This work was made at the Normandy seaside resort of Deauville while Léger was on holiday there in August 1950. It belongs to a small set of brightly coloured gouaches which he made during his stay. All of these works integrate aspects of seaside paraphernalia for formal purposes, adapting beach umbrellas, windbreakers, helium balloons, and the boarding which separated the beach from the sidewalk painted in red, green and yellow. In Construction, these elements have been used to manifest an abstract composition, in which a series of diagonal ‘steps’ are arranged in rhythmical contrast to four upright posts. His other work from 1950 shows that Léger’s attention was focused on wholesome, proletarian forms of entertainment and enrichment. An ardent communist, Léger’s beachside works from Deauville were a celebration of the era’s unprecedented growth of holidaying, even amongst working people. At the same time, he produced a large book called Cirque (‘Circus’) with the Paris-based Greek publisher Tériade, which used a pithy, accessible style to praise another common source of popular pleasure.