Exceeding the Limit is one of twenty studies on paper that the artist created in 1965 as preparatory work for three large-scale canvases titled Four Phases Around a Prohibition painted in 1966.

The image shows a multitude of human figures in motion, viewed from above, framed within an oval that acts as a peephole or telephoto lens. The elevated viewpoint and oval shape concentrate the gaze and position the viewer in the position of power that observes: the surveillance camera, the weapon, authority. The figures, executed with the stencil technique in shades of gray, white and black, are repeated silhouettes that individually are indistinguishable, but collectively form a fleeing mass. A horizontal white line divides the composition: the limit that gives the work its title, which the figures are exceeding.

Genovés was one of the most politically committed Spanish artists during Francoism. His work transformed the image of the multitude harassed by power into a visually recognizable language of denunciation internationally. In these anonymous figures that run, gather or are dispersed lies a critique of the repressive violence of totalitarian regimes that transcends the Spanish context and remains fully relevant today.