The Fundació Joan Miró
Bertie Broomfield
On a wall in The Fundació Joan Miró in Barcelona, you will find the following words:
“Si arriba a faltar material de treball, anar a la platja i fer grafismes amb una canya sobre la sorra, dibuixar amb el raig d’un pixat sobre la terra seca, dibuixar en el buit espai el gràfic del cant dels ocells, el soroll de l’aigua i del vent i d’una roda de carro i el cant dels insectes, que tot això s’ho emporti després el vent, l’aigua.”
“If the material to work is lacking, go to the beach and draw symbols in the sand with a stick, draw with a stream of piss on the dry earth, draw in the empty space the graphics of birdsong, the sound of the water and the wind, and the wheel of a wagon, and the song of the insects, and afterwards let it all be carried away by the wind, and the water.”
Joan Miró, 1941.
Luna, sol y una estrella (1968), model for a sculpture offered to the city of Barcelona. Photo credits to Bertie Broomfield.
On a blistering July day, escaping the unmasked, socially undistanced crowds of central Barcelona, I jumped on the metro to Plaça d’Espanya, from where I wandered up to the beautiful – and unbelievably empty – botanical gardens of Montjuïc. This secluded, sun-kissed haven on the hill grants its visitors a peace and quiet which proves hard to come by in the bustling, sizzling, post-Covid world of Barcelona. In this tranquil mood, I decided to visit The Fundació Joan Miró. Nestled in a quiet corner of an area which once hummed with the excitement of The 1992 Olympic Games, the foundation is housed in a building which is as stunning as its contents.
The interior of The Fundació Joan Miró. Photo credits to Bertie Broomfield.
The above quotation hints at the rich and varied tapestry of styles and influences in Joan Miró’s body of work: the occasional reference to the vulgar or the visceral; a destructive and challenging attitude to the canvas; the deep rooted presence of nature and the countryside in his psyche; the way in which the artificial and the mechanical are incorporated into – and, crucially, moulded by – their natural surroundings; a violation of the traditional dividing lines of interaction between various stimuli and their corresponding senses; and an awareness of the temporariness of all things.
The museum makes clear the essential influence of Mont-roig in Miró’s philosophy and work. This small town in Catalunya, where his family would holiday every summer, sowed the seeds of his connection to the earth and the countryside. Mont-roig, viñedos y olivares (1919) is typical of Miró’s early years, in which his focus was primarily on the rich, agricultural Catalan landscape. Nonetheless, the beginnings of his experimental style with shape and colour – which would eventually develop into his surrealism – are present here, vividly portraying the bountiful fecundity of the land.
Hombre y mujer frente a un montón de excrementos (1935). Photo credits to Bertie Broomfield.
Fast-forward to the mid-1930s, and Miró’s surrealism is reaching its apogee with such works as Caracol, mujer, flor, estrella (1934), in which any connection to gravity, natural forms and physical realism has been relinquished. In the 1920s and ‘30s, Miró had been moving in the surrealist circles of Paris, where his hunger-induced hallucinations proved to be a source of inspiration for his work. Spanish society’s decline into instability during the Second Republic inspired a period of “pinturas salvajes”, of which one piece particularly struck me at the museum: Hombre y mujer frente a un montón de excrementos (1935, pictured). Two grotesque, vulgar and obscene figures seem to be remonstrating with each other in an apocalyptic underworld of infernal colour – not dissimilar to the tragic scenes about to break out all over Spain between 1936-9.
Miró had plenty more to give after the establishment of the dictadura, producing work throughout Franco’s rule and living to see the transición to democracy, along with the opening of his Fundació in 1975. I will leave the reader with this brief apéritif to his work so that they may discover the rest for themselves. Personally, something unexpected which I took away from my experience at The Fundació was an appreciation of the benefit of a museum dedicated to one artist. I had seen Miró’s work incorporated into displays in London and Madrid in the past, but it was only upon seeing this formidable collection, with the contextual chronology provided by the museum, that I came to understand the brilliance of Miró, a true visionary and a leading vanguardista. I have since transferred this lesson across to my enjoyment of other art, and now often eschew my Spotify playlists for the pleasure of listening to an album in its entirety, a pursuit which transforms the experience of any one track. I am ashamed to say it took me so long to work it out, but I am grateful to The Fundació Joan Miró for teaching me this lesson.
Indeed, I feel that the words quoted at the beginning of this piece are as much an incidentally timely lesson for our generation – or, at least, for me – as they are a description of Miró’s philosophy. Think about them again:
“If the material to work is lacking, go to the beach and draw symbols in the sand with a stick, draw with a stream of piss on the dry earth, draw in the empty space the graphics of birdsong, the sound of the water and the wind, and the wheel of a wagon, and the song of the insects, and afterwards let it all be carried away by the wind, and the water.”
When I read this, it was as if the artist were reaching his hand forward through the decades and taking me by the scruff of the neck to give me his wisdom: we humans can create something out of nothing, so don’t sulk around looking for excuses not to be creative; and stop trying to capture, frame, and edit every moment for posterity. Instead, breathe in the sound of the wind, and feast your eyes on the colours of birdsong. Do what you do because it pleases you, not because you think it might please others. After all, one day, the water and the wind will take it all.