|For a series of late works, called ‘burnt and lacerated canvases’ from 1973, Joan Miró made notes to himself with comments like ‘improvise with rage’. He loved to work with fire, it destroyed less than it transformed. His reaction to the political state of Spain in the 70’s was: “The artist does not live in bliss. He is sensitive to the world, to the pulsation of his time, to the events which compel him to act. This is not an intellectual attitude but a profound feeling, something like a cry of joy which delivers you from anguish.” In 1974, at the age of 79, he painted the triptych ‘The Hope of a Condemned Man’: “I finished my work on the same day that they killed Salvador Puig Antich, without me knowing it: a black on a white background, a black line is a cut because someone has the force and no mercy.”. Exhibition June 19-October 11, 2015 at Rijksmuseum Amsterdam