Salvador Dalí

Early life

The Dalí family in 1910: from the upper left, aunt Maria Teresa, mother, father, Salvador Dalí, aunt Caterina (later became the second wife of father), sister Anna Maria and grandmother Anna

Salvador Dalí was born on 11 May 1904, at 8:45 am,^[9] on the first floor of Carrer Monturiol, 20 in the town of Figueres, in the Empordà region, close to the French border in Catalonia, Spain.^[10] Dalí's older brother, who had also been named Salvador (born 12 October 1901), had died of gastroenteritis nine months earlier, on 1 August 1903. His father, Salvador Luca Rafael Aniceto Dalí Cusí (1872–1950)^[11] was a middle-class lawyer and notary,^[12] an anti-clerical atheist and Catalan federalist, whose strict disciplinary approach was tempered by his wife, Felipa Domènech Ferrés (1874–1921),^[13] who encouraged her son's artistic endeavors.^[14] In the summer of 1912, the family moved to the top floor of Carrer Monturiol 24 (presently 10).^[15][16] Dalí later attributed his "love of everything that is gilded and excessive, my passion for luxury and my love of oriental clothes"^[17] to an "Arab lineage", claiming that his ancestors were descendants of the Moors.^[5][18]

Dalí was haunted by the idea of his dead brother throughout his life, mythologizing him in his writings and art. Dalí said of him, "[we] resembled each other like two drops of water, but we had different reflections."^[19] He "was probably the first version of myself but conceived too much in the absolute".^[19] Images of his brother would reappear in his later works, including Portrait of My Dead Brother (1963).^[20]

Dalí also had a sister, Anna Maria, who was three years younger.^[12] In 1949, she published a book about her brother, Dalí as Seen by His Sister.^[21][22]

His childhood friends included future FC Barcelona footballers Emili Sagi-Barba and Josep Samitier. During holidays at the Catalan resort town of Cadaqués, the trio played football together.^[23]

Dalí attended the Municipal Drawing School at Figueres in 1916 and also discovered modern painting on a summer vacation trip to Cadaqués with the family of Ramon Pichot, a local artist who made regular trips to Paris.^[12] The next year, Dalí's father organized an exhibition of his charcoal drawings in their family home. He had his first public exhibition at the Municipal Theatre in Figueres in 1918,^[24] a site he would return to decades later. In early 1921 the Pichot family introduced Dalí to Futurism. That same year, Dalí's uncle Anselm Domènech, who owned a bookshop in Barcelona, supplied him with books and magazines on Cubism and contemporary art.^[25]

On 6 February 1921, Dalí's mother died of uterine cancer.^[26] Dalí was 16 years old and later said his mother's death "was the greatest blow I had experienced in my life. I worshipped her... I could not resign myself to the loss of a being on whom I counted to make invisible the unavoidable blemishes of my soul."^[5][27] After the death of Dali's mother, Dalí's father married her sister. Dalí did not resent this marriage, because he had great love and respect for his aunt.^[12]

Madrid, Barcelona and Paris

Dalí with Federico García Lorca, Turó Park de la Guineueta, Barcelona, 1925

In 1922, Dalí moved into the Residencia de Estudiantes (Students' Residence) in Madrid^[12] and studied at the Real Academia de Bellas Artes de San Fernando (San Fernando Royal Academy of Fine Arts). A lean 1.72 metres (5 ft 7+3⁄4 in) tall,^[28] Dalí already drew attention as an eccentric and dandy. He had long hair and sideburns, coat, stockings, and knee-breeches in the style of English aesthetes of the late 19th century.^[29]

At the Residencia, he became close friends with Pepín Bello, Luis Buñuel, Federico García Lorca, and others associated with the Madrid avant-garde group Ultra.^[30] The friendship with Lorca had a strong element of mutual passion,^[31] but Dalí said he rejected the poet's sexual advances.^[32] Dalí's friendship with Lorca was to remain one of his most emotionally intense relationships until the poet's death at the hands of Nationalist forces in 1936 at the beginning of the Spanish Civil War.^[6]

Also in 1922, he began what would become a lifelong relationship with the Prado Museum, which he felt was, 'incontestably the best museum of old paintings in the world.'^[33] Each Sunday morning, Dalí went to the Prado to study the works of the great masters. 'This was the start of a monk-like period for me, devoted entirely to solitary work: visits to the Prado, where, pencil in hand, I analyzed all of the great masterpieces, studio work, models, research.'^[34]

Dalí (left) and fellow surrealist artist Man Ray in Paris on 16 June 1934

Those paintings by Dalí in which he experimented with Cubism earned him the most attention from his fellow students, since there were no Cubist artists in Madrid at the time.^[35] Cabaret Scene (1922) is a typical example of such work. Through his association with members of the Ultra group, Dalí became more acquainted with avant-garde movements, including Dada and Futurism. One of his earliest works to show a strong Futurist and Cubist influence was the watercolor Night-Walking Dreams (1922).^[36] At this time, Dalí also read Freud and Lautréamont who were to have a profound influence on his work.^[37]

In May 1925 Dalí exhibited eleven works in a group exhibition held by the newly formed Sociedad Ibérica de Artistas in Madrid. Seven of the works were in his Cubist mode and four in a more realist style. Several leading critics praised his work.^[38] Dalí held his first solo exhibition at Galeries Dalmau in Barcelona, from 14 to 27 November 1925.^[39][40] This exhibition, before his exposure to Surrealism, included twenty-two works and was a critical and commercial success.^[41]

In April 1926 Dalí made his first trip to Paris where he met Pablo Picasso, whom he revered.^[5] Picasso had already heard favorable reports about Dalí from Joan Miró, a fellow Catalan who later introduced him to many Surrealist friends.^[5] As he developed his own style over the next few years, Dalí made some works strongly influenced by Picasso and Miró.^[42] Dalí was also influenced by the work of Yves Tanguy, and he later allegedly told Tanguy's niece, "I pinched everything from your uncle Yves."^[43]

Dalí left the Royal Academy in 1926, shortly before his final exams.^[5] His mastery of painting skills at that time was evidenced by his realistic The Basket of Bread, painted in 1926.^[44]

Later that year he exhibited again at Galeries Dalmau, from 31 December 1926 to 14 January 1927, with the support of the art critic Sebastià Gasch [es].^[45][46] The show included twenty-three paintings and seven drawings, with the "Cubist" works displayed in a separate section from the "objective" works. The critical response was generally positive with Composition with Three Figures (Neo-Cubist Academy) singled out for particular attention.^[47]

The Great Masturbator (1929). oil on canvas, 110 cm × 150 cm., Museo Nacional Centro de Arte Reina Sofía

From 1927 Dalí's work became increasingly influenced by Surrealism. Two of these works, Honey is Sweeter than Blood (1927) and Gadget and Hand (1927), were shown at the annual Autumn Salon (Saló de tardor) in Barcelona in October 1927. Dalí described the earlier of these works, Honey is Sweeter than Blood, as "equidistant between Cubism and Surrealism".^[48] The works featured many elements that were to become characteristic of his Surrealist period including dreamlike images, precise draftsmanship, idiosyncratic iconography (such as rotting donkeys and dismembered bodies), and lighting and landscapes strongly evocative of his native Catalonia. The works provoked bemusement among the public and debate among critics about whether Dalí had become a Surrealist.^[49]

Influenced by his reading of Freud, Dalí increasingly introduced suggestive sexual imagery and symbolism into his work. He submitted Dialogue on the Beach (Unsatisfied Desires) (1928) to the Barcelona Autumn Salon for 1928 but the work was rejected because "it was not fit to be exhibited in any gallery habitually visited by the numerous public little prepared for certain surprises."^[50] The resulting scandal was widely covered in the Barcelona press and prompted a popular Madrid illustrated weekly to publish an interview with Dalí.^[51]

Some trends in Dalí's work that would continue throughout his life were already evident in the 1920s. Dalí was influenced by many styles of art, ranging from the most academically classic, to the most cutting-edge avant-garde.^[52] His classical influences included Raphael, Bronzino, Francisco de Zurbarán, Vermeer and Velázquez.^[53] Exhibitions of his works attracted much attention and a mixture of praise and puzzled debate from critics who noted an apparent inconsistency in his work by the use of both traditional and modern techniques and motifs between works and within individual works.^[54]

In the mid-1920s Dalí grew a neatly trimmed mustache. In later decades he cultivated a more flamboyant one in the manner of 17th-century Spanish master painter Diego Velázquez, and this mustache became a well known Dalí icon.^[55]

1929 to World War II

Soft Construction with Boiled Beans (Premonition of Civil War) 1936. oil on canvas, 100 x 99 cm., Philadelphia Museum of Art

In 1929, Dalí collaborated with Surrealist film director Luis Buñuel on the short film Un Chien Andalou (An Andalusian Dog). His main contribution was to help Buñuel write the script for the film. Dalí later claimed to have also played a significant role in the filming of the project, but this is not substantiated by contemporary accounts.^[56] In August 1929, Dalí met his lifelong muse and future wife Gala,^[57] born Elena Ivanovna Diakonova. She was a Russian immigrant ten years his senior, who at that time was married to Surrealist poet Paul Éluard.^[58]

In works such as The First Days of Spring, The Great Masturbator and The Lugubrious Game Dalí continued his exploration of the themes of sexual anxiety and unconscious desires.^[59] Dalí's first Paris exhibition was at the recently opened Goemans Gallery in November 1929 and featured eleven works. In his preface to the catalog, André Breton described Dalí's new work as "the most hallucinatory that has been produced up to now".^[60] The exhibition was a commercial success but the critical response was divided.^[60] In the same year, Dalí officially joined the Surrealist group in the Montparnasse quarter of Paris. The Surrealists hailed what Dalí was later to call his paranoiac-critical method of accessing the subconscious for greater artistic creativity.^[12][14]

Meanwhile, Dalí's relationship with his father was close to rupture. Don Salvador Dalí y Cusi strongly disapproved of his son's romance with Gala and saw his connection to the Surrealists as a bad influence on his morals. The final straw was when Don Salvador read in a Barcelona newspaper that his son had recently exhibited in Paris a drawing of the Sacred Heart of Jesus Christ, with a provocative inscription: "Sometimes, I spit for fun on my mother's portrait".^[5][18] Outraged, Don Salvador demanded that his son recant publicly. Dalí refused, perhaps out of fear of expulsion from the Surrealist group, and was violently thrown out of his paternal home on 28 December 1929. His father told him that he would be disinherited and that he should never set foot in Cadaqués again. The following summer, Dalí and Gala rented a small fisherman's cabin in a nearby bay at Port Lligat. He soon bought the cabin, and over the years enlarged it by buying neighboring ones, gradually building his beloved villa by the sea. Dalí's father would eventually relent and come to accept his son's companion.^[61]

In 1931, Dalí painted one of his most famous works, The Persistence of Memory,^[62] which developed a surrealistic image of soft, melting pocket watches. The general interpretation of the work is that the soft watches are a rejection of the assumption that time is rigid or deterministic. This idea is supported by other images in the work, such as the wide expanding landscape, and other limp watches shown being devoured by ants.^[63]

