One of the most famous paintings written in the genre of surrealism is “The Persistence of Memory.” Salvador Dali, the author of this painting, created it in just a few hours. The canvas is now in New York, at the Museum of Modern Art. This small painting, measuring only 24 by 33 centimeters, is the artist’s most discussed work.
Explanation of the name
Salvador Dali's painting "The Persistence of Memory" was painted in 1931 on a tapestry canvas self made. The idea of creating this painting was connected with the fact that one day, while waiting for his wife Gala to return from the cinema, Salvador Dali painted an absolutely deserted landscape sea coast. Suddenly he saw on the table a piece of cheese, which he had eaten in the evening with friends, melting in the sun. The cheese melted and became softer and softer. Having thought about it and connecting the long passage of time with a melting piece of cheese, Dali began to fill the canvas with spreading hours. Salvador Dali called his work “The Persistence of Memory,” explaining the title by the fact that once you look at a painting, you will never forget it. Another name of the painting is “Flowing Clock”. This name is associated with the content of the canvas itself, which Salvador Dali put into it.
“Persistence of Memory”: description of the painting
When you look at this canvas, your eye is immediately struck by the unusual placement and structure of the objects depicted. The picture shows the self-sufficiency of each of them and the general feeling of emptiness. There are many seemingly unrelated items here, but they all create a general impression. What did Salvador Dali depict in the painting “The Persistence of Memory”? The description of all items takes up quite a lot of space.
The atmosphere of the painting “The Persistence of Memory”
Salvador Dali painted the painting in brown tones. The general shadow lies on the left side and middle of the picture, the sun falls on the back and right side canvases. The picture seems to be filled quiet horror and the fear of such calm, and at the same time, a strange atmosphere fills “The Persistence of Memory.” Salvador Dali with this painting makes you think about the meaning of time in the life of every person. About whether time can stop? Can it adapt to each of us? Probably everyone should give themselves answers to these questions.
It is a known fact that the artist always left notes about his paintings in his diary. However, Salvador Dali did not say anything about the most famous painting “The Persistence of Memory”. great artist Initially he understood that by painting this picture he would make people think about the frailty of existence in this world.
The influence of canvas on a person
Salvador Dali's painting “The Persistence of Memory” was examined by American psychologists, who came to the conclusion that this painting has the strongest psychological impact on certain types of human personalities. Many people, looking at this painting by Salvador Dali, described their feelings. Most of the people were immersed in nostalgia, the rest were trying to sort out the mixed emotions of general horror and thoughtfulness caused by the composition of the picture. The canvas conveys the feelings, thoughts, experiences and attitude towards the “softness and hardness” of the artist himself.
Of course, this picture is small in size, but it can be considered one of the greatest and most powerful psychological paintings by Salvador Dali. The painting “The Persistence of Memory” carries the greatness of the classics of surrealist painting.
Without exaggeration, Salvador Dali can be called the most famous surrealist XX century, because his name is familiar even to those who are completely far from painting. Some people consider him the greatest genius, others - a madman. But both the first and second unconditionally recognize the artist’s unique talent. His paintings are an irrational combination of real objects deformed in a paradoxical way. Dali was a hero of his time: the master’s work was discussed both in the highest circles of society and among the proletarians. He became a true embodiment of surrealism with the freedom of spirit, inconsistency and shockingness inherent in this painting movement. Today, anyone can access masterpieces created by Salvador Dali. The paintings, photos of which can be seen in this article, are capable of impressing every fan of surrealism.
The role of Gala in Dali's work
Salvador Dali left behind a huge creative legacy. Paintings with titles that evoke mixed feelings among many today attract art lovers so much that they deserve detailed consideration and description. The artist’s inspiration, model, support and main fan was his wife Gala (an emigrant from Russia). All his most famous paintings were painted during the period life together with this woman.
The Hidden Meaning of "The Persistence of Memory"
When considering Salvador Dali, it is worth starting with his most recognizable work - “The Persistence of Memory” (sometimes called “Time”). The canvas was created in 1931. The artist was inspired to paint the masterpiece by his wife Gala. According to Dali himself, the idea for the painting arose from the sight of something melting under the sun's rays. What did the master want to say by depicting a soft clock on canvas against the backdrop of a landscape?
