Letters to the Editor

50 years of Miró: a fiasco

I went up to the Fundació Miró with some excitement to see the exhibition commemorating its 50th anniversary. The Foundation had been the brainchild of Joan Miró and Josep Lluís Sert, the great Catalan architect living in the United States, with the support of patron Joan Prats and the collaboration of M. Lluïsa Borràs, who at the time was Miró's liaison with Barcelona.

The Foundation, which for many years has shown a rather lackluster program, began with great impetus under the direction of Francesc Vicens and later Rosa M. Malet. Miró didn't want a mausoleum but a CEAC (Center for the Study of Contemporary Art), and he made this abundantly clear in his letters to Sert. "To create a living space for free discussion, gatherings of poets, musicians, painters, and artisans! Classical and experimental theater. Cinema. Ballet. To plan all kinds of cultural activities, thinking of the new world that is emerging, not limiting ourselves to gatherings of intellectuals."

There were some splendid early exhibitions, such as América, América, Francis Bacon, Vostell, Klee, and the one dedicated to the Bauhaus. There was a colloquium on video and communication, and Jordi Benito's brutal performance, Toro Performance, in which the animal's throat was cut, something that would be completely prohibited today.

In 1975, the young people who had already gathered at the Institut Alemany formed what was known as the Research Area within the Foundation. We were Jordi Pablo, Federico Amat, García Sevilla, Javier Grau, Carlos Pazos, Silvia Gubern, the critics Mercè Vidal and Alícia Suàrez, and myself, among others. It was the first, or one of the first, experiences of self-management by artists in an institution. We organized Art with New Media 1966-1975; Object. Catalan Anthology of Art and the Object; and Painting 1.

But little by little, the Foundation was taking on a more classical character, and we decided to inform the international board of trustees of our demands. The controversy was settled in the newspapers, and even Joan Brossa expressed his opinion in our favor.

If I mention all this, it's because not for a moment does this unusual episode in Catalan art appear in the Miró exhibition.

The exhibition opens with a staircase (perhaps because of the Dog Barking at the Moon, a 1926 painting by Miró) and the phrase "This exhibition is a chronicle and a game where each visitor can sketch their own story." But what story can be created from such bizarre museography? The Spanish Pavilion of the Republic of 1937, where Miró presented his Catalan Labrador in Revolt and Calder his Mercury Fountain, appears with blacked-out photos. A photograph by Carlos Santos almost completely covers the text of a letter from Calder. Mercedes Cunningham appears in another with her head cut off. The plans for the Fundació Miró are completely indistinguishable. There are very small images of the activities, and the worst are the catalog covers with a photograph of an artist who doesn't belong in the catalog. Long live the confusion!

However, on the lower floor you can read a huge chronology, which will be covered with white paint once the exhibition is over.

We don't know what hurts more: the ignorance demonstrated by the gaps in information about people and events, or the stupidity of a pointless, content-free montage. A missed opportunity.

Victoria Combalía

Barcelona

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