Dalí had two important exhibitions at the Pierre Colle Gallery in Paris in June 1931 and May–June 1932. The earlier exhibition included sixteen paintings of which The Persistence of Memory attracted the most attention. Some of the notable features of the exhibitions were the proliferation of images and references to Dalí's muse Gala and the inclusion of Surrealist Objects such as Hypnagogic Clock and Clock Based on the Decomposition of Bodies.^[64] Dalí's last, and largest, the exhibition at the Pierre Colle Gallery was held in June 1933 and included twenty-two paintings, ten drawings, and two objects. One critic noted Dalí's precise draftsmanship and attention to detail, describing him as a "paranoiac of geometrical temperament".^[65] Dalí's first New York exhibition was held at Julien Levy's gallery in November–December 1933. The exhibition featured twenty-six works and was a commercial and critical success. The New Yorker critic praised the precision and lack of sentimentality in the works, calling them "frozen nightmares".^[66]

Dalí and Gala, having lived together since 1929, were civilly married on 30 January 1934 in Paris.^[67] They later remarried in a Church ceremony on 8 August 1958 at Sant Martí Vell.^[68] In addition to inspiring many artworks throughout her life, Gala would act as Dalí's business manager, supporting their extravagant lifestyle while adeptly steering clear of insolvency. Gala, who herself engaged in extra-marital affairs,^[69] seemed to tolerate Dalí's dalliances with younger muses, secure in her own position as his primary relationship. Dalí continued to paint her as they both aged, producing sympathetic and adoring images of her. The "tense, complex and ambiguous relationship" lasting over 50 years would later become the subject of an opera, Jo, Dalí (I, Dalí) by Catalan composer Xavier Benguerel.^[70]

Dalí's first visit to the United States in November 1934 attracted widespread press coverage. His second New York exhibition was held at the Julien Levy Gallery in November–December 1934 and was again a commercial and critical success. Dalí delivered three lectures on Surrealism at the Museum of Modern Art (MoMA) and other venues during which he told his audience for the first time that "[t]he only difference between me and a madman is that I am not mad."^[71] The heiress Caresse Crosby, the inventor of the brassiere, organized a farewell fancy dress ball for Dalí on 18 January 1935. Dalí wore a glass case on his chest containing a brassiere and Gala dressed as a woman giving birth through her head. A Paris newspaper later claimed that the Dalís had dressed as the Lindbergh baby and his kidnapper, a claim which Dalí denied.^[72]

Portrait of Salvador Dalí, Paris, 16 June 1934

While the majority of the Surrealist group had become increasingly associated with leftist politics, Dalí maintained an ambiguous position on the subject of the proper relationship between politics and art. Leading Surrealist André Breton accused Dalí of defending the "new" and "irrational" in "the Hitler phenomenon", but Dalí quickly rejected this claim, saying, "I am Hitlerian neither in fact nor intention".^[73] Dalí insisted that Surrealism could exist in an apolitical context and refused to explicitly denounce fascism.^[74] Later in 1934, Dalí was subjected to a "trial", in which he narrowly avoided being expelled from the Surrealist group.^[75] To this, Dalí retorted, "The difference between the Surrealists and me is that I am a Surrealist."^[76][77]

Dalí, photographed by Studio Harcourt in 1936

In 1936, Dalí took part in the London International Surrealist Exhibition. His lecture, titled Fantômes paranoiacs authentiques, was delivered while wearing a deep-sea diving suit and helmet.^[78] He had arrived carrying a billiard cue and leading a pair of Russian wolfhounds and had to have the helmet unscrewed as he gasped for breath. He commented that "I just wanted to show that I was 'plunging deeply into the human mind."^[79]

Dalí's first solo London exhibition was held at the Alex, Reid, and Lefevre Gallery the same year. The show included twenty-nine paintings and eighteen drawings. The critical response was generally favorable, although the Daily Telegraph critic wrote: "These pictures from the subconscious reveal so skilled a craftsman that the artist's return to full consciousness may be awaited with interest."^[80]

In December 1936 Dalí participated in the Fantastic Art, Dada, Surrealism exhibition at MoMA and a solo exhibition at the Julien Levy Gallery in New York. Both exhibitions attracted large attendances and widespread press coverage. The painting Soft Construction with Boiled Beans (Premonition of Civil War) (1936) attracted particular attention. Dalí later described it as, "a vast human body breaking out into monstrous excrescences of arms and legs tearing at one another in a delirium of auto-strangulation".^[81] On 14 December, Dalí, aged 32, was featured on the cover of Time magazine.^[5]

From 1933 Dalí was supported by Zodiac, a group of affluent admirers who each contributed to a monthly stipend for the painter in exchange for a painting of their choice.^[82] From 1936 Dalí's main patron in London was the wealthy Edward James who would support him financially for two years. One of Dalí's most important paintings from the period of James' patronage was The Metamorphosis of Narcissus (1937). They also collaborated on two of the most enduring icons of the Surrealist movement: the Lobster Telephone and the Mae West Lips Sofa.^[83]

Dalí was in London when the Spanish Civil War broke out in July 1936. When he later learned that his friend Lorca had been executed by Nationalist forces, Dalí's claimed response was to shout: "Olé!" Dalí was to include frequent references to the poet in his art and writings for the remainder of his life.^[84] Nevertheless, Dalí avoided taking a public stand for or against the Republic for the duration of the conflict.^[85]

In January 1938, Dalí unveiled Rainy Taxi, a three-dimensional artwork consisting of an automobile and two mannequin occupants being soaked with rain from within the taxi. The piece was first displayed at the Galerie Beaux-Arts in Paris at the Exposition Internationale du Surréalisme, organized by André Breton and Paul Éluard. The Exposition was designed by artist Marcel Duchamp, who also served as host.^[86][87][88]

In March that year, Dalí met Sigmund Freud thanks to Stefan Zweig. As Dalí sketched Freud's portrait, Freud whispered, "That boy looks like a fanatic." Dalí was delighted upon hearing later about this comment from his hero.^[5] The following day Freud wrote to Zweig "...until now I have been inclined to regard the Surrealists, who have apparently adopted me as their patron saint, as complete fools.....That young Spaniard, with his candid fanatical eyes and his undeniable technical mastery, has changed my estimate. It would indeed be very interesting to investigate analytically how he came to create that picture [i.e. Metamorphosis of Narcissus]."^[89]

In September 1938, Salvador Dalí was invited by Gabrielle Coco Chanel to her house "La Pausa" in Roquebrune on the French Riviera. There he painted numerous paintings he later exhibited at Julien Levy Gallery in New York.^[90][91] This exhibition in March–April 1939 included twenty-one paintings and eleven drawings. Life reported that no exhibition in New York had been so popular since Whistler's Mother was shown in 1934.^[92]

At the 1939 New York World's Fair, Dalí debuted his Dream of Venus Surrealist pavilion, located in the Amusements Area of the exposition. It featured bizarre sculptures, statues, mermaids, and live nude models in "costumes" made of fresh seafood, an event photographed by Horst P. Horst, George Platt Lynes, and Murray Korman.^[93] Dalí was angered by changes to his designs, railing against mediocrities who thought that "a woman with the tail of a fish is possible; a woman with the head of a fish impossible."^[94]

Soon after Franco's victory in the Spanish Civil War in April 1939, Dalí wrote to Luis Buñuel denouncing socialism and Marxism and praising Catholicism and the Falange. As a result, Buñuel broke off relations with Dalí.^[95]

In the May issue of the Surrealist magazine Minotaure, André Breton announced Dalí's expulsion from the Surrealist group, claiming that Dalí had espoused race war and that the over-refinement of his paranoiac-critical method was a repudiation of Surrealist automatism. This led many Surrealists to break off relations with Dalí.^[96] In 1949 Breton coined the derogatory nickname "Avida Dollars" (avid for dollars), an anagram for "Salvador Dalí".^[97] This was a derisive reference to the increasing commercialization of Dalí's work, and the perception that Dalí sought self-aggrandizement through fame and fortune.

World War II

The outbreak of World War II in September 1939 saw the Dalís in France. Following the German invasion, they were able to escape because on 20 June 1940 they were issued visas by Aristides de Sousa Mendes, Portuguese consul in Bordeaux, France. They crossed into Portugal and subsequently sailed on the Excambion from Lisbon to New York in August 1940.^[98] Dalí and Gala were to live in the United States for eight years, splitting their time between New York and the Monterey Peninsula, California.^[99][100]

Dalí spent the winter of 1940–41 at Hampton Manor, the residence of Caresse Crosby, in Caroline County, Virginia, where he worked on various projects including his autobiography and paintings for his upcoming exhibition.^[101][102]

Dalí announced the death of the Surrealist movement and the return of classicism in his exhibition at the Julien Levy Gallery in New York in April–May 1941. The exhibition included nineteen paintings (among them Slave Market with the Disappearing Bust of Voltaire and The Face of War) and other works. In his catalog essay and media comments, Dalí proclaimed a return to form, control, structure and the Golden Section. Sales however were disappointing and the majority of critics did not believe there had been a major change in Dalí's work.^[103]

On September 2, 1941, he hosted A Surrealistic Night in an Enchanted Forest in Monterey, a charity event which attracted national attention but raised little money for charity.^[104][100]

The Museum of Modern Art held two major, simultaneous retrospectives of Dalí^[105] and Joan Miró^[106] from November 1941 to February 1942, Dalí being represented by forty-two paintings and sixteen drawings. Dalí's work attracted significant attention of critics and the exhibition later toured eight American cities, enhancing his reputation in America.^[107]

In October 1942, Dalí's autobiography, The Secret Life of Salvador Dalí was published simultaneously in New York and London and was reviewed widely by the press. Time magazine's reviewer called it "one of the most irresistible books of the year". George Orwell later wrote a scathing review in the Saturday Book.^[108][109] A passage in the autobiography in which Dalí claimed that Buñuel was solely responsible for the anti-clericalism in the film L'Age d'Or may have indirectly led to Buñuel resigning his position at MoMA in 1943 under pressure from the State Department.^[110][111] Dalí also published a novel Hidden Faces in 1944 with less critical and commercial success.^[112]

In the catalog essay for his exhibition at the Knoedler Gallery in New York in 1943 Dalí continued his attack on the Surrealist movement, writing: "Surrealism will at least have served to give experimental proof that total sterility and attempts at automatizations have gone too far and have led to a totalitarian system. ... Today's laziness and the total lack of technique have reached their paroxysm in the psychological signification of the current use of the college [collage]".^[113] The critical response to the society portraits in the exhibition, however, was generally negative.^[114]

In November–December 1945 Dalí exhibited new work at the Bignou Gallery in New York. The exhibition included eleven oil paintings, watercolors, drawings, and illustrations. Works included Basket of Bread, Atomic and Uranian Melancholic Ideal, and My Wife Nude Contemplating her own Body Transformed into Steps, the Three Vertebrae of a Column, Sky and Architecture. The exhibition was notable for works in Dalí's new classicism style and those heralding his "atomic period".^[115]

