Civic responsibility of the artist
Joan Miró was committed to his times and his country, as he proved in his speech when he was awarded an honorary doctorate by the University of Barcelona on 2 October, 1979.
Miró spoke of a “human approach” which is innate to all artists, binding them to society with a sense of their responsibility as citizens and driving them to create with the aim of “serving all men”. As proof of this claim, Miró created numerous posters throughout his life, seeking to have his voice be that of a community. In the streets, his posters became public action and broke the boundaries of authorship to become expressions of social engagement.
Some of these posters, which synthesize causes and projects to which Miró was committed, now allow us to illustrate his speech from 1979. Both the posters and the speech have been sources of inspiration for the “What are your causes?” workshop organized by the Fundació Joan Miró as part of the Open City Thinking Biennale.
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