Shooting Star 1938

Joan Miró made this painting, Shooting Star, with oil on canvas, and what strikes me is how it balances control and chance. Look at how Miró has built up the surface, with thin washes of colour layered on top of one another. You can almost feel the texture of the canvas coming through, giving the painting a sense of depth and luminosity. Then, against this ground, he's added these bold, graphic shapes in black and white, creating a real push-pull effect. The shapes almost seem to float on the surface. There's something so playful and improvisational about the way he's put this together. It reminds me of some of the early abstract expressionists, like Arshile Gorky, who were also interested in tapping into the unconscious and letting the painting guide them. With Miro, as with Gorky, the painting becomes a record of its own making, a testament to the ongoing conversation between the artist and the canvas.