Although it was his connections that initiated the first CoBrA exhibition, Eugène Brands distanced himself from its collective politics and intense expressionism in favor of a more personal and introspective practice. During the 1950s, his work turned toward the light-filled memories of his youth, often depicting beach scenes from the Dutch coast, possibly Zandvoort, with striped awnings, figures, and fragments of summer life rendered in vivid, childlike brushstrokes. His figures float and have a lightness reminiscent of Marc Chagall and hold an optimism that he carried through his life's work.