The Red Sun

The Red Sun, 1950, captures the simplicity of artist Joan Miro's work and the abstract movement more generally. It remains one of his most famous paintings.

The striking red sun is a symbol found in many of the Spanish artist's work, with a more detailed version coming earlier in 1948. Miro and Dali had similar influences during their careers, firstly the colour and culture of their Catalan backgrounds, followed by their spells in Paris where they were to draw in a wide variety of experiences and and artistic inspirations. Here they would come across the likes of Paul Klee, and they would exchange ideas for future work. Shortly before producing a series of paintings which included red suns, artist Miro also spent time in New York, where he would meet several famous American artists. Jackson Pollock was one of a number of artists who helped to inspire further his abstract ideas, having once famously claiming to have declared war on traditional painting styles.

Miro liked to reduce detail to a minimum, whilst still allowing each object to be identifiable. The large red circle dominates the title of the piece and also the composition itself, stretching to two thirds of the width and height of the painting. There is then a loose shape of blue underneath plus additional detail to the left and right of the scene. Whilst anyone can understand the construct of the red sun in this painting, it may take those more knowledgable of other Miro paintings to explain what the other elements of the scene represent. He produced a visual language which remained consistent through a number of his works and so an understanding of them will help to explain much of this one. He also helpfully supplied a glossary for some artworks which detailed what each and every item represented to avoid any confusion or misunderstanding.

The Red Sun can be located in the collection of the The Phillips Memorial Gallery, United States. MoMA in New York is one of the finest venues from which to enjoy the work of this artist but there are also a number of places to visit in his native Spain, too. Several museums exist in his name and are excellent places to quickly get a broader understanding of his overall career oeuvre, which went well beyond just painting, taking in the likes of sculpture, ceramics and drawing too. The boldness of this particular painting also makes it suitable as an art print reproduction from any online stores with a suitable license to reproduce any of his work.