During the war years, Dalí was also engaged in projects in various other fields. He executed designs for a number of ballets including Labyrinth (1942), Sentimental Colloquy, Mad Tristan, and The Cafe of Chinitas (all 1944).^[116] In 1945 he created the dream sequence for Alfred Hitchcock's film Spellbound.^[117] He also produced artwork and designs for products such as perfumes, cosmetics, hosiery and ties.^[118]

Postwar in United States (1946–48)

In 1946, Dalí worked with Walt Disney and animator John Hench on an unfinished animated film Destino.^[119]

Dalí exhibited new work at the Bignou Gallery from November 1947 to January 1948. The 14 oil paintings and other works in the exhibition reflected Dalí's increasing interest in atomic physics. Notable works included Dematerialization Near the Nose of Nero (The Separation of the Atom), Intra-Atomic Equilibrium of a Swan's Feather, and a study for Leda Atomica. The proportions of the latter work were worked out in collaboration with a mathematician.^[120]

In early 1948, Dalí's 50 Secrets of Magic Craftsmanship was published. The book was a mixture of anecdotes, practical advice on painting, and Dalínian polemics.^[121]

Later years in Spain

Portrait of Dalí by Allan Warren, 1972

In 1948, Dalí and Gala moved back into their house in Port Lligat, on the coast near Cadaqués. For the next three decades, they would spend most of their time there, spending winters in Paris and New York.^[5][61] Dalí's decision to live in Spain under Franco and his public support for the regime prompted outrage from many anti-Francoist artists and intellectuals. Pablo Picasso refused to mention Dalí's name or acknowledge his existence for the rest of his life.^[122] In 1960, André Breton unsuccessfully fought against the inclusion of Dalí's Sistine Madonna in the Surrealist Intrusion in the Enchanter's Domain exhibition organized by Marcel Duchamp in New York.^[123] Breton and other Surrealists issued a tract to coincide with the exhibition denouncing Dalí as "the ex-apologist of Hitler... and friend of Franco".^[124]

In December 1949 Dalí's sister Anna Maria published her book Salvador Dalí Seen by his Sister. Dalí was angered by passages that he considered derogatory towards his wife Gala and broke off relations with his family. When Dalí's father died in September 1950 Dalí learned that he had been virtually disinherited in his will. A two-year legal dispute followed over paintings and drawings Dalí had left in his family home, during which Dalí was accused of assaulting a public notary.^[125]

The Hallucinogenic Toreador (1968–1970), oil on canvas, 398.8 cm × 299.7 cm., Salvador Dalí Museum

As Dalí moved further towards embracing Catholicism he introduced more religious iconography and themes in his painting. In 1949 he painted a study for The Madonna of Port Lligat (first version, 1949) and showed it to Pope Pius XII during an audience arranged to discuss Dalí 's marriage to Gala.^[126] This work was a precursor to the phase Dalí dubbed "Nuclear Mysticism," a fusion of Einsteinian physics, classicism, and Catholic mysticism. In paintings such as The Madonna of Port Lligat, The Christ of Saint John on the Cross and The Disintegration of the Persistence of Memory, Dalí sought to synthesize Christian iconography with images of material disintegration inspired by nuclear physics.^[127][128] His later Nuclear Mysticism works included La Gare de Perpignan (1965) and The Hallucinogenic Toreador (1968–70).

Dalí's keen interest in natural science and mathematics was further manifested by the proliferation of images of DNA and rhinoceros horn shapes in works from the mid-1950s. According to Dalí, the rhinoceros horn signifies divine geometry because it grows in a logarithmic spiral.^[129] Dalí was also fascinated by the Tesseract (a four-dimensional cube), using it, for example, in Crucifixion (Corpus Hypercubus).

Dalí had been extensively using optical illusions such as double images, anamorphosis, negative space, visual puns and trompe-l'œil since his Surrealist period and this continued in his later work. At some point, Dalí had a glass floor installed in a room near his studio in Port Lligat. He made extensive use of it to study foreshortening, both from above and from below, incorporating dramatic perspectives of figures and objects into his paintings.^{[130]: 17–18, 172} He also experimented with the bulletist technique^[131] pointillism, enlarged half-tone dot grids and stereoscopic images.^[130] He was among the first artists to employ holography in an artistic manner.^[132] In Dalí's later years, young artists such as Andy Warhol proclaimed him an important influence on pop art.^[133]

In 1960, Dalí began work on his Theatre-Museum in his home town of Figueres. It was his largest single project and a main focus of his energy through to 1974, when it opened. He continued to make additions through the mid-1980s.^[134][135]

In 1955, Dalí met Nanita Kalaschnikoff, who was to become a close friend, muse, and model.^[136] At a French nightclub in 1965 Dalí met Amanda Lear, a fashion model then known as Peki Oslo. Lear became his protégée and one of his muses. According to Lear, she and Dalí were united in a "spiritual marriage" on a deserted mountaintop.^[137][138]

Final years and death

Church of Sant Pere in Figueres, site of Dalí's baptism, first communion, and funeral

Dalí's crypt at the Dalí Theatre-Museum in Figueres displays his name and title

In 1968, Dalí bought a castle in Púbol for Gala, and from 1971 she would retreat there for weeks at a time, Dalí having agreed not to visit without her written permission.^[61] His fears of abandonment and estrangement from his longtime artistic muse contributed to depression and failing health.^[5]

In 1980, at age 76, Dalí's health deteriorated sharply and he was treated for depression, drug addiction, and Parkinson-like symptoms, including a severe tremor in his right arm. There were also allegations that Gala had been supplying Dalí with pharmaceuticals from her own prescriptions.^[139]

Gala died on 10 June 1982, at the age of 87. After her death, Dalí moved from Figueres to the castle in Púbol, where she was entombed.^[5][61][140]

In 1982, King Juan Carlos bestowed on Dalí the title of Marqués de Dalí de Púbol^[141][142] (Marquess of Dalí of Púbol) in the nobility of Spain, Púbol being where Dalí then lived. The title was initially hereditary, but at Dalí's request was changed to life-only in 1983.^[141]

In May 1983, what was said to be Dalí's last painting, The Swallow's Tail, was revealed. The work was heavily influenced by the mathematical catastrophe theory of René Thom. However, some critics have questioned how Dalí could have executed a painting with such precision given the severe tremor in his painting arm.^[143]

From early 1984 Dalí's depression worsened and he refused food, leading to severe undernourishment.^[144] Dalí had previously stated his intention to put himself into a state of suspended animation as he had read that some microorganisms could do.^[145] In August 1984 a fire broke out in Dalí's bedroom and he was hospitalized with severe burns. Two judicial inquiries found that the fire was caused by an electrical fault and no findings of negligence were made.^[146] After his release from hospital Dalí moved to the Torre Galatea, an annex to the Dalí Theatre-Museum.^[147]

There have been allegations that Dalí was forced by his guardians to sign blank canvases that could later be used in forgeries.^[148] It is also alleged that he knowingly sold otherwise-blank lithograph paper which he had signed, possibly producing over 50,000 such sheets from 1965 until his death.^[5] As a result, art dealers tend to be wary of late graphic works attributed to Dalí.^[149]

In July 1986, Dalí had a pacemaker implanted. On his return to his Theatre-Museum he made a brief public appearance, saying:

When you are a genius, you do not have the right to die, because we are necessary for the progress of humanity.^[150][151]

In November 1988, Dalí entered hospital with heart failure. On 5 December 1988, he was visited by King Juan Carlos, who confessed that he had always been a serious devotee of Dalí.^[152] Dalí gave the king a drawing, Head of Europa, which would turn out to be Dalí's final drawing.

On the morning of 23 January 1989, Dalí died of cardiac arrest at the age of 84.^[153] He is buried in the crypt below the stage of his Theatre-Museum in Figueres. The location is across the street from the church of Sant Pere, where he had his baptism, first communion, and funeral, and is only 450 metres (1,480 ft) from the house where he was born.^[154]

The Gala-Salvador Dalí Foundation currently serves as his official estate.^[155] The US copyright representative for the Gala-Salvador Dalí Foundation is the Artists Rights Society.^[156]

Exhumation

On 26 June 2017 it was announced that a judge in Madrid had ordered the exhumation of Dalí's body in order to obtain samples for a paternity suit.^[157] Joan Manuel Sevillano, manager of the Fundación Gala Salvador Dalí (The Gala-Salvador Dalí Foundation), denounced the exhumation as inappropriate.^[158] The exhumation took place on the evening of 20 July, and his DNA was extracted.^[159] On 6 September 2017 the Foundation stated that the tests carried out proved conclusively that Dalí and the claimant were not related.^[160][161] On 18 May 2020 a Spanish court dismissed an appeal from the claimant and ordered her to pay the costs of the exhumation.^[162]

Discover more about Biography related topics

Empordà

Empordà

Emporda is a natural and historical region of Catalonia, Spain, divided since 1936 into two comarques, Alt Empordà and Baix Empordà.

Comarques of Catalonia

Comarques of Catalonia

This is a list of the 42 comarques into which Catalonia is divided. A comarca is a group of municipalities, roughly equivalent to a county in the US or a district or council in the UK. However, in the context of Catalonia, the term "county" can be a bit misleading, because in medieval Catalonia, aside from the kings of Aragon, the most important rulers were counts, notably the Counts of Barcelona and of Urgell. Comarques have no particular relation to the "counties" that were ruled by counts.

Moors

Moors

The term Moor, derived from the ancient Mauri, is an exonym first used by Christian Europeans to designate the Muslim inhabitants of the Maghreb, the Iberian Peninsula, Sicily and Malta during the Middle Ages.

FC Barcelona

FC Barcelona

Futbol Club Barcelona, commonly referred to as Barcelona and colloquially known as Barça, is a professional football club based in Barcelona, Catalonia, Spain, that competes in La Liga, the top flight of Spanish football.

Emili Sagi-Barba

Emili Sagi-Barba

Emilio "Emili" Sagi Liñán, was a Spanish footballer who played as a left-winger for FC Barcelona, the Catalan XI and Spain during the 1920s and 1930s. He was the son of Emilio Sagi Barba, the Catalan baritone singer, and Concepción Liñán Pelegrí, a dancer, and as a result, was widely referred to as Sagi-Barba.

Josep Samitier

Josep Samitier

Josep Samitier Vilalta, also known as José Samitier, was a Spanish football player, manager and scout who played as a midfielder for FC Barcelona, Real Madrid, OGC Nice, the Catalan XI, and Spain. He later coached Atlético Madrid, Nice and Barcelona and worked as a scout for both Barcelona and Real Madrid.

Cadaqués

Cadaqués

Cadaqués is a town in the Alt Empordà comarca, in the province of Girona, Catalonia, Spain. It is on a bay in the middle of the Cap de Creus peninsula, near Cap de Creus cape, on the Costa Brava of the Mediterranean. It is two-and-a-quarter-hour drive from Barcelona, and thus it is accessible not only to tourists but also to people who want a second home for weekends and summers. In 2002, Cadaqués had an official population of 2,612, but up to ten times as many people can live in the town during the peak of the summer tourism season.

