Miró to go on show in the United Kingdom

London (ACN). - Catalan Joan Miró is expected to be, for the second year in a row, one of the most interesting elements of the cultural year in the United Kingdom. Yorkshire Sculpture Park will stage the first major UK exhibition of sculpture by the Catalan artist next spring. It will be inaugurated just several months after the end of the successful Miró painting retrospective at the Tate Modern, and coincides with an increase in the price of the artist’s work on the art market.

The exhibition at the YSP will combine interior and exterior spaces set against the backdrop of the Yorkshire landscape and will have some of the most monumental Miró work. The Underground Gallery of the Park will trace the evolution of Miró’s sculpture from 1946 to 1982, exploring the “phantasmagoric world of living monsters”. But the main attraction will most likely be outdoors, where the monumental Miró masterpieces will be displayed.

The gallery’s director, Peter Murray, said in an interview with CNA that the show would be “one of the biggest Miró sculpture exhibitions of all times”. “You will see Miró both in the landscape and indoors, in beautiful galleries. There will be a focus on Miró the sculptor but also a focus on the interaction between the indoors and the outdoors”, he described. “In a sense it will be an ideal situation for Miró. He loved the landscape, he loved to see his work in the open air”, Murray said, adding that the Yorkshire Sculpture Park has “the best of both worlds, when the indoors and the outdoors come together”.

Visitors “will be able to interact” with Miró’s work, Murray said. In fact, the Park recently had an exhibition of the Catalan artist Jaume Plensa that allowed a perfect symbiosis between the visitors, the landscape and the art. “The interaction between the public and Jaume’s work was unbelievable”, Murray said, pointing out that the show was one of “the most successful” they have “ever had”. “With Miró we are expecting something very similar”, he added.

According to Murray, the exhibition will give the art world “another opportunity to see the work of a Catalan artist, but also to see how rich sculpture is in that part of the world”. Besides, the show comes at a time in which Miró’s production is more interesting than ever for the British public. “We are in a position to build on the success of the Tate. There has always been a strong interest in Miró, but there is a stronger interest now”, Murray said.

Sales at Christie’s and Sotheby’s

Interest in Miró’s work will be also demonstrated next week in London, when Christie’s and Sotheby’s are expected to auction some great works by the Catalan artist. Olivier Camu, deputy Chairman of Impressionist and Modern Art at Christie’s, told CNA that the main highlight of their next sale would be Miró’s Painting-Poem ‘Le corps de ma brune (1925). “It is the most important surrealist Miró of the last decade on the market”, he said. The painting has an estimated price of between $9 million and $14 million, and is expected to breach that level.

“Miró is extremely famous, but in terms of the market, his price has been rising. The record was reached in Christie’s New York a few years ago. It was $17 million. But who knows if that one could breach that level, because it is so rare”, Camu suggested.

“Miró is one of the most famous painters in the surrealist movement, along with Dalí and Magritte, and they have all gone up in price”, said the Christie’s expert. However, Miró is going through a special period, according to Camu. He had “a major retrospective at the Tate Modern last year, which was a fabulous show, and he’s got another exhibition coming up at the Yorkshire Sculpture Park”. Besides, Miró is an artist “that speaks to pro-surrealist collectors as well as people who like colours and humour”.

The auction house Sotheby’s is also selling a rare Miró next week, ‘Peinture’ (1933), with an expect price of between $10 million and $15 million.