Description
Artist: Joan Miro
Medium: Lithograph Limited Edition
Title: The Perseides III
Size: 25 7/8' x 20'
Year: 1970
Edition: From the Roman numeral edition of 15 examples
Literature: Mourlot, 658
A famous Surrealist, Joan Miro was a prolific printmaker, while lithography was one of his favorite techniques. Dated to his mature style, “The Perseides III” is a symbolic work that exhibits a perfected visual language of the artist, typical of this period. The inspiration for this lithograph series came from an astronomical phenomenon, placing it into the scope of cosmic themes, frequently found in Miro’s work. The distilled, abstract forms and fragmented, dynamic composition remain conceptually close to the earlier periods of the artist’s oeuvre, although they divert from any representational quality.
“The Perseides III” is the third plate of the series referring to the Perseids, a prolific meteor shower associated with the Swift–Tuttle comet. The visceral focus of the piece describes the artist’s fascination with the night sky, inspiring the viewer to experience the same. Nocturne, being one of the recurrent subjects in Miro’s work, is treated in a particular manner: A poetic, purified image is reduced to prominent arrow-like marks and fine, linear signs, accentuated with spots of pure color. Miro's favorite deep blue is present only marginally, while the entirely abstract scene retains all the freshness and ingenuousness of the artist's expression.
The piece belonged to the collection of Louis Broder, a renowned 20th-century collaborator and publisher of many graphic works. He commissioned artists such as Picasso, Jean Arp, Jacques Villon, Andre Masson to create interpretations of literary works, poems or conceptual ideas through a variety of media.
Broder collaborated with Joan Miro through the famous Parisian lithographic studio of Francois Mourlot. Their joint work produced four historically important and highly collectible series of color lithographs in 1970 and 1971, to which “The Perseides III” pertains.
The piece comes with a Certificate of Authenticity issued by the Park West Gallery expert.