Cover León Gallery unveils Joan Punyet Miró’s works through ‘Punyet: L’Azur—a Homage to Mallarmé’ (Photo: Denzel dela Cruz)
León Gallery unveils Joan Punyet Miró’s works through ‘Punyet: L’Azur—a Homage to Mallarmé’ (Photo: Denzel dela Cruz)
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León Gallery unveils Joan Punyet Miró’s works through the exhibition ‘Punyet: L’Azur—a Homage to Mallarmé’
‘It’s unbelievable. Here in the tropics, it can be stormy and dark and raining for 10 minutes, and then you have this beautiful, shiny sky for 20 minutes.’
Blue is the world, and blue is the Philippines.
This is the impression the country has left on Barcelona-born Joan Punyet Miró, grandson of Joan Miró, the Catalan abstractionist who helped pioneer surrealism and shared the 20th-century art stage with Pablo Picasso, Salvador Dalí, and Marcel Duchamp.
It is Miró’s first visit to the Philippines, and through his painter’s eye, everything is blue. The colour is both harsh and calming, as it is in Mallorca, one of Spain’s Balearic islands, where he lives.
Read more: Home tour: an eclectic Singapore apartment with interiors inspired by artist Joan Miró
Above León Gallery International mounts Joan Punyet Miró’s exhibition in Manila, featuring a 10-piece series inspired by the blue colour, Mallorca, and the Philippines (Photo: Denzel dela Cruz)
León Gallery International mounts Joan Punyet Miró’s exhibition in Manila, featuring a 10-piece series inspired by the blue colour, Mallorca, and the Philippines (Photo: Denzel dela Cruz)
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Blue is the foundation of a 10-piece series he is unveiling on May 28 at León Gallery International. He calls it “my Manila series,” and each painting was made here. At the time of this interview, he has been working on them since his arrival for 10 straight days. “Ten days,” he repeats with emphasis, crouching or on all fours, using his best tools, not his brushes, not his palette knives or spatulas, not his paint sprays, but his hands.
“It’s all coming from the inside. You cannot think. You have to do it. You have to follow your heartbeats, the intuition of your soul,” he says. He describes his process as fully automatic and intuitive. “You have to be fit because it requires muscles. It requires flexibility, lots of movement. You have to be in good shape.”
At the time of writing, Miró is still completing the series. The humidity in Manila speeds up the drying time, which forces him to work more quickly than he normally would.
Above Joan Punyet Miró stands before his large-scale work, to be unveiled at León Gallery (Photo: Adrian Ardiente)
Above Joan Punyet Miró stands before his large-scale work, to be unveiled at León Gallery (Photo: Adrian Ardiente)
Joan Punyet Miró stands before his large-scale work, to be unveiled at León Gallery (Photo: Adrian Ardiente)
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A marked page in his copy of Poésies by the French symbolist Stéphane Mallarmé lies open in the studio he is renting somewhere in leafy Legazpi Village. It is the poem L’Azur.
The everlasting azure’s tranquil irony
Depresses, like the flowers indolently fair,
The powerless poet who damns his superiority
Across a sterile wilderness of aching despair.
“This poem by Mallarmé is, for me, the foundation of the entire concept of my show here in Manila,” he says. “The 10 paintings are all blue, in different hues, intensities, and vibrations. They speak of the spirituality in the poem, and of the space between humans and heaven. You can transcend the surface of the blue and reach God, reach the beyond, reach the faith and spirituality that the blue opens up to you.”
Above Joan Punyet Miró reads an excerpt of ‘Poésies’ by Stéphane Mallarmé (Photo: Adrian Ardiente)
Joan Punyet Miró reads an excerpt of ‘Poésies’ by Stéphane Mallarmé (Photo: Adrian Ardiente)
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He is drawn to the idea of linking the blue waters of Mallorca and the blue that surrounds the islands of the Philippines. Then there is the sky. “It’s unbelievable. Here in the tropics, it can be stormy and dark and raining for 10 minutes, and then you have this beautiful, shiny sky for 20 minutes,” he says. “So you have different lights at all times in Manila. In Mallorca, we always have the sun. Sometimes we have storms, of course, but they clear the sky completely. It is beautiful to see the skylight. You can see all the stars, the full moon, even the shadow of the moon on the sea. The light is clearer there, more pure. Here, it is a bit darker, more brooding.”
Read also: The life and music of Manila-born singer-songwriter Luis Eduardo Aute
Above Joan Punyet Miró’s ‘‘Punyet: L’Azur—a Homage to Mallarmé’ at León Gallery International will open on May 28 (Photo: Denzel dela Cruz)
Joan Punyet Miró’s ‘‘Punyet: L’Azur—a Homage to Mallarmé’ at León Gallery International will open on May 28 (Photo: Denzel dela Cruz)
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Like his grandfather, Miró works in multiple forms. He is a painter, sculptor, poet, fictionist, and musician. Along with these pursuits, he brings the same restless energy to environmental work, and possibly activism, though he does not name it as such.
“I feel very happy to be in Manila,” says the Spanish artist. “I’m so impressed. We were conquistadores. The history was painful for the Filipino people, and yet they are so warm-hearted, so welcoming. I’ve been to Intramuros. I’ve been to Tagaytay. I can’t wait to fly to El Nido. I’ve been walking around the city and I feel very much at home. You’ve made me feel that way.”
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