Joan Miro, born April 20, 1893, in Barcelona, Spain, grew up wanting to be an artist. His early paintings showed farms, villages, and landscapes in careful detail. Then something changed. Miro decided he wanted to paint what he felt, not what he saw. He began using simple shapes -- circles, crescents, stars, and dots -- arranged in bright bursts of color. His painting The Farm showed a detailed scene of a farmyard. But within a few years, his style became completely abstract. Shapes floated on the canvas. Lines squiggled across open space. Colors clashed and danced. People sometimes asked what his paintings were supposed to be. Miro said that was the wrong question. He wanted viewers to feel something, not recognize something. A red splash might feel like anger. A floating circle might feel like a dream. Miro also worked with sculpture and ceramics. He created a massive ceramic wall for the UNESCO building in Paris. He made bronze figures that looked like they came from another planet. He worked for over sixty years, constantly trying new techniques. He died in 1983 at the age of ninety.