Читать книгу Neurological Disorders in Famous Artists - Part 4 - Группа авторов - Страница 12

Joan Miró I Ferrà was born in Barcelona on April 20th, 1893. He studied commerce according to his father’s wish, but enrolled in La Lonja School in order to study drawing. At the age of 17 years, he finished his studies of commerce and began to work for 2 years. After this period, he retired to Mont-Roig (Tarragona) due to a disease. Miró’s illness served a specific purpose: his ill health permitted him to persuade his father of his condition, since he was reluctant to accept that his son was too sick to work. When he returned to Barcelona, he made the decision to become an artist and studied at the Art Academy until 1915.

His first exhibition was in Barcelona in 1918 with a clear influence of French trends of postimpressionism, cubism and fauvism. His first trip to Paris was in 1920. There, he met other artists, such as André Masson or Pablo Picasso. During that time he painted The Farm (Paris 1921–1922), which represented the culminant work of the “detailism.” Joan Miró described this work as the summary of all his life in the countryside.

Along with others, Joan Miró founded (with the poet André Bretón at the head) the surrealist movement in 1924. One of his main works at this time was The Harlequin’s Carnival (Paris 1924–1925). This work was the beginning of the surrealism phase. One year later, in 1925, he painted Birth of the World, which may be seen as a precursor of abstract expressionism.

In 1928 he travelled to Belgium and the Netherlands, visiting the most important museums. When he returned to Paris he painted a series of paintings known as Dutch Interiors, inspired by originals by other authors, but modified with “mironian” shapes, placing importance on composition elements instead of physical proportions.

From 1928 and 1930, Joan Miró left the idea of surrealism behind and dedicated himself to the collage. He produced a number of collages that were striking for their inclusion of non-artistic materials and their overtly crude construction. This anti-art strategy echoed the widespread sense of social, economic and cultural crisis, and at the same time it sought to provoke a new model of artistic identity. From 1930 onwards, he also dedicated his time to sculptures and ceramics [Jeffett, 1996].

Tim Adams [2011] summarized the three periods of Miró’s constantly reimagined career: his formative years in Catalonia; his exile in Paris in the years of the Spanish Civil War and the outbreak of the Second World War; and his enthusiasm for the radicalism of the 1960s, when he was approaching the late period of his work.

He died from heart disease in Palma de Mallorca on December 25th, 1983. His work is admired all over the world.