edges and others modified by curves, establish a rhythm across the composition. Their repetition suggests order, yet variations in contour complicate the pattern as the eye moves through it. Black shapes and white intervals compete for attention, allowing areas initially perceived as background to become active forms. The resulting movement arises through looking rather than through any change in the printed surface.

Screenprinting gives these relationships particular clarity, preserving sharply articulated boundaries and consistent passages of tone. Within Riley’s practice, printmaking offers a means of extending compositional ideas explored in painting, testing how their effects operate at a different scale and through another medium. Here, the precision of the process supports an image whose apparent simplicity gives way to increasingly complex relationships.

The title’s suggestion of something light or modest provides a playful counterpoint to the concentration the image invites. Bagatelle 3 encourages repeated looking, as provisional arrangements dissolve and new groupings emerge. Its significance lies in this exchange between deliberate construction and perceptual uncertainty, revealing how a limited vocabulary of forms can sustain an intricate experience of rhythm, tension and balance.

A detailed condition report is available upon request.