The three soft dials decorating the foreground of the picture are identified with subjective time, which flows freely and unevenly fills all available space. The number of hours is also symbolic, because the number 3 on this canvas indicates the past, present and future. The soft state of the objects indicates the relationship between space and time, which was always obvious to the artist. There is also a solid clock in the picture, depicted with the dial down. They symbolize objective time, the course of which goes against humanity.
Salvador Dali also depicted his self-portrait on this canvas. The painting “Time” contains in the foreground an incomprehensible spread object framed by eyelashes. It was in this image that the author painted himself sleeping. In a dream, a person releases his thoughts, which while awake he carefully hides from others. Everything that can be seen in the picture is Dali’s dream - the result of the triumph of the unconscious and the death of reality.
Ants crawling on the body of a solid watch symbolize decay and rotting. In the painting, insects are arranged in the form of a dial with arrows and indicate that objective time destroys itself. A fly sitting on a soft watch was a symbol of inspiration for the painter. Ancient Greek philosophers spent a lot of time surrounded by these “Mediterranean fairies” (this is what Dali called flies). The mirror visible in the picture on the left is evidence of the impermanence of time; it reflects both objective and subjective worlds. The egg in the background symbolizes life, the dry olive symbolizes forgotten ancient wisdom, and eternity.
“Giraffe on Fire”: interpretation of images
By studying the paintings of Salvador Dali with descriptions, you can study the artist’s work more deeply and better understand the subtext of his paintings. In 1937, the artist’s brush produced the work “Giraffe on Fire.” This was a difficult period for Spain, since a little earlier it began. In addition, Europe was on the threshold of World War II, and Salvador Dali, like many progressive people of that time, felt its approach. Despite the fact that the master claimed that his “Giraffe on Fire” has nothing to do with the political events shaking the continent, the picture is thoroughly saturated with horror and anxiety.
In the foreground, Dali painted a woman standing in a pose of despair. Her hands and face are bloody, and it looks like their skin has been torn off. The woman looks helpless, she is unable to resist the impending danger. Behind her is a lady with a piece of meat in her hands (it is a symbol of self-destruction and death). Both figures stand on the ground thanks to thin supports. Dali often depicted them in his works to emphasize human weakness. The giraffe, after which the painting is named, is painted in the background. He is much fewer women, top part his torso is engulfed in fire. Despite his small size, he is the main character of the canvas, embodying the monster bringing the apocalypse.
Analysis of "Premonitions of Civil War"
It was not only in this work that Salvador Dali expressed his premonition of war. Paintings with titles indicating its approach appeared by the artist more than once. A year before “Giraffe,” the artist painted “Soft Construction with Boiled Beans” (otherwise known as “Premonition” civil war"). The structure of human body parts, depicted in the center of the canvas, resembles the outlines of Spain on a map. The structure on top is too bulky, it hangs over the ground and can collapse at any moment. Beans are scattered below the building, which look completely out of place here, which only emphasizes the absurdity of the political events taking place in Spain in the second half of the 30s.
Description of "Faces of War"
“The Face of War” is another work left by the surrealist to his fans. The painting dates from 1940 - a time when Europe was engulfed in hostilities. The canvas depicts a human head with a face frozen in agony. She is surrounded on all sides by snakes, and instead of eyes and mouth she has countless skulls. It seems that the head is literally stuffed with death. The painting symbolizes the concentration camps that took the lives of millions of people.
Interpretation of "Dream"
“The Dream” is a painting by Salvador Dali, created by him in 1937. It depicts a huge sleeping head supported by eleven thin supports (exactly the same as those of the women in the painting “Giraffe on Fire”). Crutches are everywhere, they support the eyes, forehead, nose, lips. The person has no body, but has an unnaturally stretched back thin neck. The head represents sleep, and the crutches indicate support. As soon as each part of the face finds its support, the person collapses into the world of dreams. It's not just people who need support. If you look closely, in the left corner of the canvas you can see a small dog, whose body is also leaning on a crutch. You can also think of supports as threads that allow your head to float freely during sleep, but do not allow it to completely lift off the ground. The blue background of the canvas further emphasizes the detachment of what is happening on it from the rational world. The artist was sure that this is exactly what a dream looks like. The painting by Salvador Dali was included in his series of works “Paranoia and War”.
