Self-Portrait I 1937

Joan Miró made Self-Portrait I with oil paint, using a simple palette and direct, almost childlike lines. It’s like he's feeling his way around the canvas, discovering what a self-portrait could even be. Look at that single eye, ringed with red, floating in the left circle – one of the eyes in the head. It’s as though Miró is staring both out at us and deep into himself, maybe not liking what he sees. He is revealing a sort of vulnerability through this stark, almost brutal simplicity. You can almost feel the texture of the canvas coming through in the background, with these strange and delicate little drawings that seem to suggest his inner world. Miró reminds me a little of Arshile Gorky, another artist who walked a tightrope between representation and pure abstraction. Both ask us to consider what it means to build an image out of very little, what it means to be true to feeling and to the process of painting.