Arkas Art Center Hosts Never-Before-Seen Works by Joan Miró!

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Arkas Art Center Hosts Never-Before-Seen Works by Joan Miró!

Arkas Art Center hosts the exhibition titled Joan Miró: Image, Text, Sign, featuring the works of Joan Miró, a Catalan painter and sculptor born in Barcelona, who created these works with a wide variety of techniques throughout his life. The exhibition, which presents Miró’s understanding of art centered on his imagination to the audience with a comprehensive selection, is organized by the Serralves Foundation in collaboration with Arkas Art Center between September 26, 2024 and February 9, 2025.

Joan Miró: Image, Text, Sign, directed by Mujde Unustasi and curated by art historian and academician Robert Lubar Messeri, focuses on the works of Miró created between 1924 and 1981. The exhibition includes 74 works from the Portuguese State Contemporary Art Collection, under the auspices of the Serralves Foundation – Museum of Contemporary Art in Porto, Portugal.

An unprecedented selection in Türkiye

The exhibition is one of the most comprehensive Miró exhibitions ever organized in Türkiye, featuring the works of Miró, known as the pioneer of contemporary art and one of the most important figures of the modernist movement. These works were created on various surfaces such as packaging, paper, masonite, panels, tapestries, burlap and newspapers, and with techniques such as bronze, driftwood and ceramics.

Within the scope of the exhibition, in addition to the paintings which the artist became famous for, the Sobreteixims series, which aims to bridge the distinction between paintings and fabrics, and an example from Burnt Canvases, which emphasizes that art can be used as a powerful tool of criticism beyond being an aesthetic expression, are exhibited for the first time in Türkiye.

At the press conference held before the opening of the exhibition, Arkas Holding Chairman, Lucien Arkas, said: “In the past 13 years, since 2011, this has been our 27th exhibition at Arkas Art Center. We have always had a relationship of trust and respect with prestigious museums and collectors abroad, and we have exchanged works within the scope of our exhibitions. We have brought Joan Miró works to Izmir for the first time. In fact, we can say that this exhibition is one of the most comprehensive Miró exhibitions organized in our country. The exhibition includes works of the artist that have never been exhibited in Türkiye before, such as the Sobreteixims and Burnt Canvases series.

In my opinion, Miro is the person who started surrealism. That is why he is very important, he is a pioneer. When you first see his works, they amaze you and you try to understand what he wants to say. That is what he wanted. I’m sure it will be a successful exhibition.”

Izmir Metropolitan Municipality Mayor Cemil Tugay said, “Lucien Arkas continues to add quality to Izmir’s art life. We continue to follow all the beautiful artworks he has gifted us with joy. He not only establishes art centers but also enables Izmir residents to visit the world’s most valuable collections. This is an invaluable endeavor for us. As the mayor, I was happy when they asked me to facilitate visits to these art centers. We will build art stops in the city and provide shuttles from these stops to the exhibitions. We will contribute to new expansions in this city, which has cherished art for generations and has raised many artists in its 8,000-year history. Lucien Arkas continues to gain our admiration and appreciation for what he has done as a pioneer and an inspiring person for us. I would like to thank everyone who contributed to bringing this beautiful exhibition here.”

Porto Mayor Rui Moreira said, “The Mayor of Izmir Metropolitan Municipality and I are very lucky mayors. We both have great foundations and businesspeople like Lucien Arkas. This makes our work very easy. We have a lot in common with Lucien Arkas. We both work in the maritime sector. We also both love art and nature. I appreciate the steps you are taking in this direction; these steps are significant for us. Serralves Foundation was founded by chance. The neighborhood where this building is located was no different from any other neighborhood. A few citizens came together and bought this farm, and with the support of the government, a modern art museum was established. It showed us that the private and public sectors can work together to create such a beautiful art center in the heart of the city. The story of the exhibition is more interesting. During the financial crisis, it was agreed that the works would be sold in an auction, but the residents of Porto refused to allow it. This collection you are looking at survived the financial crisis.”

Director of the Serralves Museum, Philippe Vergne, said, “This exhibition in Izmir is of utmost importance and significance to the Museum of Contemporary Art of the Serralves Foundation, since it shows, for the first time in Türkiye, the works of the Catalonian painter and sculptor born in Barcelona. During the next five months, we will be celebrating, with a new public, the art of one of the greatest masters of Modernism. The Arkas Art Center, a landmark in the field of modern and contemporary art in the country, is the right place for us to take yet another step in showing these works, which illustrate the imaginative approach and artistic vision of the Catalonian painter and sculptor. I would like to express my deepest gratitude to Lucien Arkas, Chairman of Arkas Holding, and to Mujde Unustasi, Director of the Arkas Art Center. Your collaboration and support were crucial to make this exhibition come true, thus allowing the Miró Collection to reach new audiences, now here in Türkiye. The Serralves Foundation therefore fulfils a part of its mission – to promote and make accessible this extraordinary collection.”