Images of Gala
Salvador Dali also painted his beloved wife. Paintings with the names “Angelus Gala”, “Madonna of Port Ligata” and many others directly or indirectly indicate the presence of Dyakonova in the plots of the works of the genius. For example, in “Galatea with the Spheres” (1952), he depicted his life partner as a divine woman, whose face shines through a large number of balls. The wife of a genius hovers above the real world in the upper ethereal layers. Became his muse the main character such paintings as “Galarina”, where she is depicted with a bare left breast, “Atomic Leda”, in which Dali presented his naked wife in the form of the ruler of Sparta. Almost everything female images, present on the canvases, inspired the painter by his faithful wife.
Impression of the artist's work
Photos depicting paintings by Salvador Dali, high resolution allow you to study his work down to the smallest detail. The artist lived long life and left behind several hundred works. Each of them is unique and incomparable inner world, depicted by a genius named Salvador Dali. Pictures with names known to everyone since childhood can inspire, cause delight, bewilderment or even disgust, but not a single person will remain indifferent after viewing them.
Salvador Dali, thanks to his all-consuming talent, could turn everything he touched into a “museum exhibit,” into a masterpiece, a legacy for future generations. Be it a photograph or a painting, a book or an advertisement - he managed to do everything on top level. He is a genius who was cramped in his country, his works were ahead of their time and thanks to this the artist became “great” during his lifetime. Today we, as you may have guessed, will talk about the well-known representative surrealism - Salvador Dali and about the best, most famous of his paintings.
“... I decided and began to comprehend space-time by contemplating levitation, which destroys entropy” - the words of the artist, spoken as a description of his painting depicting the process of loss of form. It was written in 1956. Currently located in the Salvador Dali Museum in St. Petersburg.
“Landscape near Figueres” is one of the artist’s earliest works, which he painted at the age of 6 on a postcard in 1910. This shining example, illustrating Dali's impressionistic period. It is currently kept in the private collection of Albert Field in New York.
"The Invisible Man" or "The Invisible Man" is a painting painted by Salvador Dali between 1929 and 1933. Kept in the Reina Sofia Museum in Madrid. This is an unfinished experimental work in which Dali practiced double images. On it the artist very elegantly depicted hidden meanings and contours of objects.
“The Appearance of a Face and a Bowl of Fruit on the Seashore” is another surreal painting that demonstrates metamorphoses, hidden meanings and contours of objects. The semblance of a bowl of fruit on the table and the landscape form the folded figure of a dog and the face of a man. This work was written in 1938. Now located in the Wadsworth Atheneum Museum in Hartford, Connecticut, USA.
In 1943, during the Second World War, Dali painted a picture about the birth of a new man. We see how a person tries to hatch from an egg, which symbolizes the birth of a new force, and is also a symbol of the universe.
This work was painted in 1940, at the beginning of World War II in California, USA, where the artist lived for 8 years. Through his work he condemns the horrors of war and the suffering of the people facing it. The painting is located in the Boijmans-van Beuningen Museum in Rotterdam, the Netherlands.
“Dream caused by the flight of a bee around a pomegranate, a second before awakening” is one of the few paintings painted by Dali in 1944. This is an example of Freud's influence on surrealist art, as well as the artist's attempt to explore the world of dreams. Located in the Thyssen-Bornemisza Museum in Madrid.
The painting was painted in 1954. This is an unconventional, surreal image of Jesus Christ crucified on a tesseract - a hypercube. The woman below is Gala, the wife of Salvador Dali. The artist seems to be hinting that Christ is being crucified by the coldness of this world and soullessness. The painting is in the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York.
Undoubtedly, this is one of the best and most famous paintings by Salvador Dali. It was written in 1931. It has three names - “Memory Persistence”, “Memory Persistence” and “Soft Clock”. It’s interesting that the idea of its creation was inspired by the artist’s view of processed Camembert cheese. It depicts a person's experience of time and memory, which is enlivened by the region of the unconscious, in the form of flowing hours.
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The great and extraordinary man Salvador Dali was born in Spain in the city of Figueres in 1904 on May 11. His parents were very different. My mother believed in God, but my father, on the contrary, was an atheist. Salvador Dali's father's name was also Salvador. Many people believe that Dali was named after his father, but this is not entirely true. Although father and son had the same names, the younger Salvador Dali was named in memory of his brother, who died before he was two years old. This worried the future artist, as he felt like a double, some kind of echo of the past. Salvador had a sister who was born in 1908.
