Mighty Money

By Borja Bandrés

Mother, I humble myself before gold,
He is my lover and my beloved,
because I'm completely in love.
It's constantly yellow.
So, a doubloon or a single?
It does everything I want,
powerful knight
It's Mr. Money.

These are the opening lines of Francisco de Quevedo's famous poem "Poderoso Caballero Don Dinero" (Mighty Gentleman Sir Money), popularized by Paco Ibáñez's music. Money, and more specifically the dollar as its quintessential symbol, is a constant theme in the work of the Valencian artist Antoni Miró , whose work was rooted in social realism from the mid-1960s onward. This movement, which began in the 19th century, takes as its starting point the propagandistic images of society and the linguistic codes used by mass media, aiming to convey a clear message of denunciation in order to awaken a critical attitude toward history. As Antoni Miró himself wrote:

My objective is to aggressively strike at the conscience of humankind, gripped by a frenzied and corrosive consumerism that deprives them of all freedom at every level and in every aspect of their existence. My intention is also to express my complete disagreement with the alienation that is occurring, by conducting an increasingly thorough analysis of the many objectionable and destructive things happening around us. The symbol I chose was the dollar, which, by constantly incorporating it into the critical expression of my work, has become a direct means of communication—a point that always concerns me.

Antoni Miró - Act of Faith

Critical and intelligent judgment of our surroundings should be everyone's task, but especially that of the artist, given their unique sensitivity, their capacity for communication, their influence on society, and their impact. Engaging with social reality, taking a stand, and defending it has always been a delicate position for an artist; for this very reason, the works of some have become legendary, like Picasso's Guernica or Steinbeck's *The Grapes of Wrath *, not to mention the music of Chilean Victor Jara, violently tortured and murdered after the fall of Salvador Allende in Chile, orchestrated by the CIA— an organization that also played a key role in popularizing abstract expressionist art in the mid-1950s. These events, of which Antoni Miró was a contemporary, are reflected in his works, including his series aptly titled " The Dollar ."

Antoni Miró - Chile

With renewed relevance as the sound of boots echoes once more on a massive scale, Antoni Miró's antimilitarist works, reflecting ignorance, greed, stupidity, suffering, lack of culture, and barbarity, invite a profound and often uncomfortable reflection on what lies behind behaviors that should belong to the annals of history but are incessantly repeated. For if the desire for money, indispensable for seizing power, makes man a wolf to man, as the philosopher Thomas Hobbes reminded us, then art is one of the only ways we can become a little more civilized.