Joan Miró’s Je travaille comme un jardinier (I Work Like a Gardener), a set of 9 colour lithographs in an edition of 145, was published in 1963. Coinciding with the publication, Miró painted a series of watercolours in an elegant surrealist style, very much in line with the visual investigations he was carrying out at the time. He dedicated that suite to a number of friends, including Max Ernst (1891-1976), Nina Kandinsky, Aimé Maegth and Jacques Dupin.

One year later the artist took part in the illustration of Quelques fleurs pour des amis, published by Société Internationale d’Art XXe siècle of Paris, with texts by the playwright Eugène Ionesco. The book also included the 32 watercolours printed in Vitela Arches paper that he had dedicated to his friends the year before.

This litoghraph is a tribute to Fondation Maeght, and it is dedicated to its founders, Marguerite, who Miró affectionately refers to by her nickname Guiguite, and Aimé Maeght.

The relationship of the Maeghts with Miró is well documented, and was reflected in the activity of the foundation and the comprehensive collection of works by Miró it would hold. Furthermore, Miró collaborated in Josep Lluís Sert’s architectural project for Fondation Maeght, expressly creating for it his Labyrinthe Miró, consisting of sculptures and pieces of ceramics. Equally meaningful is the great survey show held at the foundation in 1984, a year after Miró’s death and concurrent with the gallery’s twentieth anniversary.

Fondation Maeght was established in 1964 to provide continuity to the famous Galerie Maeght, which had opened in 1946. The period ranging from the establishment of the foundation and Marguerite’s death in 1977 allows us to date the work, and it is even likely that it could had been done as a gift on the opening of the foundation in 1964.

In this work, built around the use of the line, the motifs are rendered in the artist’s signature primary colours: green, blue and red. In the top right area we see a grey-edged yellow circle, with small blue ovals (perhaps made with the artist’s fingers) printed on the bottom left section. This beautiful example of Miró’s oeuvre pays testimony to the fertile relationship between the painter and the Maeghts.