Futurism

Futurism

Futurism was an artistic and social movement that originated in Italy, and to a lesser extent in other countries, in the early 20th century. It emphasized dynamism, speed, technology, youth, violence, and objects such as the car, the airplane, and the industrial city. Its key figures included the Italians Filippo Tommaso Marinetti, Umberto Boccioni, Carlo Carrà, Fortunato Depero, Gino Severini, Giacomo Balla, and Luigi Russolo. Italian Futurism glorified modernity and according to its doctrine, aimed to liberate Italy from the weight of its past. Important Futurist works included Marinetti's 1909 Manifesto of Futurism, Boccioni's 1913 sculpture Unique Forms of Continuity in Space, Balla's 1913–1914 painting Abstract Speed + Sound, and Russolo's The Art of Noises (1913).

Cubism

Cubism

Cubism is an early-20th-century avant-garde art movement that revolutionized European painting and sculpture, and inspired related artistic movements in music, literature, and architecture. In Cubist works of art, the subjects are analyzed, broken up, and reassembled in an abstract form—instead of depicting objects from a single perspective, the artist depicts the subject from multiple perspectives to represent the subject in a greater context. Cubism has been considered the most influential art movement of the 20th century. The term cubism is broadly associated with a variety of artworks produced in Paris or near Paris (Puteaux) during the 1910s and throughout the 1920s.

Federico García Lorca

Federico García Lorca

Federico del Sagrado Corazón de Jesús García Lorca, known as Federico García Lorca, was a Spanish poet, playwright, and theatre director. García Lorca achieved international recognition as an emblematic member of the Generation of '27, a group consisting mostly of poets who introduced the tenets of European movements into Spanish literature.

Luis Buñuel

Luis Buñuel

Luis Buñuel Portolés was a Spanish filmmaker who worked in France, Mexico, and Spain. He has been widely considered by many film critics, historians, and directors to be one of the greatest and most influential filmmakers of all time.

Museo del Prado

Museo del Prado

The Prado Museum, officially known as Museo Nacional del Prado, is the main Spanish national art museum, located in central Madrid. It is widely considered to house one of the world's finest collections of European art, dating from the 12th century to the early 20th century, based on the former Spanish royal collection, and the single best collection of Spanish art. Founded as a museum of paintings and sculpture in 1819, it also contains important collections of other types of works. The Prado Museum is one of the most visited sites in the world and is considered one of the greatest art museums in the world. The numerous works by Francisco Goya, the single most extensively represented artist, as well as by Hieronymus Bosch, El Greco, Peter Paul Rubens, Titian, and Diego Velázquez, are some of the highlights of the collection. Velázquez and his keen eye and sensibility were also responsible for bringing much of the museum's fine collection of Italian masters to Spain, now one of the largest outside Italy.

From the late 1920s, Dalí progressively introduced many bizarre or incongruous images into his work which invite symbolic interpretation. While some of these images suggest a straightforward sexual or Freudian interpretation (Dalí read Freud in the 1920s) others (such as locusts, rotting donkeys, and sea urchins) are idiosyncratic and have been variously interpreted.^[163] Some commentators have cautioned that Dalí's own comments on these images are not always reliable.^[164]

Food

Food and eating have a central place in Dalí's thoughts and work. He associated food with beauty and sex and was obsessed with the image of the female praying mantis eating her mate after copulation.^[165] Bread was a recurring image in Dalí's art, from his early work The Basket of Bread to later public performances such as in 1958 when he gave a lecture in Paris using a 12-meter-long baguette an illustrative prop.^[166] He saw bread as "the elementary basis of continuity" and "sacred subsistence".^[167]

The egg is another common Dalínian image. He connects the egg to the prenatal and intrauterine, thus using it to symbolize hope and love.^[168] It appears in The Great Masturbator, The Metamorphosis of Narcissus and many other works. There are also giant sculptures of eggs in various locations at Dalí's house in Port Lligat^[169] as well as at the Dalí Theatre-Museum in Figueres.

Both Dalí and his father enjoyed eating sea urchins, freshly caught in the sea near Cadaqués. The radial symmetry of the sea urchin fascinated Dalí, and he adapted its form to many artworks. Other foods also appear throughout his work.^[170]

The famous "melting watches" that appear in The Persistence of Memory suggest Einstein's theory that time is relative and not fixed.^[63] Dalí later claimed that the idea for clocks functioning symbolically in this way came to him when he was contemplating Camembert cheese.^[171]

Animals

The rhinoceros and rhinoceros horn shapes began to proliferate in Dalí's work from the mid-1950s. According to Dalí, the rhinoceros horn signifies divine geometry because it grows in a logarithmic spiral. He linked the rhinoceros to themes of chastity and to the Virgin Mary.^[129] However, he also used it as an obvious phallic symbol as in Young Virgin Auto-Sodomized by the Horns of Her Own Chastity.^[172]

Various other animals appear throughout Dalí's work: rotting donkeys and ants have been interpreted as pointing to death, decay, and sexual desire; the snail as connected to the human head (he saw a snail on a bicycle outside Freud's house when he first met Sigmund Freud); and locusts as a symbol of waste and fear.^[168] The elephant is also a recurring image in his work; for example, Dream Caused by the Flight of a Bee Around a Pomegranate a Second Before Awakening. The elephants are inspired by Gian Lorenzo Bernini's sculpture base in Rome of an elephant carrying an ancient obelisk.^[173]

Science

Dalí's life-long interest in science and mathematics was often reflected in his work. His soft watches have been interpreted as references to Einstein's theory of the relativity of time and space.^[63] Images of atomic particles appeared in his work soon after the atomic bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki^[174] and strands of D.N.A. appeared from the mid-1950s.^[172] In 1958 he wrote in his Anti-Matter Manifesto: "In the Surrealist period, I wanted to create the iconography of the interior world and the world of the marvelous, of my father Freud. Today, the exterior world and that of physics have transcended the one of psychology. My father today is Dr. Heisenberg."^[175][176]

The Disintegration of the Persistence of Memory (1954) harks back to The Persistence of Memory (1931) and in portraying that painting in fragmentation and disintegration has been interpreted as a reference to Heisenberg's quantum mechanics.^[175]

Discover more about Symbolism related topics

The Basket of Bread

The Basket of Bread

The Basket of Bread is a painting by Spanish surrealist Salvador Dalí. The painting depicts four pieces of bread with butter on them sitting in a basket. One is separated from the others and is half-bitten. The basket sits on a white cloth. The painting resides at the Salvador Dalí Museum, St. Petersburg, Florida.

The Great Masturbator

The Great Masturbator

The Great Masturbator (1929) is a painting by Salvador Dalí executed during the surrealist epoch, and is currently displayed at Museo Nacional Centro de Arte Reina Sofía, Madrid.

Metamorphosis of Narcissus

Metamorphosis of Narcissus

Metamorphosis of Narcissus (1937) is an oil-on-canvas painting by the Spanish surrealist Salvador Dalí. Originally titled Métamorphose de Narcisse, this painting is from Dalí's paranoiac-critical period and depicts his interpretation of the Greek myth of Narcissus. Dalí began his painting in the spring of 1937 while in Zürs, in the Austrian Alps.

Logarithmic spiral

Logarithmic spiral

A logarithmic spiral, equiangular spiral, or growth spiral is a self-similar spiral curve that often appears in nature. The first to describe a logarithmic spiral was Albrecht Dürer (1525) who called it an "eternal line". More than a century later, the curve was discussed by Descartes (1638), and later extensively investigated by Jacob Bernoulli, who called it Spira mirabilis, "the marvelous spiral".

Young Virgin Auto-Sodomized by the Horns of Her Own Chastity

Young Virgin Auto-Sodomized by the Horns of Her Own Chastity

Young Virgin Auto-Sodomized by the Horns of Her Own Chastity is a 1954 painting by Salvador Dalí. During the 1950s, Dalí painted many of his subjects as composed of rhinoceros horns. Here, the young virgin's buttocks consist of two converging horns and two horns float beneath; "as the horns simultaneously comprise and threaten to sodomise the callipygian figure, she is effectively (auto) sodomised by her own constitution."

Snail

Snail

A snail is a shelled gastropod. The name is most often applied to land snails, terrestrial pulmonate gastropod molluscs. However, the common name snail is also used for most of the members of the molluscan class Gastropoda that have a coiled shell that is large enough for the animal to retract completely into. When the word "snail" is used in this most general sense, it includes not just land snails but also numerous species of sea snails and freshwater snails. Gastropods that naturally lack a shell, or have only an internal shell, are mostly called slugs, and land snails that have only a very small shell are often called semi-slugs.

Dream Caused by the Flight of a Bee Around a Pomegranate a Second Before Awakening

Dream Caused by the Flight of a Bee Around a Pomegranate a Second Before Awakening

Dream Caused by the Flight of a Bee Around a Pomegranate a Second Before Awakening is a surrealist painting by Salvador Dalí. A shorter alternate title for the painting is Dream Caused by the Flight of a Bee. It was painted in 1944, and the woman in the painting, dreaming, is said to represent his wife, Gala. The painting is currently in the Thyssen-Bornemisza Museum, in Madrid.

Gian Lorenzo Bernini

Gian Lorenzo Bernini

Gian Lorenzo Bernini was an Italian sculptor and architect. While a major figure in the world of architecture, he was more prominently the leading sculptor of his age, credited with creating the Baroque style of sculpture. As one scholar has commented, "What Shakespeare is to drama, Bernini may be to sculpture: the first pan-European sculptor whose name is instantaneously identifiable with a particular manner and vision, and whose influence was inordinately powerful ..." In addition, he was a painter and a man of the theater: he wrote, directed and acted in plays, for which he designed stage sets and theatrical machinery. He produced designs as well for a wide variety of decorative art objects including lamps, tables, mirrors, and even coaches.

Werner Heisenberg

Werner Heisenberg

Werner Karl Heisenberg was a German theoretical physicist and one of the main pioneers of the theory of quantum mechanics. He published his work in 1925 in a major breakthrough paper. In the subsequent series of papers with Max Born and Pascual Jordan, during the same year, his matrix formulation of quantum mechanics was substantially elaborated. He is known for the uncertainty principle, which he published in 1927. Heisenberg was awarded the 1932 Nobel Prize in Physics "for the creation of quantum mechanics".

The Disintegration of the Persistence of Memory

The Disintegration of the Persistence of Memory

La Desintegración de la Persistencia de la Memoria or The Disintegration of the Persistence of Memory is an oil on canvas painting by the Spanish surrealist Salvador Dalí. It is a 1954 re-creation of the artist's famous 1931 work The Persistence of Memory, and measures a diminutive 25.4 × 33 cm. It was originally known as The Chromosome of a Highly-coloured Fish's Eye Starting the Harmonious Disintegration of the Persistence of Memory, and first exhibited at the Carstairs Gallery in New York in 1954.

Dalí was a versatile artist. Some of his more popular works are sculptures and other objects, and he is also noted for his contributions to theater, fashion, and photography, among other areas.

