Woman and Birds 1968

Joan Miró made this painting, Woman and Birds, with paint and a brush. The whole composition is underpinned by a process of artmaking, mark upon mark. Look at the woman’s yellow face, this bright patch is offset against a symphony of strong blacks, reds and blues. The paint here is thinly applied, almost translucent in places, heightening the contrast with the boldness of the black outlines. Notice the way the black lines have been applied with a loaded brush, these lines feel immediate and free. There’s something so playful about the way Miró orchestrates these colours and lines into recognizable figures, his vocabulary of forms feels like a kind of visual poetry. You can see this same language across the whole of Miró's oeuvre. Like the art of Paul Klee, who used art as a playground for the mind. Both artists find a common ground in their exploration of abstraction and their shared sense of humor. Ultimately, art is a dialogue, an ongoing exchange of ideas that continues to evolve over time.