Peinture-Poésie. Livres d’artiste by Joan Miró

The exhibition Peinture-Poésie brings together for the first time three important illustrated books by Joan Miró: Il était une petite pie (1928), Parler seul (1948-50), and Mà de Proverbis (1970). These books demonstrate the full range of Miró's development as a graphic artist, his close relationship with poets, and his lifelong interest in the word/image matrix in his painting and in his graphic work. Miró’s first book of 1928 illustrates children’s songs by Lise Hirtz, a poet and close associate of the French Surrealists. It is executed using the technique of pochoir (stencil printing) and includes 8 prints. The second book represents a collaboration between Miró and the Dada poet Tristan Tzara. It includes 72 lithographs in color and in black and white, a selection of which is presented in the exhibition, along with pages from the book’s maquette, which Miró executed in gouache. The third book represents a collaboration between Miró and the Japanese poet Shûzô Takiguchi, a key figure of the Japanese avant-gardes, who wrote the first monograph on the Catalan artist in 1940. It includes seven lithographs in black and white, and three lithographs printed in color for the cover and frontispiece of the book.

The three books by Miró are supplemented by paintings and works on paper from the Museu Serralves, the Fundació Joan Miró in Barcelona, and the Museo Nacional Centro de Arte Reina Sofía in Madrid. Each book is presented with documents that chart Miró’s progress, his dialogues with the poets involved, and materials that are related to the commission and gestation of the projects.

Livres d'artiste will be presented in dialogue with works from the Miró Collection of the Portuguese State, given to the Municipality of Porto and deposited at the Serralves Foundation.

The exhibition is organised by the Serralves Foundation - Museum of Contemporary Art and curated by Robert Lubar Messeri.