Sculptures and other objects

From the early 1930s, Dalí was an enthusiastic proponent of the proliferation of three-dimensional Surrealist Objects to subvert perceptions of conventional reality, writing: "museums will fast fill with objects whose uselessness, size and crowding will necessitate the construction, in deserts, of special towers to contain them."^[177] His more notable early objects include Board of Demented Associations (1930–31), Retrospective Bust of a Woman (1933), Venus de Milo with Chest of Drawers (1936) and Aphrodisiac Dinner Jacket (1936). Two of the most popular objects of the Surrealist movement were Lobster Telephone (1936) and Mae West Lips Sofa (1937) which were commissioned by art patron Edward James.^[178] Lobsters and telephones had strong sexual connotations for Dalí who drew a close analogy between food and sex.^[179] The telephone was functional, and James purchased four of them from Dalí to replace the phones in his home. The Mae West Lips Sofa was shaped after the lips of actress Mae West, who was previously the subject of Dalí's watercolor, The Face of Mae West which may be used as a Surrealist Apartment (1934–35).^[178] In December 1936 Dalí sent Harpo Marx a Christmas present of a harp with barbed-wire strings.^[180]

After World War II Dalí authorized many sculptures derived from his most famous works and images. In his later years other sculptures also appeared, often in large editions, whose authenticity has sometimes been questioned.^[181]

Between 1941 and 1970, Dalí created an ensemble of 39 pieces of jewelry, many of which are intricate, some containing moving parts. The most famous assemblage, The Royal Heart, is made of gold and is encrusted with 46 rubies, 42 diamonds, and four emeralds, created in such a way that the center "beats" like a heart.^[182]

Dalí ventured into industrial design in the 1970s with a 500-piece run of Suomi tableware by Timo Sarpaneva that Dalí decorated for the German Rosenthal porcelain maker's "Studio Linie".^[183] In 1969 he designed the Chupa Chups logo.^[184] He facilitated the design of the advertising campaign for the 1969 Eurovision Song Contest and created a large on-stage metal sculpture that stood at the Teatro Real in Madrid.^[185][186]

A sundial painted by Dalí, 27 Rue Saint-Jacques, Paris

Theater and film

In theater, Dalí designed the scenery for Federico García Lorca's 1927 romantic play Mariana Pineda.^[187] For Bacchanale (1939), a ballet based on and set to the music of Richard Wagner's 1845 opera Tannhäuser, Dalí provided both the set design and the libretto.^[188] He executed designs for a number of other ballets including Labyrinth (1942), Sentimental Colloquy, Mad Tristan, The Cafe of Chinitas (all 1944) and The Three-Cornered Hat (1949).^[189][116]

Dalí became interested in film when he was young, going to the theater most Sundays.^[190] By the late 1920s he was fascinated by the potential of film to reveal "the unlimited fantasy born of things themselves"^[191] and went on to collaborate with the director Luis Buñuel on two Surrealist films: the 17-minute short Un Chien Andalou (1929) and the feature film L'Age d'Or (1930). Dalí and Buñuel agree that they jointly developed the script and imagery of Un Chien Andalou, but there is controversy over the extent of Dalí's contribution to L'Age d'Or.^[192] Un Chien Andalou features a graphic opening scene of a human eyeball being slashed with a razor and develops surreal imagery and irrational discontinuities in time and space to produce a dreamlike quality.^[193] L'Age d'Or is more overtly anti-clerical and anti-establishment, and was banned after right-wing groups staged a riot in the Parisian theater where it was being shown.^[194] Summarizing the impact of these two films on the Surrealist film movement, one commentator has stated: "If Un Chien Andalou stands as the supreme record of Surrealism's adventures into the realm of the unconscious, then L'Âge d'Or is perhaps the most trenchant and implacable expression of its revolutionary intent."^[195]

After he collaborated with Buñuel, Dalí worked on several unrealized film projects including a published script for a film, Babaouo (1932); a scenario for Harpo Marx called Giraffes on Horseback Salad (1937); and an abandoned dream sequence for the film Moontide (1942).^[196] In 1945 Dalí created the dream sequence in Hitchcock's Spellbound, but neither Dalí nor the director was satisfied with the result.^[197] Dalí also worked with Walt Disney and animator John Hench on the short film Destino in 1946.^[119] After initially being abandoned, the animated film was completed in 2003 by Baker Bloodworth and Walt Disney's nephew Roy E. Disney. Between 1954 and 1961 Dalí worked with photographer Robert Descharnes on The Prodigious History of the Lacemaker and the Rhinoceros, but the film was never completed.^[198]

In the 1960s Dalí worked with some directors on documentary and performance films including with Philippe Halsman on Chaos and Creation (1960), Jack Bond on Dalí in New York (1966) and Jean-Christophe Averty on Soft Self-Portrait of Salvador Dalí (1966).^[199]

Dalí collaborated with director José-Montes Baquer on the pseudo-documentary film Impressions of Upper Mongolia (1975), in which Dalí narrates a story about an expedition in search of giant hallucinogenic mushrooms.^[200] In the mid-1970s film director Alejandro Jodorowsky initially cast Dalí in the role of the Padishah Emperor in a production of Dune, based on the novel by Frank Herbert. However, Jodorowsky changed his mind after Dalí publicly supported the execution of alleged ETA terrorists in December 1975. The film was ultimately never made.^[201][202]

In 1972 Dalí began to write the scenario for an opera-poem called Être Dieu (To Be God). The Spanish writer Manuel Vázquez Montalbán wrote the libretto and Igor Wakhévitch the music. The opera poem was recorded in Paris in 1974 with Dalí in the role of the protagonist.^[203]

Fashion and photography

Dalí Atomicus, photo by Philippe Halsman (1948), shown before support wires were removed from the image

Fashion designer Elsa Schiaparelli worked with Dalí from the 1930s and commissioned him to produce a white dress with a lobster print. Other designs Dalí made for her include a shoe-shaped hat and a pink belt with lips for a buckle. He was also involved in creating textile designs and perfume bottles. In 1950, Dalí created a special "costume for the year 2045" with Christian Dior.^[204]

Photographers with whom he collaborated include Man Ray, Brassaï, Cecil Beaton, and Philippe Halsman. Halsman produced the Dalí Atomica series (1948) – inspired by Dalí's painting Leda Atomica  – which in one photograph depicts "a painter's easel, three cats, a bucket of water, and Dalí himself floating in the air".^[204]

Architecture

Dalí Theatre-Museum in Figueres also holds the crypt where Dalí is buried

Dalí's architectural achievements include his Port Lligat house near Cadaqués, as well as his Theatre Museum in Figueres. A major work outside of Spain was the temporary Dream of Venus Surrealist pavilion at the 1939 New York World's Fair, which contained several unusual sculptures and statues, including live performers posing as statues.^[93] In 1958, Dalí completed Crisalida, a temporary installation promoting a drug, which was exhibited at a medical convention in San Francisco.^[205]

Literary works

In his only novel, Hidden Faces (1944), Dalí describes the intrigues of a group of eccentric aristocrats whose extravagant lifestyle symbolizes the decadence of the 1930s. The Comte de Grandsailles and Solange de Cléda pursue a love affair, but interwar political turmoil and other vicissitudes drive them apart. It is variously set in Paris, rural France, Casablanca in North Africa, and Palm Springs in the United States. Secondary characters include aging widow Barbara Rogers, her bisexual daughter Veronica, Veronica's sometime female lover Betka, and Baba, a disfigured U.S. fighter pilot.^[206] The novel was written in New York, and translated by Haakon Chevalier.^[112]

His other literary works include The Secret Life of Salvador Dalí (1942), Diary of a Genius (1966), and Oui: The Paranoid-Critical Revolution (1971). Dalí also published poetry, essays, art criticism, and a technical manual on art.^[207]

Graphic arts

Dalí worked extensively in the graphic arts, producing many drawings, etchings, and lithographs. Among the most notable of these works are forty etchings for an edition of Lautréamont's The Songs of Maldoror (1933) and eighty drypoint reworkings of Goya's Caprichos (1973–77).^[208] From the 1960s, however, Dalí would often sell the rights to images but not be involved in the print production itself. In addition, a large number of fakes were produced in the 1980s and 1990s, thus further confusing the Dalí print market.^[149]

Book illustrations were an important part of Dalí's work throughout his career. His first book illustration was for the 1924 publication of the Catalan poem Les bruixes de Llers [ca] ("The Witches of Liers") by his friend and schoolmate, poet Carles Fages de Climent.^{[209][210][211]} His other notable book illustrations, apart from The Songs of Maldoror, include 101 watercolors and engravings for The Divine Comedy (1960) and 100 drawings and watercolors for The Arabian Nights (1964).^[212]

Discover more about Endeavors outside painting related topics

Lobster Telephone

Lobster Telephone

Lobster Telephone is a Surrealist object, created by Salvador Dalí in 1936 for the English poet Edward James (1907–1984), a leading collector of surrealist art. In his 1942 book The Secret Life of Salvador Dalí, Dalí wrote teasingly of his demand to know why, when he asked for a grilled lobster in a restaurant, he was never presented with a boiled telephone.

Mae West Lips Sofa

Mae West Lips Sofa

The Mae West Lips Sofa is a surrealist sculpture in the form of a sofa by Salvador Dalí. The light red, 110 cm × 183 cm × 81.5 cm sized seating furniture made of polyurethane foam coated with a red polidur coating was shaped in 1972 after the lips of actress Mae West, whom Dalí apparently found fascinating. Dalí never intended for the sofa to serve a functional use. He also claimed that he partly based the design of the sofa on a pile of rocks near Cadaqués and Portlligat, where he stayed for many years with his wife, Gala Éluard Dalí. The sofa was produced in 1973 by Bocaccio Design, known also as BD Barcelona Design.

Edward James

Edward James

Edward Frank Willis James was a British poet known for his patronage of the surrealist art movement.

Eurovision Song Contest 1969

Eurovision Song Contest 1969

The Eurovision Song Contest 1969 was the 14th edition of the annual Eurovision Song Contest. It took place in Madrid, Spain, following the country's victory at the 1968 contest with the song "La, la, la" by Massiel. Organised by the European Broadcasting Union (EBU) and host broadcaster Televisión Española (TVE), the contest was held at the Teatro Real on 29 March 1969 and was hosted by Spanish television presenter and actress Laurita Valenzuela.

Federico García Lorca

Federico García Lorca

Federico del Sagrado Corazón de Jesús García Lorca, known as Federico García Lorca, was a Spanish poet, playwright, and theatre director. García Lorca achieved international recognition as an emblematic member of the Generation of '27, a group consisting mostly of poets who introduced the tenets of European movements into Spanish literature.

Mariana Pineda (play)

Mariana Pineda (play)

Mariana Pineda is a play by the Spanish playwright and poet Federico García Lorca. It is based on the life of Mariana de Pineda Muñoz, whose opposition to Ferdinand VII, had become part of the folklore of Granada. The play was written between 1923 and 1925 and was first performed in June 1927 at the Teatre Goya in Barcelona. That production was directed by García Lorca, with scenic design and costumes by Salvador Dalí, and was performed by the company of Margarida Xirgu. The play received its Madrid première that October, at the Teatro Fontalba.

