Joan Miró, "The Running of the Bulls", 1942 , The painting represents the dramatic face-off between the bull and the toreador. It symbolizes violence and death at a time when Europe is at war. Under Picasso's brush, the bull evokes the Spanish identity and blind brutality. In Miró's work, he becomes both disturbing and ridiculous: his teeth and whiskers turn him into a cat, his eye becomes a target, and he seems to have lost his sexual power. At the top right, the toreador appears to be running on legs that look like strings. On the left appears a strange and monstrous organism. Some elements are close to the surrealist aesthetic, such as the hybrid aspect of the animal, half bull, half cat. Miró lets his unconscious act when he paints, but he does not use surrealist techniques. He runs the line quickly across the painting like an automatic drawing but, unlike André Masson, for example, the drawing is voluntary and not the result of chance. André Breton, poet and leader of the Surrealist movement, whom he met in 1924, was intrigued by his empty canvases, which seemed dirtied rather than painted and of a primitive beauty. He even offered him membership in the group, but Miró rejected the invitation. Despite his close relationship with the Surrealist artists and galleries, Miró insisted on maintaining his independence.
