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Joan Miró: A New Genesis
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# : |
10995 |
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Section : |
THE ARTS
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| Issue
Date : |
11 / 1993 |
3,552 Words |
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Susan Fegley Osmond
Susan Fegley Osmond is an editor in the Arts section of The
World & I. |
One hundred years ago, Joan Miró, one of the most innovative and influential artists of the twentieth century was born to an artisan family in Barcelona. Outwardly quiet and sensitive, he single-mindedly followed the dictates of his complex and even contradictory nature, overcoming the limited expectations of others. As a boy, he prevailed over his parents attempt to force him into a career as an accountant. As a young man, he worked with opinionated Surrealists while transcending their limited doctrine and techniques. In his maturity he forged a unique approach-- utilizing a protolanguage of "signs" in compelling compositions with masterful color--that returned art to its primal roots.
Through January 11, 1994, the Museum of Modern Art is honoring Miró's centennial with a retrospective of over 350 works. The exhibition surveys the whole of his output from 1915 through 1980. Only six years ago the Guggenheim Museum mounted a large Miró retrospective, challenging this new show to find a different angle on the famous artist. MOMA's Joan Miró: A Retrospective, which runs through January 11, 1994, has met the challenge in two ways. First, it explores Miró's tendency to work in series, bringing together works that show his concentrated but varied investigations of certain themes, styles, or techniques. Second, MOMA focuses on showing the artist in process, displaying many preparatory drawings Miró made in giving birth to his seemingly spontaneous works. In particular, the "dream" paintings of the 1920s, generally regarded as exemplars of the Surrealist technique of free association, or "automatism," are shown for the first time in America alongside their preparatory studies.
Secret Rebellion
Joan Miró was born on April 20, 1893. His father was a goldsmith and watchmaker, and his mother was the daughter of a cabinetmaker; this descent from a long line of artisans made itself felt in Miró's careful craftsmanship and in some of his most fastidiously detailed works, such as the Constellations series of World War II. By the time he was seven, he was taking drawing lessons in Barcelona and soon expressed his desire to become an artist. To this his father turned a deaf ear, so the youth dutifully went to business school and got a job as a bookkeeper in a drugstore. But a secret rebellion brewed within him, and in 1910 he had a nervous breakdown, complicated by typhoid fever. His parents purchased a farm at Montroig for his convalescence. This farm, and the surrounding Catalan countryside, was to have a profound effect on Miró and his art.
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