Bacchanale

Bacchanale

A bacchanale is an orgiastic musical composition, often depicting a drunken revel or bacchanal.

L'Age d'Or

L'Age d'Or

L'Age d'Or, commonly translated as The Golden Age or Age of Gold, is a 1930 French surrealist satirical comedy film directed by Luis Buñuel about the insanities of modern life, the hypocrisy of the sexual mores of bourgeois society, and the value system of the Catholic Church. Much of the story is told with title cards like a predominantly silent film. The screenplay is by Buñuel and Salvador Dalí. L'Age d'Or was one of the first sound films made in France, along with Miss Europe and Under the Roofs of Paris.

Destino

Destino

Destino is an animated short film released in 2003 by Walt Disney Animation Studios. Destino is unique in that its production originally began in 1945, 58 years before its eventual completion in 2003. The project was originally a collaboration between Walt Disney and Spanish surrealist painter Salvador Dalí, and features music written by Mexican songwriter Armando Domínguez and performed by Mexican singer Dora Luz. It was included in the Animation Show of Shows in 2003.

Jack Bond (director)

Jack Bond (director)

Jack Bond is a British film producer and director. He is best known for his work for The South Bank Show and his creative partnership with the British writer, actor and director Jane Arden (1927–1982) between 1965 and 1979.

Jean-Christophe Averty

Jean-Christophe Averty

Jean-Christophe Averty was a French television and radio director, and Satrap of the College of 'Pataphysique.

Alejandro Jodorowsky

Alejandro Jodorowsky

Alejandro Jodorowsky Prullansky Embusterosky is a Chilean-French avant-garde filmmaker. Best known for his 1970s films El Topo and The Holy Mountain, Jodorowsky has been "venerated by cult cinema enthusiasts" for his work which "is filled with violently surreal images and a hybrid blend of mysticism and religious provocation".

Politics and religion

Dalí in the 1960s, sporting his characteristic flamboyant moustache, holding his pet ocelot, Babou

As a youth, Dalí identified as communist, anti-monarchist and anti-clerical,^[213] and in 1924 he was briefly imprisoned by the Primo de Rivera dictatorship as a person "intensely liable to cause public disorder".^[214] When Dalí officially joined the Surrealist group in 1929 his political activism initially intensified. In 1931, he became involved in the Workers' and Peasants' Front, delivering lectures at meetings and contributing to their party journal.^[215] However, as political divisions within the Surrealist group grew, Dalí soon developed a more apolitical stance, refusing to publicly denounce fascism. In 1934, André Breton accused him of being sympathetic to Hitler and Dalí narrowly avoided being expelled from the group.^[216] In 1935 Dalí wrote a letter to Breton suggesting that non-white races should be enslaved.^[217] After the outbreak of the Spanish Civil War in 1936, Dalí avoided taking a public stand for or against the Republic.^[85] However, immediately after Franco's victory in 1939, Dalí praised Catholicism and the Falange and was expelled from the Surrealist group.^[95]

After Dalí's return to his native Catalonia in 1948, he publicly supported Franco's regime and announced his return to the Catholic faith.^[218] Dalí was granted an audience with Pope Pius XII in 1949 and with Pope John XXIII in 1959. He had official meetings with General Franco in June 1956, October 1968, and May 1974.^[219] In 1968, Dalí stated that on Franco's death there should be no return to democracy and Spain should become an absolute monarchy.^[220] In September 1975, Dalí publicly supported Franco's decision to execute three alleged Basque terrorists and repeated his support for an absolute monarchy, adding: "Personally, I'm against freedom; I'm for the Holy Inquisition." In the following days, he fled to New York after his home in Port Lligat was stoned and he had received numerous death threats.^[221] When King Juan Carlos visited the ailing Dalí in August 1981, Dalí told him: "I have always been an anarchist and a monarchist."^[222]

Dalí espoused a mystical view of Catholicism and in his later years he claimed to be a Catholic and an agnostic.^[223] He was interested in the writings of the Jesuit priest and philosopher Teilhard de Chardin^[224] and his Omega Point theory. Dalí's painting Tuna Fishing (Homage to Meissonier) (1967) was inspired by his reading of Chardin.^[225]

Sexuality

Dalí's sexuality had a profound influence on his work. He stated that as a child he saw a book with graphic illustrations of venereal diseases and this provoked a life-long disgust of female genitalia and a fear of impotence and sexual intimacy. Dalí frequently stated that his main sexual activity involved voyeurism and masturbation and his preferred sexual orifice was the anus.^[226] Dalí said that his wife Gala was the only person with whom he had achieved complete coitus.^[227] From 1927 Dalí's work featured graphic and symbolic sexual images usually associated with other images evoking shame and disgust. Images of anality and excrement also abound in his work from this time. Some of the most notable works reflecting these themes include The First Days of Spring (1929), The Great Masturbator (1929), and The Lugubrious Game (1929). Several of Dalí's intimates in the 1960s and 1970s have stated that he would arrange for selected guests to perform choreographed sexual activities to aid his voyeurism and masturbation.^{[228][229][230]}

Personality

Dalí was renowned for his eccentric and ostentatious behavior throughout his career. In 1941, the Director of Exhibitions and Publications at MoMA wrote: "The fame of Salvador Dalí has been an issue of particular controversy for more than a decade...Dalí's conduct may have been undignified, but the greater part of his art is a matter of dead earnest."^[231] When Dalí was elected to the French Academy of Fine Arts in 1979, one of his fellow academicians stated that he hoped Dalí would now abandon his "clowneries".^[232]

In 1936, at the premiere screening of Joseph Cornell's film Rose Hobart at Julien Levy's gallery in New York City, Dalí knocked over the projector in a rage. "My idea for a film is exactly that," he said shortly afterward, "I never wrote it down or told anyone, but it is as if he had stolen it!"^[233] In 1939, while working on a window display for Bonwit Teller, he became so enraged by unauthorized changes to his work that he pushed a display bathtub through a plate glass window.^[5] In 1955, he delivered a lecture at the Sorbonne, arriving in a Rolls-Royce full of cauliflowers.^[234] To promote Robert Descharnes' 1962 book The World of Salvador Dalí, he appeared in a Manhattan bookstore on a bed, wired up to a machine that traced his brain waves and blood pressure. He would autograph books while thus monitored, and the book buyer would also be given the paper chart recording.^[5]

After World War II, Dalí became one of the most recognized artists in the world, and his long cape, walking stick, haughty expression, and upturned waxed mustache became icons of his brand. His boastfulness and public declarations of his genius became essential elements of the public Dalí persona: "every morning upon awakening, I experience a supreme pleasure: that of being Salvador Dalí".^[235]

Dalí frequently traveled with his pet ocelot Babou, even bringing it aboard the luxury ocean liner SS France.^[236] He was also known to avoid paying at restaurants by executing drawings on the checks he wrote. His theory was the restaurant would never want to cash such a valuable piece of art, and he was usually correct.^[237]

Dalí's fame meant he was a frequent guest on television in Spain, France and the United States, including appearances on the Tonight Show with Johnny Carson on 7 January 1963^[238] The Mike Wallace Interview^[239] and the panel show What's My Line?.^[240][241] Dalí appeared on The Dick Cavett Show on 6 March 1970 carrying an anteater.^[242] He also appeared in numerous advertising campaigns such for Lanvin [fr] chocolates^[243][244] and Braniff International Airlines in 1968.^[245]

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Miguel Primo de Rivera

Miguel Primo de Rivera

Miguel Primo de Rivera y Orbaneja, 2nd Marquess of Estella, was a dictator, aristocrat, and military officer who served as Prime Minister of Spain from 1923 to 1930 during Spain's Restoration era. He deeply believed that it was the politicians who had ruined Spain and that by governing without them, he could restore the nation. His slogan was "Country, Religion, Monarchy."

André Breton

André Breton

André Robert Breton was a French writer and poet, the co-founder, leader, and principal theorist of surrealism. His writings include the first Surrealist Manifesto of 1924, in which he defined surrealism as "pure psychic automatism".

Pope John XXIII

Pope John XXIII

Pope John XXIII (Latin: Ioannes XXIII; Italian: Giovanni XXIII; born Angelo Giuseppe Roncalli was head of the Catholic Church and sovereign of the Vatican City State from 28 October 1958 until his death in June 1963. Angelo Giuseppe Roncalli was one of thirteen children born to Marianna Mazzola and Giovanni Battista Roncalli in a family of sharecroppers who lived in Sotto il Monte, a village in the province of Bergamo, Lombardy. He was ordained to the priesthood on 10 August 1904 and served in a number of posts, as nuncio in France and a delegate to Bulgaria, Greece and Turkey. In a consistory on 12 January 1953 Pope Pius XII made Roncalli a cardinal as the Cardinal-Priest of Santa Prisca in addition to naming him as the Patriarch of Venice. Roncalli was unexpectedly elected pope on 28 October 1958 at age 76 after 11 ballots. Pope John XXIII surprised those who expected him to be a caretaker pope by calling the historic Second Vatican Council, the first session opening on 11 October 1962.

Pierre Teilhard de Chardin

Pierre Teilhard de Chardin

Pierre Teilhard de Chardin was a French Jesuit priest, scientist, paleontologist, theologian, philosopher and teacher. He was Darwinian in outlook and the author of several influential theological and philosophical books.

Omega Point

Omega Point

The Omega Point is a supposed future when everything in the universe spirals toward a final point of unification. The term was invented by the French Jesuit Catholic priest Pierre Teilhard de Chardin (1881–1955). Teilhard argued that the Omega Point resembles the Christian Logos, namely Christ, who draws all things into himself, who in the words of the Nicene Creed, is "God from God", "Light from Light", "True God from true God", and "through him all things were made". In the Book of Revelation, Christ describes himself thrice as "the Alpha and the Omega, the beginning and the end". The idea of the Omega Point is developed in later writings, such as those of John David Garcia (1971), Paolo Soleri (1981), Frank Tipler (1994), and David Deutsch (1997).

The First Days of Spring

The First Days of Spring

The First Days of Spring is an oil an collage on panel painting by the Spanish surrealist Salvador Dalí, created in 1929.

The Great Masturbator

The Great Masturbator

The Great Masturbator (1929) is a painting by Salvador Dalí executed during the surrealist epoch, and is currently displayed at Museo Nacional Centro de Arte Reina Sofía, Madrid.

Académie des Beaux-Arts

Académie des Beaux-Arts

The Académie des Beaux-Arts is a French learned society based in Paris. It is one of the five academies of the Institut de France. The current president of the academy (2021) is Alain-Charles Perrot, a French architect.

Joseph Cornell

Joseph Cornell

Joseph Cornell was an American visual artist and film-maker, one of the pioneers and most celebrated exponents of assemblage. Influenced by the Surrealists, he was also an avant-garde experimental filmmaker. He was largely self-taught in his artistic efforts, and improvised his own original style incorporating cast-off and discarded artifacts. He lived most of his life in relative physical isolation, caring for his mother and his disabled brother at home, but remained aware of and in contact with other contemporary artists.

