Head of a Catalan Peasant 1924

Joan Miró’s, Head of a Catalan Peasant, is a painting made with oil on canvas, but it feels like something else altogether. The ochre color makes me think of egg tempera. There is something so earthy in the way Miró approaches the process of artmaking. The surface of the painting is so open, raw and honest, like we are looking into the artists mind, or at a diagram of the subconscious. Just look at the way that the forms are constructed, there’s something so delightfully playful in the way these shapes are arranged, each one floats in its own orbit. I just love the single blue star, placed just to the right of the central axis. Like the other forms, it’s rendered with such simple, uncomplicated strokes, but it feels so important to the overall harmony of the piece. It makes me think of Klee or Kandinsky, the way he uses simple forms to invoke a deeper emotional response. For me, this piece demonstrates the power of art to speak to the invisible forces that shape our lives.