For years we have been waiting for an exhibition like the one now taking place at the Fundació Joan Miró and the MuseuPicasso in Barcelona. Miró-Picasso deserves to be considered, internationally, as one of the great exhibitions of the year. It is an event that justifies contemporary art lovers, whether European or from other continents, traveling to Barcelona to see it. This exceptional event occurred previously on the occasion of Joan Miró's centenary, when the Barcelona Fundació presented the anthological exhibition Joan Miró 1893-1993, which could also be seen at the MoMA in New York, in a year 1993 in which other exhibitions were also held. outstanding samples, such as Joan Miró. Star Field (Mncars, Reina Sofía). In recent years, other exhibitions about these artists were also memorable, such as the one that the Museu Picasso dedicated last year to the dealer and publisher Daniel-Henry Kahnweiler and the one presented by the Fundació Joan Miró in 2011, with the title Miró. The stairs of evasion.
Once again, anniversaries and round numbers have been the factors that have helped to specify dates and make an exhibition that seemed necessary for a long time a reality: 2023 is the year of the Picasso Celebration 1973-2023, which commemorates the 50th anniversary of the death of this artist, and also this year marks 40 years since the disappearance of Joan Miró.
That it has taken so long to materialize this posthumous meeting has, however, allowed the exhibition presented by the two Barcelona museums to benefit from various research, and especially from those carried out by Josep Massot to write Joan Miró. The Boy Who Talked to the Trees (2018) and Joan Miró Under Francoism (2021), the first two biographical books about Miró that, in depth and breadth, live up to the importance of this artist. And, evidently, it has also drawn on the contributions of a previous book by Victoria Combalía, precisely titled Picasso-Miró. Crossed Looks (1998).
The only objection that could be made to this happy initiative agreed upon and addressed by the directors of the two museums (Emmanuel Guigon and Marko Daniel) is that a presentation of the exhibition in Paris has not been planned – or has not been carried out. Perhaps the aim is, in this way, for the French public to visit the Catalan capital. In any case, Paris and Barcelona were the two decisive cities for Picasso and Miró. In fact, it was in Paris where both artists met –in 1920–, and where both held meetings and conversations, while developing their styles and plastic languages. Therefore, it made sense for the French capital to also participate in this celebration, beyond the loans of some significant and splendid works, especially from the Musée National Picasso-Paris, where the painting Figures on the Seashore (1930) comes from. –one of Picasso's most intense works– or the also famous Portrait of Dora Maar from 1937, both now on display at the Fundació Joan Miró.
Also from Paris – from Galerie 1900-2000 – comes the wonderful Mironian constellation Femmes encerclées par le vol d'un oiseau (Women Surrounded by the Flight of a Bird, 1941), which is on display at the Museu Picasso next to L' étoile matinale (The Morning Star, 1940), is on loan from the Fundació Joan Miró. Another especially valuable loan is The Farmhouse (1921-1922), which has traveled from Washington (National Gallery of Art) and has been installed in the Museu Picasso. This generous double exhibition brings together a total of 338 works, of which 116 are paintings, 71 are original graphic works, 67 drawings and collages, 28 sculptures, 15 illustrated books, 15 ceramics (all in the Museu Picasso), and the rest It is divided among objects, sketches, annotations... A feast for the eyes and poetic brains.
At the Gran Teatre del Liceu in Barcelona, Miró was able to admire the show Parade, by Diaghilev's Ballets Russes, with costumes, curtains and sets by Picasso, which had premiered at the end of 1917. Later he was able to visit Miró's mother's apartment. Picasso in Barcelona and see works by that artist eleven and a half years older than him.
This age difference is significant, since at the beginning it is Picasso who goes ahead and influences the young Miró. However, only a little later, already in the same twenties, the influences are mutual, and I would say that from then on it is Miró who is often ahead of Picasso, especially since 1940. However, on March 1 1920, when Miró first set foot in Paris, he was still a budding artist and Picasso was an already famous master. Miró brings Picasso a package from the Malaga artist's mother: an ensaimada. And he visited him again on several occasions at the address on Rue La Boétie.
Shortly afterwards, when Picasso already knew and appreciated the work of the young Barcelona painter, he put him in contact with those who could best help disseminate his work and gave him valuable advice: “Believe me, if you want to be a painter, don't leave Paris.” . Miró did it only to flee the Nazi invasion and to go to Mallorca, and also to New York, where he triumphed, while he was despised by the Catalan and Spanish collectors of the time (he was one until very late, too late: the seventies). For his part, Picasso had good contacts in France that protected him from Nazi barbarism. And then he could no longer travel personally to the United States, because he had identified himself as a communist and that political option was cause for denial of the essential visa. But his works traveled.
The Miró-Picasso double exhibition covers more than half a century of artistic affinities, influences and mutual admirations and also shows the significant differences between these two artists. Their relationship was one of friendship and also of non-enmity rivalry: each new discovery of one served as a creative stimulus to the other, who tried to go further and surpass him. Their relationship could be compared to that between Lennon and McCartney from Rubber Soul to Abbey Road. But it was more distant and was also expressed in correspondence. By the way, Miró wrote to Picasso in French and Catalan, not in Spanish.
Picasso and Miró agreed in many aspects. Mainly, in his artistic ambition, his desire to freely explore the possibilities of painting, sculpture, engraving and ceramics to always go further in that adventure of avant-garde modern art. And also in his desire to become one of the great artists of his time. But, they also agreed on recurring themes such as the figure of women, the vitalistic expression of desire and sexual energy, the confirmation of violence, the denunciation of fascism and war.
Also in his republican ideology and his interest in popular culture, the performing arts and especially poetry. The surrealist poets were decisive especially in the case of Miró, who was also deeply influenced by Schelling and Novalis, the spirit and the romantic feeling of union with the universe – beyond the romantic ego that has been talked about so much – that had already inspired before Paul Klee. And that continues to inspire some current artists.
In the exhibition you can find quite a few juxtapositions of works that illustrate how one artist influences the other, even if only because of the subject matter or the composition. While Picasso still sketches the details of a piece of furniture or a print, in Miró everything is already body and space, elemental nature like earth and fire. But the exhibition includes less obvious revealing details. For example, in an illustration by Picasso for Balzac's text Le Chef d'oeuvre inconnu – published by Vollard in 1931 – we can see points and connecting lines that seem to prefigure some signs that nine and ten years later characterized Miró's Constellations. On the other hand, perhaps Picasso had in turn been inspired by other artists, perhaps anonymous and primitive.
In any case, Miró possibly saw in these signs one of the keys that later allowed him to fully develop his personal vision of the universe, between abstract and figurative, poetic and musical, at the same time earthly and celestial.
Miró-Picasso
Curators: Margarida Cortadella, Elena Llorens, Teresa Montaner, Sònia Villegas. Picasso Museum. Miró Foundation Barcelona www.museupicassobcn.ca. www.fmirobcn.org/ca. Until February 26, 2024