Rose Hobart (film)

Rose Hobart (film)

Rose Hobart is a 1936 experimental collage film created by the artist Joseph Cornell, who cut and re-edited the Universal film East of Borneo (1931) into one of America's most famous surrealist short films. Cornell was fascinated by the star of East of Borneo, an actress named Rose Hobart, and named his short film after her. The piece consists of snippets from East of Borneo combined with shots from a documentary film of an eclipse.

Ocelot

Ocelot

The ocelot is a medium-sized spotted wild cat that reaches 40–50 cm (15.7–19.7 in) at the shoulders and weighs between 7 and 15.5 kg on average. It was first described by Carl Linnaeus in 1758. Two subspecies are recognized. It is native to the southwestern United States, Mexico, Central and South America, and the Caribbean islands of Trinidad and Margarita. It prefers areas close to water sources with dense vegetation cover and high prey availability.

Babou (ocelot)

Babou (ocelot)

Babou was a pet ocelot and frequent companion of the surrealist artist Salvador Dalí in the 1960s. A cat lover, Dalí claimed to have been given the animal by the head of state of Colombia. Babou's date of death is unknown.

Two major museums are devoted to Dalí's work: the Dalí Theatre-Museum in Figueres, Catalonia, Spain, and the Salvador Dalí Museum in St. Petersburg, Florida, U.S.

Dalí's life and work have been an important influence on pop art, other Surrealists, and contemporary artists such as Jeff Koons and Damien Hirst.^[7][8] He has been portrayed on film by Robert Pattinson in Little Ashes (2008), and by Adrien Brody in Midnight in Paris (2011). The Salvador Dalí Desert in Bolivia and the Dalí crater on the planet Mercury are named for him.^[246][247]

The Spanish television series Money Heist (2017–2021) includes characters wearing a costume of red jumpsuits and Dalí masks.^[248] The creator of the series stated that the Dalí mask was chosen because it was an iconic Spanish image.^[249] The Gala-Salvador Dalí Foundation protested against the use of Dalí's image without the authorisation of the Dalí estate.^[250] Following the popular success of the series, there were reports of people in various countries wearing the costume while participating in political protests, committing crimes or as fancy dress.^[248][251]

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Salvador Dalí Museum

Salvador Dalí Museum

The Salvador Dalí Museum is an art museum in St. Petersburg, Florida, United States, dedicated to the works of Salvador Dalí. Designed by Yann Weymouth, the museum is located on the downtown St. Petersburg waterfront by 5th Avenue Southeast, Bay Shore Drive, and Dan Wheldon Way.

St. Petersburg, Florida

St. Petersburg, Florida

St. Petersburg is a city in Pinellas County, Florida, United States. As of the 2020 census, the population was 258,308, making it the fifth-most populous city in Florida and the second-largest city in the Tampa Bay Area, after Tampa. It is the largest city in the state that is not a county seat. Along with Clearwater, these cities are part of the Tampa–St. Petersburg–Clearwater Metropolitan Statistical Area, the second-largest in Florida with a population of around 2.8 million. St. Petersburg is on the Pinellas peninsula between Tampa Bay and the Gulf of Mexico, and is connected to mainland Florida to the north.

Florida

Florida

Florida is a state in the Southeastern region of the United States, bordered to the west by the Gulf of Mexico; Alabama to the northwest; Georgia to the north; the Bahamas and Atlantic Ocean to the east; and the Straits of Florida and Cuba to the south. It is the only state that borders both the Gulf of Mexico and the Atlantic Ocean. With a population exceeding 21 million, it is the third-most populous state in the nation as of 2020. It spans 65,758 square miles (170,310 km2), ranking 22nd in area among the 50 states. The Miami metropolitan area, anchored by the cities of Miami, Fort Lauderdale, and West Palm Beach, is the state's largest metropolitan area with a population of 6.138 million, and the state's most-populous city is Jacksonville with a population of 949,611. Florida's other major population centers include Tampa Bay, Orlando, Cape Coral, and the state capital of Tallahassee.

United States

United States

The United States of America, commonly known as the United States or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It consists of 50 states, a federal district, five major unincorporated territories, nine Minor Outlying Islands, and 326 Indian reservations. The United States is also in free association with three Pacific Island sovereign states: the Federated States of Micronesia, the Marshall Islands, and the Republic of Palau. It is the world's third-largest country by both land and total area. It shares land borders with Canada to its north and with Mexico to its south and has maritime borders with the Bahamas, Cuba, Russia, and other nations. With a population of over 333 million, it is the most populous country in the Americas and the third most populous in the world. The national capital of the United States is Washington, D.C. and its most populous city and principal financial center is New York City.

Robert Pattinson

Robert Pattinson

Robert Douglas Thomas Pattinson is an English actor. Known for starring in both big-budget and independent films, Pattinson has ranked among the world's highest-paid actors. In 2010, Time magazine named him one of the 100 most influential people in the world, and he was featured in the Forbes Celebrity 100 list.

Little Ashes

Little Ashes

Little Ashes is a 2008 Spanish-British drama film set against the backdrop of Spain during the 1920s and 1930s, as three of the era's most creative young talents meet at university and set off on a course to change their world. Luis Buñuel watches helplessly as the friendship between surrealist painter Salvador Dalí and the poet Federico García Lorca develops into a love affair.

Adrien Brody

Adrien Brody

Adrien Nicholas Brody is an American actor. He received widespread recognition and acclaim after starring as Władysław Szpilman in Roman Polanski's The Pianist (2002), for which he won the Academy Award for Best Actor at age 29, becoming the youngest actor to win in that category. Brody is the second male American actor after Christopher Lambert to receive the César Award for Best Actor.

Midnight in Paris

Midnight in Paris

Midnight in Paris is a 2011 fantasy comedy film written and directed by Woody Allen. Set in Paris, the film follows Gil Pender, a screenwriter, who is forced to confront the shortcomings of his relationship with his materialistic fiancée and their divergent goals, which become increasingly exaggerated as he travels back in time each night at midnight.

Salvador Dalí Desert

Salvador Dalí Desert

Salvador Dalí Desert, also known as Dalí Valley, is an extremely barren valley of southwestern Bolivia, in the Potosí Department. It is entirely contained within the borders of Eduardo Avaroa Andean Fauna National Reserve and is characterized by landscapes that resemble surrealist paintings by Salvador Dalí.

Dali (crater)

Dali (crater)

Dali is a crater on Mercury. It has a diameter of 176 kilometers. Its name was adopted by the International Astronomical Union in 2008. Dali is named for the Spanish painter Salvador Dalí, who lived from 1904 to 1989.

Money Heist

Money Heist

Money Heist is a Spanish heist crime drama television series created by Álex Pina. The series traces two long-prepared heists led by the Professor, one on the Royal Mint of Spain, and one on the Bank of Spain, told from the perspective of one of the robbers, Tokyo. The narrative is told in a real-time-like fashion and relies on flashbacks, time-jumps, hidden character motivations, and an unreliable narrator for complexity.

• 1964: Knight Grand Cross of the Order of Isabella the Catholic^[252]
• 1972: Associate member of the Royal Academy of Science, Letters and Fine Arts of Belgium^[253]
• 1978: Associate member of the Académie des Beaux-Arts of the Institut de France^[254]
• 1981: Knight Grand Cross of the Order of Charles III^[255]
• 1982: Created 1st Marquess of Dalí of Púbol, by King Juan Carlos^[142]

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Order of Isabella the Catholic

Order of Isabella the Catholic

The Order of Isabella the Catholic is a Spanish civil order and honor granted to persons and institutions in recognition of extraordinary services to the homeland or the promotion of international relations and cooperation with other nations. The Order is open not only to Spaniards; it has been granted to many foreigners.

Royal Academy of Science, Letters and Fine Arts of Belgium

Royal Academy of Science, Letters and Fine Arts of Belgium

The Royal Academy of Science, Letters and Fine Arts of Belgium is the independent learned society of science and arts of the French Community of Belgium. One of Belgium's numerous academies, it is the French-speaking counterpart of the Royal Flemish Academy of Belgium for Science and the Arts. In 2001 both academies founded a joint association for the purpose of promoting science and arts on an international level: The Royal Academies for Science and the Arts of Belgium (RASAB). All three institutions are located in the same building, the Academy Palace in Brussels.

Académie des Beaux-Arts

Académie des Beaux-Arts

The Académie des Beaux-Arts is a French learned society based in Paris. It is one of the five academies of the Institut de France. The current president of the academy (2021) is Alain-Charles Perrot, a French architect.

Institut de France

Institut de France

The Institut de France is a French learned society, grouping five académies, including the Académie Française. It was established in 1795 at the direction of the National Convention. Located on the Quai de Conti in the 6th arrondissement of Paris, the institute manages approximately 1,000 foundations, as well as museums and châteaux open for visit. It also awards prizes and subsidies, which amounted to a total of over €27 million per year in 2017. Most of these prizes are awarded by the institute on the recommendation of the académies.

Order of Charles III

Order of Charles III

The Royal and Distinguished Spanish Order of Charles III, originally Royal and Much Distinguished Order of Charles III was established by the King of Spain Charles III by means of the Royal Decree of 19 September 1771, with the motto Virtuti et mérito. Its objective is to reward people for their actions in benefit to Spain and the Crown.

Dalí produced over 1,600 paintings and numerous graphic works, sculptures, three-dimensional objects, and designs.^[256] Below is a sample of important and representative works.

• Landscape Near Figueras (1910–14)
• Vilabertran (1910–14)
• Cabaret Scene (1922)
• Night Walking Dreams (1922)
• The Basket of Bread (1926)
• Composition with Three Figures (Neo-Cubist Academy) (1927)
• Honey is Sweeter than Blood (1927)
• Un Chien Andalou (An Andalusian Dog) (1929) (film in collaboration with Luis Buñuel)
• The Lugubrious Game (1929)
• The Great Masturbator (1929)
• The First Days of Spring (1929)
• L'Age d'Or (The Golden Age) (1930) (film in collaboration with Luis Buñuel)
• Board of Demented Associations (1930–31) (Surrealist object)
• Premature Ossification of a Railway Station (1931)
• The Persistence of Memory (1931)
• Retrospective Bust of a Woman (1933) (mixed media sculpture collage)
• The Ghost of Vermeer of Delft Which Can Be Used As a Table (c.1934)
• Lobster Telephone (1936)
• Venus de Milo with Drawers (1936)
• Soft Construction with Boiled Beans (Premonition of Civil War) (1936)
• Metamorphosis of Narcissus (1937)
• Swans Reflecting Elephants (1937)
• The Burning Giraffe (1937)
• Mae West Lips Sofa (1937)
• Apparition of Face and Fruit Dish on a Beach (1938)
• Shirley Temple, The Youngest, Most Sacred Monster of the Cinema in Her Time (1939)
• Slave Market with the Disappearing Bust of Voltaire (1940)
• The Face of War (also known as The Visage of the War) (1940)
• Geopoliticus Child Watching the Birth of the New Man (1943)
• Dream Caused by the Flight of a Bee Around a Pomegranate a Second Before Awakening (c.1944)
• Basket of Bread – Rather Death than Shame (1945)
• The Temptation of St. Anthony (1946)
• The Elephants (1948) (also known as Project for "As You Like It")
• Leda Atomica (1947–1949)
• The Madonna of Port Lligat (1949)
• Christ of Saint John of the Cross (also known as The Christ) (1951)
• Galatea of the Spheres (1952) (also known as Gala Placidia)
• The Disintegration of the Persistence of Memory (1952–54)
• Crucifixion (Corpus Hypercubus) (c.1954) (also known as Hypercubic Christ)
• Young Virgin Auto-Sodomized by the Horns of Her Own Chastity (1954)
• The Sacrament of the Last Supper (1955)
• Still Life Moving Fast (c. 1956) (also known as Fast-Moving Still Life)
• The Discovery of America by Christopher Columbus (1958)
• Perpignan Railway Station (c. 1965)
• Tuna Fishing (1966–67)
• The Hallucinogenic Toreador (1970)
• Nieuw Amsterdam (1974 object/sculpture)
• The Swallow's Tail (c.1983)

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List of works by Salvador Dalí

List of works by Salvador Dalí

Salvador Dalí produced over 1,500 paintings over the course of his career. He also produced illustrations for books, lithographs, designs for theater sets and costumes, a great number of drawings, dozens of sculptures, and various other projects, including an animated short film for Disney.

