JOAN MIRO

I wanted to see Miro's paintings in real life, and this summer I finally went to Miro Museum in Barcelona. From the first room I entered a marvelous world of magical shapes and colors and I was so taken, that I don't know when four hours passed. I wanted to observe the technique in some of his paintings, how he got that flawlessness and lightness. I was surprised to see that the artist wasn't actually preoccupied with the way the completed paintings looked. In some of the works, the paint barely touched the canvas, and the lightness came actually from the fact that the paint was applied sparingly, and the canvas was showing through the layer of paint. Some paintings looked unfinished, and in others the paint was applied carelessly, like something much more important preoccupied the artist's mind. The same in Picasso's museum. Many works seemed finished in a hurry, like the artist wanted to put on the canvas, as fast as he could what he was thinking. It is interesting how at the beginning of their career, many artists display extraordinary skills and technique, but later on, the only thing that seem to matter is the concept. What always startles me at a great artist is the continuous search. They never cease to search all their life, for their truth, like it is the only thing that matters. 

Blue I

Miró's paintings have a childlike quality, the objects and human beings are symbolically depicted and reduced to simple shapes. His paintings have also a dreamlike quality, they seem to come directly from the unconscious. Later on he experimented with found objects and unusual materials.  ' My characters have undergone the same process of simplification as the colors. Now that they have 

been simplified, they appear more human and alive than if they had been represented in all their details'.

Blue II

"I feel the need of attaining the maximum of intensity with the minimum of means. It is this which has led me to give my painting a character of even greater bareness."

"Throughout the time in which I am working on a canvas I can feel how I am beginning to love it, with that love which is born of slow comprehension."

"Miró's art has a poetic imagery: stars, fantastical creatures, playful distorted forms drawn in sharp lines and bright blue, yellow, red or green. They aim the receptor's soul and not his mind."

Blue III

Catalan Peasant with a Guitar

Dancer

Miró showed talent from a young age, though he had to study business and even worked as a clerk for two years. He had to suffer a nervous breakdown to finally be able to get his parents approval to study art. You can read more on his life and see more images here: http://joanmiro.com/