Video: Joan Miró At Tate Modern

WATCH: Joan Miró's Secret Political Side

Curators have a lot to say about the new Joan Miró exhibition at London's Tate Modern. In the video below, journalist Will Gompertz asks Tate Modern curator Matthew Gale if he could discuss five or six works to sum up the show. Gale hesitates, cracks a hint of a smile, and says, "No." The beloved Spanish Surrealist's career and inspiration is too complicated, Gale claims, and too tied up in his opposition to dictator Francisco Franco, but the curator gives a list nonetheless. The interview, which also touches on the inspiration Miró drew from his family's Catalonian farm and his erratic friendship with Salvador Dali, introduces the artist's first major exhibition in London for nearly half a century.

Even if historical context is required to discuss Miró's life, his paintings' speak for themselves. Although often politically charged, the intricate, whimsical images often conceal their spirit of protest. For those who can do without the context, the interview shows several important images, including one of Miro's "Constellations." Painted during the German invasion of France in 1941, the canvas does not give up its origins easily, portraying an unease more in line with the spiritual alienation of Swiss painter Paul Klee than the violence of Picasso's wartime works.

(Via BBC Arts)

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