Landscape Near Figueras

Landscape Near Figueras

Landscape Near Figueras (1910) is a painting by the Spanish artist Salvador Dalí. This is one of the earliest known works by Dalí, having been painted when he was about six years old.

Cabaret Scene

Cabaret Scene

Cabaret Scene is an oil on canvas painting by the Spanish surrealist Salvador Dalí, executed in 1922. It was a unique cubist experiment that came between Dalí's early impressionist work and the classic surrealist technique he later developed. Dalí was inspired by Pablo Picasso after he was expelled from the School of Fine Arts in Spain.

The Basket of Bread

The Basket of Bread

The Basket of Bread is a painting by Spanish surrealist Salvador Dalí. The painting depicts four pieces of bread with butter on them sitting in a basket. One is separated from the others and is half-bitten. The basket sits on a white cloth. The painting resides at the Salvador Dalí Museum, St. Petersburg, Florida.

Luis Buñuel

Luis Buñuel

Luis Buñuel Portolés was a Spanish filmmaker who worked in France, Mexico, and Spain. He has been widely considered by many film critics, historians, and directors to be one of the greatest and most influential filmmakers of all time.

L'Age d'Or

L'Age d'Or

L'Age d'Or, commonly translated as The Golden Age or Age of Gold, is a 1930 French surrealist satirical comedy film directed by Luis Buñuel about the insanities of modern life, the hypocrisy of the sexual mores of bourgeois society, and the value system of the Catholic Church. Much of the story is told with title cards like a predominantly silent film. The screenplay is by Buñuel and Salvador Dalí. L'Age d'Or was one of the first sound films made in France, along with Miss Europe and Under the Roofs of Paris.

Collage

Collage

Collage is a technique of art creation, primarily used in the visual arts, but in music too, by which art results from an assemblage of different forms, thus creating a new whole.

Lobster Telephone

Lobster Telephone

Lobster Telephone is a Surrealist object, created by Salvador Dalí in 1936 for the English poet Edward James (1907–1984), a leading collector of surrealist art. In his 1942 book The Secret Life of Salvador Dalí, Dalí wrote teasingly of his demand to know why, when he asked for a grilled lobster in a restaurant, he was never presented with a boiled telephone.

Soft Construction with Boiled Beans (Premonition of Civil War)

Soft Construction with Boiled Beans (Premonition of Civil War)

Soft Construction with Boiled Beans (1936) is a painting by the Spanish surrealist artist Salvador Dalí. Dalí created the piece to represent the horrors of the Spanish Civil War, having painted it only six months before the conflict began. He subsequently claimed that he was aware the war was going to occur long before it began, and cited his work as evidence of "the prophetic power of his subconscious mind." However, some have speculated that Dalí may have changed the name of the painting after the war to emphasize his prophetic assertions, although it is not entirely certain. The art historian Robert Hughes commented on Dalí's painting in his biography of Goya, stating: "Salvador Dalí appropriated the horizontal thigh of Goya's crouching Saturn for the hybrid monster in the painting Soft Construction with Boiled Beans, ... which—rather than Picasso's Guernica—is the finest single work of visual art inspired by the Spanish Civil War."

Metamorphosis of Narcissus

Metamorphosis of Narcissus

Metamorphosis of Narcissus (1937) is an oil-on-canvas painting by the Spanish surrealist Salvador Dalí. Originally titled Métamorphose de Narcisse, this painting is from Dalí's paranoiac-critical period and depicts his interpretation of the Greek myth of Narcissus. Dalí began his painting in the spring of 1937 while in Zürs, in the Austrian Alps.

Swans Reflecting Elephants

Swans Reflecting Elephants

Swans Reflecting Elephants (1937) is a painting by the Spanish surrealist Salvador Dalí. This painting is from Dalí's Paranoiac-critical period. Painted using oil on canvas, it contains one of Dalí's famous double images. The double images were a major part of Dalí's "paranoia-critical method", which he put forward in his 1935 essay "The Conquest of the Irrational". He explained his process as a "spontaneous method of irrational understanding based upon the interpretative critical association of delirious phenomena." Dalí used this method to bring forth the hallucinatory forms, double images and visual illusions that filled his paintings during the Thirties.

Mae West Lips Sofa

Mae West Lips Sofa

The Mae West Lips Sofa is a surrealist sculpture in the form of a sofa by Salvador Dalí. The light red, 110 cm × 183 cm × 81.5 cm sized seating furniture made of polyurethane foam coated with a red polidur coating was shaped in 1972 after the lips of actress Mae West, whom Dalí apparently found fascinating. Dalí never intended for the sofa to serve a functional use. He also claimed that he partly based the design of the sofa on a pile of rocks near Cadaqués and Portlligat, where he stayed for many years with his wife, Gala Éluard Dalí. The sofa was produced in 1973 by Bocaccio Design, known also as BD Barcelona Design.

• Dalí Theatre-Museum – Figueres, Catalonia, Spain, holds the largest collection of Dalí's work
• Gala Dalí House-Museum – Castle of Púbol in Púbol, Catalonia, Spain
• Museo Nacional Centro de Arte Reina Sofia (Reina Sofia Museum) – Madrid, Spain, holds a significant collection
• Salvador Dalí House Museum – Port Lligat, Catalonia, Spain
• Salvador Dalí Museum – St Petersburg, Florida, contains the collection of Reynolds and Eleanor Morse, and over 1500 works by Dalí, including seven large "masterworks".

Discover more about Dalí museums and permanent exhibitions related topics

Dalí Theatre and Museum

Dalí Theatre and Museum

The Dalí Theatre and Museum is a museum dedicated to the artist Salvador Dalí in his home town of Figueres, in Catalonia, Spain. Salvador Dalí lived there from 1984 to 1989, and is buried in a crypt below the stage. The museum received 1,368,755 visitors in 2016.

Figueres

Figueres

Figueres is the capital of the comarca of Alt Empordà, in the province of Girona, Catalonia, Spain.

Catalonia

Catalonia

Catalonia is an autonomous community of Spain, designated as a nationality by its Statute of Autonomy.

Castle of Púbol

Castle of Púbol

The Castle of Púbol or Gala Dalí Castle House-Museum, located in Púbol in the comarca of Baix Empordà, Girona, Catalonia, Spain, is a medieval building where the surrealist painter Salvador Dalí's enormous creative efforts were focused on a single person, his wife Gala, with the aim of providing her with a unique sanctuary and resting place. Gala is buried at the castle. Together with the Salvador Dalí House Museum in Portlligat and the Dalí Theater-Museum in Figueres, they form the Empordà Dalinian triangle.

Púbol

Púbol

Púbol is a small town located in the municipality of La Pera, in the comarca (county) of Baix Empordà, in the province of Girona, Catalonia, Spain.

Salvador Dalí House Museum

Salvador Dalí House Museum

The Salvador Dalí House-Museum is the house in Portlligat, Catalonia, Spain, where Salvador Dalí lived and worked from 1930 to 1982. After the death of his wife Gala Dalí, he took up residence at Púbol Castle.

Salvador Dalí Museum

Salvador Dalí Museum

The Salvador Dalí Museum is an art museum in St. Petersburg, Florida, United States, dedicated to the works of Salvador Dalí. Designed by Yann Weymouth, the museum is located on the downtown St. Petersburg waterfront by 5th Avenue Southeast, Bay Shore Drive, and Dan Wheldon Way.

Reynolds and Eleanor Morse

Reynolds and Eleanor Morse

Albert Reynolds Morse was an American businessman and philanthropist. His wife, Eleanor Reese Morse was also an American philanthropist. They founded the Salvador Dalí Museum in St. Petersburg, Florida.

• 

  Gala in the Window (1933), Marbella

• 

  The Rainbow (1972), M.T. Abraham Foundation

• 

  Rinoceronte vestido con puntillas (1956), Puerto José Banús

• 

  Plaza de Dalí (Dalí Square), Madrid

• 

  Perseo (Perseus), Marbella

• 

  Children at Dalí exhibition in Sakıp Sabancı Museum, Istanbul

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Marbella

Marbella

Marbella is a city and municipality in southern Spain, belonging to the province of Málaga in the autonomous community of Andalusia. It is part of the Costa del Sol and is the headquarters of the Association of Municipalities of the region; it is also the head of the judicial district that bears its name.

M.T. Abraham Foundation

M.T. Abraham Foundation

The M.T. Abraham Foundation is a non-profit art institution, which is part of the Israeli M.T. Abraham Group. Its headquarters are in Paris, France, and its collections are stored in Geneva, Switzerland. It was founded by the descendants of Mansur Tamir Abraham after his death in 1999. Its stated intent is promoting public appreciation for Russian and European Modernism, Impressionism, and Modern Art by collecting pieces that can be loaned "for the sole purpose of display and study by public institutions."

Perseus

Perseus

In Greek mythology, Perseus is the legendary founder of Mycenae and of the Perseid dynasty. He was, alongside Cadmus and Bellerophon, the greatest Greek hero and slayer of monsters before the days of Heracles. He beheaded the Gorgon Medusa for Polydectes and saved Andromeda from the sea monster Cetus. He was the son of Zeus and the mortal Danaë, as well as the half-brother and great-grandfather of Heracles.

Sakıp Sabancı Museum

Sakıp Sabancı Museum

The Sabancı University Sakıp Sabancı Museum is a private fine arts museum in Istanbul, Turkey, dedicated to calligraphic art, religious and state documents, as well as paintings of the Ottoman era. The museum was founded by Sakıp Sabancı, and was opened in June 2002. Aside from permanent exhibitions, the museum also hosts national and foreign temporary exhibitions and, hosts cultural events on the weekends.