Arkas Art Director Mujde Unustasi said, “The collection is very important and extraordinary in two ways. First of all, it covers 60 years of Miro’s career without focusing on a specific period. The oldest work in the collection dates back to 1924 and is a very important one. As a matter of fact, Miro began to use the language of signs as of this year. The most recent works are from 1981. These works were created two years before the artist’s death. Another important aspect of the collection is that it shows the richness of the techniques and materials used by Miro. Miro was an artist who worked with many different techniques and materials. He liked to surprise the art enthusiasts by transferring artistic techniques to different mediums. This collection is of great importance in terms of seeing this diversity he used and discovering how he transferred different techniques from one medium to another.”

Curator of the exhibition, Robert Lubar Messeri, said, “Miro defined himself as a painter-poet. For him, poetry did not have to consist of words. He always had a deep interest in poetry: He wrote, he read, he lived a life intertwined with poets. The marks he left on the paintings became a kind of handwriting. This interaction influenced Miro’s entire artistic practice after 1924. Therefore, in this exhibition, we wanted to look at Miro’s artistic practice in the triangle of image, text, sign.”

Joan Miró: A Universal Journey Through Colors and Shapes

Spanish artist Joan Miró, who depicted the subconscious in his works with symbols, was born in Barcelona on April 20, 1893. Like the artists of his time, Miró settled in Paris to continue his creative activities and created his own unique style by being influenced by many art movements from Impressionism to Fauvism, from Primitivism to Cubism.

His signature painting-poems, biomorphic forms, geometric shapes, abstracted and semi-abstract objects were instrumental in shaping an original understanding of art that was sustained through many media, from canvases to ceramics, sculptures to tapestries. Miró painted automatically, without conscious thought, and tended to express his subconscious, expressing the emotions suppressed in the depths of his consciousness with colorful brushstrokes. With this style, he was recognized as one of the important figures of the Automatism movement.

His radical and innovative style played a critical role in the 20th-century avant-garde’s gradual move towards abstraction. Although Miró was associated with early Surrealism and was influential on the Abstract Expressionists and Color Field painters, he created a distinctive visual vocabulary that cannot be categorized in modern art.

Established in 1989, the Serralves Foundation aims to promote contemporary art and establish a dialogue between the public and art under the mission of supporting, presenting and protecting contemporary art, architecture, and environmental planning. Since its establishment, it has hosted various exhibitions featuring the works of Portuguese and international artists. Arkas Art Center brings together the audience with the Serralves Foundation, which matches its mission, with an international figure, who has contributed to world heritage, from a perspective never seen before in Türkiye.

Addressing Miró’s irreducible artistic personality and his creative journey of 60 years, the exhibition Joan Miró: Image, Text, Sign will welcome visitors at Arkas Art Center every day except Mondays between September 26, 2024 and February 9, 2025.

T16JM 0059
Joan Miró
Manzarada Figür / Figure in a Landscape
1970
India ink, gouache and pastel on paper
Kağıt üzerine Hint mürekkebi, guaj ve pastel
35,5 x 28 cm 47,8 x 40,5 x 2,5 cm

T16JM 0042
Joan Miró
Kadın ve Kuş / Woman and Bird
24 Kasım 1959 / November 24, 1959
Oil on canvas
Tuval üzerine yağlı boya
116 x 89 cm

T16JM 0016
Joan Miró
Resim / Painting
1935
Oil on paper on cardboard
Karton üzerine kağıt üzerine yağlı boya
76 x 65 cm

All kinds of publications such as news, posters, etc. to be made within the scope of the Joan Miró: Image, Text, Sign exhibition must use the following note and the identification information of the works to be used must be written. We hereby inform you that if the works are used without the identification information despite this information and warning given to you, any direct and indirect damages that Arkas Sanat A.Ş. may suffer will be incurred by you and we declare that Arkas Sanat A.Ş. reserves its legal rights.

The Joan Miró State Collection of Contemporary Art, lent to the Municipality of Porto for a long term and located at the Serralves Foundation – Museum of Contemporary Art in Porto, Portugal, includes paintings, collages, sculptures, drawings and textiles by the renowned Catalan artist. The exhibition is organized by Serralves Foundation – Museum of Contemporary Art in collaboration with Arkas Art Center.