JOAQUIM MIR TRINXET (Barcelona, 1873 - 1940). "Landscape with almond trees in blossom". Oil on canvas. Signed in the lower right corner. Size: 38 x 46 cm; 68 x 75 cm (frame). It is difficult not to think of Van Gogh's "Almond Blossom" when contemplating this painting by Joaquim Mir. The Catalan painter probably wanted to pay homage to that last work in which the Dutch genius expressed a relaxed joie de vivre, in contrast to his better known tormented landscapes. In Mir's painting, the white branches do not stand out against a blue sky, but form a wild lace bib in the foreground, revealing behind it the outline of a church surrounded by houses. This is a work characteristic of Mir's hedonistic language, which here celebrates spring and the cyclical regeneration of life. Joaquim Mir studied at the Escola de Belles Arts de Sant Jordi in Barcelona and in the studio of the painter Luis Graner. He soon felt uncomfortable with the official teaching, which was anchored in a conception of realist painting, and so in 1893 he founded the "Colla del Safrà" (Safrà Group) with other companions to explore together the pictorial initiatives of the end of the century. In 1896 they even participated as a group in the 3rd Exhibition of Fine Arts and Artistic Industries, to which Mir submitted two works: "La huerta del rector" ("The Rector's Vegetable Garden") and "El vendedor de naranjas" ("The Orange Seller"). From 1897 he also frequented the artistic environment of "Els Quatre Gats", which helped him to mature in the compositional study of landscapes with figures in different planes of depth. During these years he took part in the Fine Arts Exhibitions in Barcelona in 1894, 1896 and 1898. Winner of a second medal at the Madrid Exhibition of 1899, that same year he moved to the capital with the aim of applying for a scholarship in Rome. When he was unsuccessful, he went with Santiago Rusiñol to Mallorca, a trip that was to be a definitive turning point in his career. Mir was dazzled by the Mallorcan landscape, which was an inexhaustible source of inspiration for him. From then on, the artist deployed a whole combination of impossible colours, the result of his personal interpretation of the island's majestic nature. The brushstrokes grew longer and became stains that almost made objects and spatial references disappear. In 1901 he exhibited the fruit of this first Mallorcan period in a solo exhibition at the Sala Parés in Barcelona, and again won a second medal at the National Exhibition. In 1907 he won the first medal at the International Exhibition of Fine Arts in Barcelona. From then on, settled in Camp de Tarragona, he did not move away from the landscape genre, but now it was the surrounding villages that were the protagonists of his painting. He gained definitive national recognition in 1917, when he was awarded the National Prize for Fine Arts. In 1929 he won the first medal at the International Exhibition in Barcelona. The following year he won the medal of honour at the National Exhibition in Madrid, a prize he had been pursuing since 1922. Although he was mainly a native painter, he held solo and group exhibitions in Washington, Paris, Pittsburgh, New York, Philadelphia, Amsterdam, Buenos Aires and Venice. Mir is today considered the foremost representative of Spanish Post-Impressionist landscape painting. His work can be found in the Museo Nacional de Arte de Cataluña, the Museo del Prado, the Museo Thyssen-Bornemisza and the Museo Reina Sofía in Madrid, among many others.