# Joan Miró

The Constellations are a series of 23 paintings on paper produced from January 1940 to September1941 by the Spanish surrealist joan miró. Art historians and museum curators have said of the paintings: "Universally considered one of the greatest achievements of his career", "The Constellations, as a group and singly, are among the miracles that art occasionally bestows", "masterpiece of world painting", "perhaps the most intricate, most elaborately developed of all Miró's compositions", "genuine masterpieces", "one of the most brilliant episodes of his career", and "As an optical experience the Constellations are entirely unprecedented, having no forerunners even in Miró's own work"."In sum, given that music, nature, and life itself are the artist's sources of inspiration"; the paintings boldly celebrate nocturnal themes of wonder, joy, nature, love, and escape, although they were painted during one of the most troubled periods of the artist life. Initiated only months after the violence and chaos of the Spanish Civil War in his homeland while Miró was exiled in France; and later completed after retreating back to an uncertain reception in fascist Spain, as the Nazis invaded France.