Constellation: Toward the Rainbow

Joan Miro was born in Barcelona to a goldsmith and a watchmaker, perhaps his first artistic influences as much of his work, particularly the Constellation series, presents the viewer with a field of intricate, inter-connected shapes not unlike the workings of a timepiece. Miro's early work was greatly influenced by his art heroes, Vincent van Gogh and Paul Cezanne, exhibiting a more painterly treatment of recognizable subject matter. In the mid-1920s, however, Miro began developing a symbolic vocabulary; encoding his work with shapes, lines and symbols which would remain central to his work for the rest of his career. His "Constellation" series of paintings (23), represents a time in the artist's life (1940), during which he fled the advancing Nazis in France, returned to Spain and settled in the town of Palma de Mallorca. In looking back at this period of his life, Miro said, "A new stage in my work began which had its source in music and nature. It was about the time that the war broke out. I felt a deep desire to escape. I closed myself within myself purposely. The night, music, and the stars began to play a major role in suggesting my paintings."