Tesi presentada a la Faculty of the Graduate School of Arts and Sciences in Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree of Doctor of Philosophy at New York University

Bibliografia

This is an authorized facsimile, made from the microfilm master copy of the original dissertation or master thesis published by UMI (University Microfilms Internation - Dissertation Information Service) Michigan 48106. Printed in 1989

Tesi presentada a la Faculty of the Graduate School of Arts and Sciences in Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree of Doctor of Philosophy at New York University. Joan Miro Before The Farm" examines the artist's formative work within the context of the cultural discourse of Catalan nationalism during the first quarter of the twentieth century. The leitmotif of this thesis is Miro's professed identity as an "international Catalan"; that is, his desire to reconcile traditional Catalan values with advanced international (especially French) artistic impulses in his work. A series of interrelated issues are explored: Miro's deep identification with the Catalan rural tradition; his responses to Catalan Noucentisme, the dominant cultural ideology of his generation; his receptivity to French painting during the First World War and his corresponding opposition to established norms for Catalan art; his isolation within the Barcelona art world and his subsequent cultural assimilation within Parisian vanguard circles. Moreover, built into the monographic structure of this thesis is an examination of the extent to which the conciliatory attitude adopted by French vanguard artists to the post-war "call to order" largely conditioned Miro's early artistic development. Miro's internalization of the ideology of the rappel a l'ordre by way of Pablo Picasso, Maurice Raynal, Jean Cocteau, and the Purists, provides new insight into his growing disillusionment with advanced French art by 1918, and his partial return to a traditional mode of figuration in the detallista canvases of that and the following year. This process is seen to culminate in The Farm, which jointly marks the conclusion of Miro's artistic apprenticeship and his ideological formation as an "international Catalan." Throughout this dissertation, Miro's introspective writings are analyzed, and his responses to the art of Pablo Picasso are addressed in depth. Miro's involvement with a range of vanguard journals in Catalonia is also highlighted. The dissertation is followed by seven appendices, including: a detailed biographical outline of Miro's life to 1922; a comprehensive Catalan cultural chronology for the period from 1906-1922; and a catalogue of Miro's painting up to The Farm.