London: Joan Miro exhibit to open at the Tate Modern

The Tate Modern Art Museum in London, which opened in 2000 in a onetime power station, will open a major exhibition of the work of Spanish artist Joan Mir�³, called the father of Abstract Expressionism, on April 14.

The show, featuring more than 150 works, is one of the most extensive shows ever dedicated to this 20th century artist and the first in London in half a century.

The exhibition, “The Ladder of Escape,” features rarely seen pieces that signpost the stages of MirÃ?³’s life and the influences on his art and explore the tension between the painter’s whimsical Surrealist symbols and the turbulent political world of Catalonia, the Spanish Civil War and World War II that formed their background.

Mir�³ was born in 1893 in Barcelona. His father was a goldsmith and a watchmaker. Mir�³ worked in different media, including sculpture, ceramics, tapestries and, of course, drawing and painting. He died on Christmas Day 1983.

The Tate exhibition runs until Sept. 11.

Info: Tate Modern