In the summer of 2018, I went on vacation to Barcelona. One of our excursions was a visit to the Miró Museum. There was a painting I stared at for a while: Painting on White Background for the Cell of a Recluse (1968). The canvas, reaching 8.5 ×11.5 feet shows an uneven, wandering black line on a white background. I liked the gesture of the line, its trajectory, the large expanse of white it fractured.

Later that night we went to La Pepita, a little tapas restaurant recommended by a number of friends. While we waited at the bar for our table, I did what anyone in Spain would do, I ordered a gin and tonic. In Spain, they are very serious about their gin and tonics. The bartender dropped a large square ice cube in a glass, then poured a shot of gin over it. Next she pulled out a drill bit to pour the tonic over, as to not bruise the gin. That was a new one for me! She handed me the glass and I took a drink. Perfect! Then there was a sound, a crack. The large square ice cube had split. I looked in the glass, a line fractured through the ice cube, I thought about the Miró painting. Miró, ice cube, Miró, ice cube, Miró, ice cube. I leaned over to my wife and said that when we returned home I was going to photograph ice cubes.