In 1935 Miró's work took a surprising turn. His joyous imagination yielded to darker themes. Forebodings of menacing forces and cataclysmic events preoccupied the artist's thoughts, and found expression in the birth of cruel and monstrous creatures which invaded and took over his paintings (see Christie's New York sale, November 9, 1994, lot 44). In 1936 the political crisis in Spain erupted into civil war; Miró's private nightmares had become reality for an entire nation.

Wildness and violence fill Miró's pictures until the end of the decade; however, by 1938 there are lulls when the cruelty abates, and there are flashes of innocence and nostalgia for more peaceful, idyllic times. Pastorale represents one such brief day-dream as the horrors of reality are held in check. Three happy creatures, so unlike the grotesque personages which populate many of Miró's watercolors during this period, approach a huge and friendly bovine beast. The sun, in the national colors of Spain, spreads its rays like huge arms to embrace the scene.

In works of this kind Miró eventually overcame the cruelty and near-despair which lie at the heart of his 'savage' period.

The progression, the ascension, the deliverance
of the figures will essentially be effected in the
transition from the gouaches and watercolors to the
oil on canvas. Their demonic character will be
attenuated and moderated on the canvas, and
dominated and overcome in the end. In Miró there
is no exploitation of suffering or delinquency,
no complaisance for the monstrous or the cruel...
And in the dejection and suffering which he in turn
embodies, he is trying to bring aid and comfort to
mankind. He is on the side of nature, of the life
principle itself. (J. Dupin, Miró, New York,
1962, p. 302)

A photo-certificate from Jacques Dupin dated Paris, October 5, 1994 accompanies this gouache.