A sculpture by the renowned Spanish artist Joan Miró will go on show at the Irish Museum on Modern Art on Tuesday 30 May 2006. The work, entitled Personnage, dates from 1974 and has been given to the Museum on a two-year loan by Successió Miró, the Miró Estate, based in Mallorca, where the artist lived and worked for many years.
Personnage is a two-metre-high bronze sculpture in characteristically playful Miró style. The work is particularly noteworthy in marking a return by the artist to modelling in wax or plaster following a long period of producing mainly assemblage sculptures in the 1960s and early ‘70s. These later bronzes were frequently on a monumental scale and many of them can be seen in prominent public spaces in New York, Chicago, Madrid, Paris and other urban settings. Personnage is on more human scale, fitting perfectly into its unique surroundings at IMMA. The sculpture will be sited, initially, in the courtyard at IMMA, but may be moved to another location at a later date.
Commenting on the loan IMMA’s Director Enrique Juncosa said: “We are delighted to add this important work by Miró to the IMMA sculpture collection. We are hoping, in the coming years, to make greater use of our magnificent grounds, involving the display of a number of different sculptures by some major artists.”
Born in Barcelona in 1893, Joan Miró is widely recognised for his immense contribution to Surrealist and Modern art. His enormously varied body of work, drawn from the realm of memory and imaginative fantasy and created over 75 years, is among the most original of the 20th century. His early work shows a wide range of influences from Catalan folk art to Cubism and the work of the Fauves. He spent some time in Paris in 1920s, where under the influence of Surrealist poets and writers he evolved his mature style, with its dreamlike visions of distorted animal forms and odd geometric constructions, often with a whimsical or humorous quality.
Miró paintings are instantly recognisable from their distinctive use of bright colours – especially blue, red, yellow, green and black – and their unaffected mixture of childlike innocence and artistic sophistication. Sculpture became a major focus of his work in the 1960s and ‘70s, both painted sculptures and bronzes, such as the work being loaned to IMMA. He also worked in a wide array of other media, including etchings, watercolours and collage. His ceramic sculptures are especially notable, particularly his two ceramic murals for the UNESCO building in Paris. He died in Mallorca in 1983.
For images or further information please contact Monica Cullinane or Patrice Molloy at Tel: +353 1 612 9900; Email: [email protected].
25 May 2006