Naked Woman Climbing a Staircase (originally in French Femme nue montant l'escalier) is a drawing done with pencil and charcoal on card made by Joan Miró in 1937. It is part of the permanent collection of the Fundació Joan Miró in Barcelona.
History
Miró created Naked Woman Climbing a Staircase during the Spanish Civil War. He was living in Paris when he started to attend life drawing classes at the school of the Grande Chaumiere. Miró returned to constructing the human figure to represent the drama that was then taking place in Catalonia. This feeling can be made out in the shapes used to draw this tortured nude woman climbing a staircase.Works by Joan Miró. Joan Miró Foundation. 1988. Ediciones Polígrafa. Other works of this period include Still Life with Old Shoe and Aidez l'Espagne.
Description
According to the Joan Miró Foundation, "Miró's despondency brought about by the moral tragedy of the war can be seen in the violent metamorphosis of the figure, in her heavy limbs and in the effort involved in climbing." At the top right is a kind of window or box where light rays can be seen entering the room. The woman is using her right arm to try to grab a ladder – this was a symbol that Miró used in several of his works to represent evasion or escape. The external genitals of the woman are similar to those of the woman in Man and Woman in Front of a Pile of Excrement as they are exaggerated in size.Clavero 2010, p.72-73 This work is said to be related to Marcel Duchamp's 1912 painting Nude Descending a Staircase, No. 2, although here the woman is ascending. The distortion and effort of the figure are interpreted as mirroring the Spanish Civil War. Duchamp's painting was not original; it alluded to the earlier photographs by Eadweard Muybridge which were amongst the first to record animal locomotion. Miró first saw this work by Duchamp in 1912, during the Cubist art exhibition held at Galeries Dalmau in Barcelona.
Muybridge's idea of a woman on a staircase caught the imagination of not only Duchamp and Miró but also Miró's contemporary Salvador Dalí who created a homage to Duchamp's painting. His model was also shown ascending the stairs like Miró's subject.
Exhibitions StartEndExhibitionPlaceCityRef 1964 1964 Tate Gallery London cat num 151 1964 1964 Kunsthaus Zürich Zurich 20 September 1978 22 January 1979 Dessins de Miró Centre Georges Pompidou Paríscat. núm. 145, repr. p. 70 1 June 1980 31 October 1980 Palacio de Velázquez Madrid 21 November 1986 1 February 1987 Kunsthaus Zürich Zurichcat. nº 108 repr 14 February 1987 20 April 1987 Städtische Kunsthalle Düsseldorf 24 November 1988 15 January 1999 Impactes. Joan Miró 1929–1941 Fundació Joan Miró Barcelonacat. nº 56 repr. p.88 3 February 1989 23 April 1989Joan Miró: Paintings & Drawings 1929–1941 Whitechapel Gallery Londoncat. repr. 4 July 1990 14 October 1990 Maeght Foundation Saint-Paul-de-Vencecat. nº 102, repr. p. 343 20 April 1993 30 August 1993 Fundació Joan Miró Barcelonacat. nº 147 repr. p.3436 October 199311 January 1994 Museum of Modern Art New Yorkcat. repr. p.22611 February 199517 April 1995 Städtische Kunsthalle Düsseldorf12 May 199516 July 1995 Kunsthalle Wien Vienna28 July 199522 October 1995 Galleria d'Arte Moderna e Contemporanea de Verona Verona 26 February 1996 5 May 1996 CCCB Barcelona 7 June 1997 11 November 1997Miró, ceci est la couleur de mes rêves Fondation Pierre Gianadda Martignycat. nº 40 repr. p.95 15 May 1998 30 August 1998Joan Miró. Creator of new worlds Moderna Museet Stockholmcat. nº 102 repr. p.113 18 September 1998 10 January 1999Joan Miró. Creator of new worlds Louisiana Museum of Modern Art Humlebækcat. nº 84 repr. p.66 4 July 2000 5 November 2000 Maeght Foundation Saint-Paul-de-Vence 23 October 2001 27 January 2002 Rèquiem per les escales CCCB Barcelona 6 March 2002 24 June 2002 La Révolution surréaliste Centre Georges Pompidou Paris 20 July 2002 24 November 2002 Kunstsammlung Nordrhein-Westfalen Düsseldorf 25 November 2004 6 February 2005 Joan Miró. Arquitectura d'un llibre Fundació Joan Miró Barcelona 25 October 2007 27 January 2008 Joan Miró. 1956–1983 Sentiment, emoció i gest Fundació Joan Miró Barcelona 14 April 2011 11 September 2011 Miró. Tate London 15 October 2011 18 March 2011 Miró i l'escala de l'evasió. Tate, Fundació Joan Miró London & Barcelona 6 May 2012 12 August 2012 National Gallery of Art Washington
2011 exhibition The exhibition L'escala de l'evasió that opened in October 2011 was supported by access to Wikipedia using QRpedia codes that allowed access to visitors in Catalan, English and several other languages.Photo at opening day of the exhibition, 15 October 2011
Notes
References
Jaques Dupin – Ariane Lelong-Mainaud. Joan Miró. Catalogue raisonné. Drawings I 1901–1937, 2008. Daniel Lelong and Successió Miró