拍品 337
  • 337

JOAN MIRÓ | Tête

估價
180,000 - 250,000 GBP
招標截止

描述

  • 胡安·米羅
  • Tête
  • signed Miró (lower right); dated 23/III/71 26/III/71, titled and numbered VI on the verso
  • gouache and wax crayon on paper
  • 63 by 93cm., 24 7/8 by 36 5/8 in.
  • Executed on 23rd & 26th March 1971.

來源

Doña Pilar Miró Juncosa, Palma de Mallorca (the artist's wife; sale: Sotheby's, Madrid, 9th December, 1986, lot 23)
Helly Nahmad Gallery, London
Sale: Sotheby's, New York, 6th May 2009, lot 214
Purchased at the above sale by the present owner

出版

Jacques Dupin & Ariane Lelong-Mainaud, Joan Miró, Catalogue raisonné. Drawings 1960-1972, Paris, 2012, vol. III, no. 2297, illustrated in colour p. 296

Condition

Please note that there is a professional condition report for this work, please contact mariella.salazar@sothebys.com to request a copy.
"In response to your inquiry, we are pleased to provide you with a general report of the condition of the property described above. Since we are not professional conservators or restorers, we urge you to consult with a restorer or conservator of your choice who will be better able to provide a detailed, professional report. Prospective buyers should inspect each lot to satisfy themselves as to condition and must understand that any statement made by Sotheby's is merely a subjective, qualified opinion. Prospective buyers should also refer to any Important Notices regarding this sale, which are printed in the Sale Catalogue.
NOTWITHSTANDING THIS REPORT OR ANY DISCUSSIONS CONCERNING A LOT, ALL LOTS ARE OFFERED AND SOLD AS IS" IN ACCORDANCE WITH THE CONDITIONS OF BUSINESS PRINTED IN THE SALE CATALOGUE."

拍品資料及來源

Painted in 1971, Miró’s Tête is the playful and poised result of decades of experimentation with both motif and medium. The archetypal figures of a woman and bird first emerged in the artist’s representational work of 1917. It was not, however, until the completion of his 1941 Constellation series that the symbols were absorbed into his enduring visual lexicon. Here, a singular white line defines the two intrinsically intertwined figures, the woman on the right and the bird to her left. A pulsing, red circle strings the figures together once more to declare them the work’s mutual protagonist. The motif and composition are first accessed through the title, Tête, referencing the multitude of figurations that begin to emerge. Although the symbols that account for Miró’s iconography are undoubtedly abstract, for him they represented immediate manifestations of his perceived reality or subjects. With reference to the signs and symbols embedded in his work, Miró remarked: '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' (Joan Miró & Georges Raillard, Ceci est la couleur de mes rêves, Paris, 1977, p. 128).

Tête exemplifies Miró’s continued confidence in the potential of his line while simultaneously espousing his later experimentations with other expressive forms of mark-making. The work sits at the intersection of control and spontaneity, where experimental and emotive flecks of pure white paint and pastel embrace the linear figures. These drippings of white paint pierce through their hazy, brown background, evocative of the stars against the night sky – another of the artist’s favored motifs.

On finding a balance between the spontaneous and deliberate, Miró stated: 'I provoke accidents – a form, a splotch of color. Any accident is good enough. I let the matière decide. Then I prepare a ground by, for example, wiping my brushes on the canvas. Letting fall some drops of turpentine on it would do just as well. If I want to make a drawing I crumple the sheet of paper or I wet it; the flowing water traces a line and this line may suggest what is to come next' (Joan Miró & Jacques Lassaigne, Miró, New York, 1963, p. 46). Tête is an excellent example of this complex equilibrium, as Miró first crumpled the paper before embarking on the composition. The effect is furthered by the choice of support – a richly toned brown Japanese paper – as the textured and antiqued background offsets the crisp, bright abstract forms. The paper is yet another of Miró’s many experiments during the 1960s and 1970s, where he worked with a range of mediums, from canvas fragments to burned masonite. The final result is a dynamic and poetic composition, one which oscillates between abstraction and figuration, spontaneity and intent, and innovation and tradition