Joan Miró: I Work Like a Gardener Compiled by Yvon Taillandier Preface by Robert Lubar — princeton architectural press · new york Published by Princeton Architectural Press A McEvoy Group company 202 Warren Street, Hudson, NY 12534 Visit our website at papress.com © Successió Miró / Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York / ADAGP, Paris 2017 First Princeton Architectural Press edition published in 2017 All rights reserved No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner without written permission from the publisher, except in the context of reviews. Every reasonable attempt has been made to identify owners of copyright. Errors or omissions will be corrected in subsequent editions. Editor: Simone Kaplan-Senchak Designer: Paul Wagner Special thanks to: Janet Behning, Nolan Boomer, Nicola Brower, Abby Bussel, Tom Cho, Barbara Darko, Benjamin English, Jenny Florence, Susan Hershberg, Lia Hunt, Mia Johnson, Valerie Kamen, Jennifer Lippert, Kristy Maier, Sara McKay, Eliana Miller, Wes Seeley, Rob Shaeffer, Sara Stemen, and Joseph Weston of Princeton Architectural Press —Kevin C. Lippert, publisher Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Names: Miró, Joan, 1893–1983, author. | Taillandier, Yvon, editor, writer of foreword. | Lubar, Robert S., writer of foreword. | Container of: Miró, Joan, 1893–1983. Je travaille comme un jardinier. | Container of: Miró,Joan, 1893–1983. Je travaille comme un jardinier. English. Title: Joan Miró : I work like a gardener / Joan Miró ; compiled by Yvon Taillandier. Description: First edition. | New York : Princeton Architectural Press, 2017. Identifiers: LCCN 2017007647 | ISBN 9781616896287 (hardback) | ISBN 9781616896751 (epub, mobi) Subjects: LCSH: Miró, Joan, 1893–1983. | BISAC: ART / Individual Artists / General. | ART / Individual Artists / Essays. | ART / European. Classification: LCC ND813.M5 A35 2017 | DDC 759.6—dc23 LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2017007647 7 Preface 13 Foreword 19 I Work Like a Gardener 63 Appendix 80 List of Works Preface On November 25, 1958, when painter and writer Yvon Taillandier sat down with Joan Miró for an interview in Paris, the Catalan artist had good reason to take stock of his career. At age sixty-five Miró was at the top of his game. In 1956 he moved into a new studio designed for him by Josep Lluís Sert in a suburb of Palma de Mallorca. There he had the opportunity to contemplate old work that had been placed in storage, and to examine works in progress that were distributed throughout the large space. In the period between the move and the interview, Miró had been busy working on two large murals for unesco’s world headquarters in Paris, for which he would receive the Guggenheim International Award in 1958. He was also preparing a large retrospective exhibition of his work for the Museum 7 of Modern Art in New York (March 18– May 10, 1959), while collaborating with poet Jacques Dupin on what would become the definitive monograph on his art and life. With additional exhibitions dedicated to his so-called “savage paintings” of 1934– 1953 and the publication of a facsimile edition of the Constellations of 1940–41, Miró confidently informed his New York dealer, Pierre Matisse, on November 11, 1958 that the various events constituted a “magnificent strategy” in solidifying his international reputation. Miró had ascended to the status of a modern Old Master. The artistic seeds that Miró had culti- vated over the course of five decades would bear rich fruit in future projects. Between 1955 and 1959 Miró had largely abandoned painting and drawing, directing his 8 efforts toward the unesco murals and printmaking. His masterpiece in the graphic arts, a collaborative undertaking with friend and poet Paul Eluard on the magnificent book A toute épreuve, appeared in 1958. The experience of work- ing with artisans on both projects and exploring new techniques in ceramics and woodblock printing honed Miró’s skills as a craftsman and his technical mastery as a fine artist. He would apply these lessons to his work in all mediums. The central simile of Taillandier’s text defines Miró’s working methods at this time: the physical labor involved in the creative process, the need to allow thoughts to germinate and take root, the studio as a laboratory for the cross-fertilization of ideas, and a deep engagement with the material elements 9 of his art. With these working principles firmly established, Miró would push his art in new directions over the course of the next two and a half decades. Rather than painting “things”—a woman, a bird, a landscape—Miró found his subjects in the creative process itself, raising the idea of chance and spontaneity to the status of foundational principles. For Miró, art making was a kind of reckoning, a journey across uncharted terrains guided only by instinct and intuition. A line might take shape in the void, an anonymous gesture might define a new visual universe, or an object found on a beach might provoke a poetic spark. Taking his cues from the physical world, each time Miró entered his studio, he embarked on a voyage of discovery that was at once artistic and 10