In the catalogue to Hill's 1983 retrospective at the Hayward Gallery Alastair Grieve writes: ‘The first mature works, Jeux, Composition, Intervals and Toccata, were made in 1951. They have flat, clear-cut compositions of dynamically placed geometric shapes. Positive and negative spaces are carefully balanced. Preliminary versions were made in collage which was then overpainted or used as a model for a painted version. Hill used an enamel paint (ripolin) which forms opaque and shiny surfaces like those of commercial signs. Probably under the influence of Moholy-Nagy's ‘Telephone' paintings, Hill hoped to have them reproduced mechanically. These paintings are unlike anything else being produced in England, even by other members of the Constructionist group.' Hill notes that Toccata, Jeux and Intervals ‘marked a departure from the cubist-type collage' which had been his preoccupation in 1950; ‘… one factor which was important for me even before I started making constructions was the idea of anonymity and serial production using industrial methods. The idea that a work could be conceived this way was close to me in the making of the six paintings listed above [including Toccata].'