- 45
JOAN MIRÓ | Femme et oiseau V/X
Estimate
1,200,000 - 1,800,000 GBP
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Description
- Joan Miró
- Femme et oiseau V/X
- signed with the initial M (lower left); signed Miró, titled and dated 14/5/60 on the reverse
- oil on burlap
- 54 by 42cm.
- 21 1/4 by 16 1/2 in.
- Painted on 14th May 1960.
Provenance
Pierre Matisse Gallery, New York Galerie Urban, Paris
Galleria Levi, Milan
Helly Nahmad Gallery, New York
Private Collection
Acquired from the above by the present owner in 2015
Galleria Levi, Milan
Helly Nahmad Gallery, New York
Private Collection
Acquired from the above by the present owner in 2015
Exhibited
Tokyo, Gallery Tamenaga; Osaka, Umeda Museum of Modern Art & Nagoya, Maruei, Art Gallery, Miró. Peintures récentes, 1960-1978, 1979, no. 5, illustrated in colour in the catalogue (with incorrect date) Basel, Galerie Beyeler, Arp & Miró, 1999, no. 24, illustrated in the catalogue (as no. 25)
London, Helly Nahmad Gallery, Joan Miró - A Retrospective, 1999-2000, no. 38, illustrated in colour in the catalogue
London, Helly Nahmad Gallery, Joan Miró - A Retrospective, 1999-2000, no. 38, illustrated in colour in the catalogue
Literature
Jacques Dupin, Joan Miró: Life and Work, London, 1962, no. 936, illustrated p. 571 (with incorrect date and measurements) Yvon Taillandier, Creación Miró 1961, Barcelona, 1962, illustrated in colour p. 13
Claude Simon & Joan Miró, Femmes, Paris, 1965, illustrated in colour pl. 18
Margit Rowell, Joan Miró. Peinture=poésie, Paris, 1976, illustrated p. 93 (with incorrect measurements)
Jacques Dupin & Ariane Lelong-Mainaud, Joan Miró, Catalogue raisonné. Paintings, Paris, 2002, vol. IV, no. 1091, illustrated in colour p. 70
Claude Simon & Joan Miró, Femmes, Paris, 1965, illustrated in colour pl. 18
Margit Rowell, Joan Miró. Peinture=poésie, Paris, 1976, illustrated p. 93 (with incorrect measurements)
Jacques Dupin & Ariane Lelong-Mainaud, Joan Miró, Catalogue raisonné. Paintings, Paris, 2002, vol. IV, no. 1091, illustrated in colour p. 70
Catalogue Note
‘This theme provides us with one of the keys to Miró’s cosmic imagination: it expounds the conflict between the earthly and aerial elements and, in the dialogue between the woman and the bird, renders the precariousness of the balance achieved between them.’ Jacques Dupin
Femme et oiseau V/X belongs to a group of ten compositions on burlap, on the subject of woman and bird, that Miró painted between late April and early June 1960. These works are characterised by patches of bold primary colours, combined with a fine, calligraphically executed black line, which stands in sharp contrast to the rich, rough texture of the material onto which they are applied, and which forms an integral part of the composition. Displaying Miró’s love of signs and symbols, these works strike a perfect balance between abstraction and image-signs, presenting a mix of poetic lyricism, radical abstraction and semiotic complexity that was groundbreaking among the avant-garde during this period.
By the time he painted Femme et oiseau V/X, Miró had developed a distinctive iconography, and the present work exemplifies the expressive, lyrical power of his imagery. For Miró, women, birds, stars, the moon, the sun, night and dusk formed a poetic language. He first introduced the motif of a woman with a bird, in a realistic manner, in his paintings of 1917, but it was only after his celebrated Constellations series of 1941, in which women, birds and stars feature prominently, that this theme became the primary subject of his art. Commenting on this subject matter, the artist himself pronounced: ‘It might be a dog, a woman, or whatever. I don’t really care. Of course, while I am painting, I see a woman or a bird in my mind, indeed, very tangibly a woman or a bird. Afterward, it’s up to you’ (J. Miró & Georges Raillard, Ceci est la couleur de mes rêves, Paris, 1977, p. 128).
Jacques Dupin wrote about the group of ten paintings to which the present oil belongs: ‘The burlap in itself suggests a nocturnal atmosphere, which gives an overtone of gravity of these paintings. The various versions of Woman and Woman and Bird are characterized by a purity, serenity, and joyfulness that distinguish them from other recent productions. […] Color is used only to modulate the grounds or to animate the burlap with pure tones. […] This theme provides us with one of the keys to Miró’s cosmic imagination: it expounds the conflict between the earthly and aerial elements and, in the dialogue between the woman and the bird, renders the precariousness of the balance achieved between them. There is nothing in the least spiritual about this flight, this blueprint of the agility of desire, the scents and the heat of this summer night suggested by the flashes of color on the dark, rough-woven material. Nothing is heavy or stabilized in this poetic stylization of woman in process of metamorphosis between fixity and volatility. The analogy between the two creatures, and the interlacing of their lines are sometimes so strong that it is hard to say where the woman ends and the bird begins, whether they do not after all form one marvellous hybrid creature’ (J. Dupin, op. cit., 1962, p. 485).
Femme et oiseau V/X belongs to a group of ten compositions on burlap, on the subject of woman and bird, that Miró painted between late April and early June 1960. These works are characterised by patches of bold primary colours, combined with a fine, calligraphically executed black line, which stands in sharp contrast to the rich, rough texture of the material onto which they are applied, and which forms an integral part of the composition. Displaying Miró’s love of signs and symbols, these works strike a perfect balance between abstraction and image-signs, presenting a mix of poetic lyricism, radical abstraction and semiotic complexity that was groundbreaking among the avant-garde during this period.
By the time he painted Femme et oiseau V/X, Miró had developed a distinctive iconography, and the present work exemplifies the expressive, lyrical power of his imagery. For Miró, women, birds, stars, the moon, the sun, night and dusk formed a poetic language. He first introduced the motif of a woman with a bird, in a realistic manner, in his paintings of 1917, but it was only after his celebrated Constellations series of 1941, in which women, birds and stars feature prominently, that this theme became the primary subject of his art. Commenting on this subject matter, the artist himself pronounced: ‘It might be a dog, a woman, or whatever. I don’t really care. Of course, while I am painting, I see a woman or a bird in my mind, indeed, very tangibly a woman or a bird. Afterward, it’s up to you’ (J. Miró & Georges Raillard, Ceci est la couleur de mes rêves, Paris, 1977, p. 128).
Jacques Dupin wrote about the group of ten paintings to which the present oil belongs: ‘The burlap in itself suggests a nocturnal atmosphere, which gives an overtone of gravity of these paintings. The various versions of Woman and Woman and Bird are characterized by a purity, serenity, and joyfulness that distinguish them from other recent productions. […] Color is used only to modulate the grounds or to animate the burlap with pure tones. […] This theme provides us with one of the keys to Miró’s cosmic imagination: it expounds the conflict between the earthly and aerial elements and, in the dialogue between the woman and the bird, renders the precariousness of the balance achieved between them. There is nothing in the least spiritual about this flight, this blueprint of the agility of desire, the scents and the heat of this summer night suggested by the flashes of color on the dark, rough-woven material. Nothing is heavy or stabilized in this poetic stylization of woman in process of metamorphosis between fixity and volatility. The analogy between the two creatures, and the interlacing of their lines are sometimes so strong that it is hard to say where the woman ends and the bird begins, whether they do not after all form one marvellous hybrid creature’ (J. Dupin, op. cit., 1962, p. 485).