The childhood of Salvador Dali
Dali studied very poorly, was spoiled and restless, although he developed the ability to draw in childhood. Ramon Pichot became El Salvador's first teacher. Already at the age of 14, his paintings were at an exhibition in Figueres. In 1921, Salvador Dali went to Madrid and entered the Academy there fine arts. He didn't like studying. He believed that he himself could teach his teachers the art of drawing. He stayed in Madrid only because he was interested in communicating with his comrades. There he met Federico García Lorca and Luis Buñuel.
Studying at the Academy
In 1924, Dali was expelled from the academy for misbehavior. Returning there a year later, he was again expelled in 1926 without the right to reinstatement. The incident that led to this situation was simply amazing. During one of the exams, a professor at the academy asked to name the 3 greatest artists in the world. Dali replied that he would not answer questions of this kind, because not a single teacher from the academy had the right to be his judge. Dali was too contemptuous of teachers. And by this time, Salvador Dali already had his own exhibition, which Pablo Picasso himself visited. This was the catalyst for the artists to meet. Salvador Dali's close relationship with Buñuel resulted in a film called Un Chien Andalou, which had a surrealistic slant. In 1929, Dali officially became a surrealist.
How Dali found his muse
In 1929, Dali found his muse. She became Gala Eluard. It is she who is depicted in many paintings by Salvador Dali. A serious passion arose between them, and Gala left her husband to be with Dali. At the time of meeting his beloved, Dali lived in Cadaqués, where he bought himself a hut without any special amenities. With the help of Gala Dali, it was possible to organize several excellent exhibitions, which took place in cities such as Barcelona, London, and New York. In 1936, a very tragicomic moment happened. At one of his exhibitions in London, Dali decided to give a lecture dressed as a diver. Soon he began to choke. Actively gesturing with his hands, he asked to take off his helmet. The public took it as a joke, and everything worked out. By 1937, when Dali had already visited Italy, the style of his work had changed significantly. The works of the Renaissance masters were too strongly influenced. Dali was expelled from the surrealist society.
During World War II, Dali went to the United States, where he was recognized, and quickly achieved success. In 1941, the US Museum of Modern Art opened its doors for his personal exhibition. Having written his autobiography in 1942, Dali felt that he was truly famous, as the book sold out very quickly. In 1946, Dali collaborated with Alfred Hitchcock. Of course, looking at the success of his former comrade, Andre Breton could not miss the chance to write an article in which he humiliated Dali - “Salvador Dali - Avida Dollars” (“Rowing Dollars”). In 1948, Salvador Dali returned to Europe and settled in Port Lligat, traveling from there to Paris and then back to New York.
Dali was very famous person. He did almost everything and was successful. It is impossible to count all his exhibitions, but the most memorable is the exhibition at the Tate Gallery, which was visited by about 250 million people, which cannot fail to impress. Salvador Dali died in 1989 on January 23 after the death of Gala, who died in 1982.
Creation
It is difficult to find a more controversial personality among artists. Judgments, actions, paintings by Salvador Dali, everything had a slight touch of crazy surrealism. This man was not just a surrealist artist, he himself was the embodiment of surrealism.
However, Dali did not come to surrealism right away. The work of Salvador Dali began, first of all, with the study of the techniques of classical academic painting. Dali also tried his hand at cubism; he treated the paintings of Pablo Picasso with the greatest reverence. As a result, elements of cubism can be traced in some of his surrealist works. The work of Salvador Dali was also greatly influenced by Renaissance painting. He said many times that contemporary artists nothing compared to the titans of the past (however, who would doubt it). But when he began to paint in the style of surrealism, it became his love almost until the end of his life. Only at the end of his life would Dali move somewhat away from surrealism and return to more realistic painting.
Salvador Dali can easily be considered a classic of surrealism. Moreover, Dali’s expression “surrealism is me” in modern world became true in the eyes of millions. Ask any person on the street who he associates with the word surrealism - almost everyone will answer without hesitation: Salvador Dali!
His name is familiar even to those who do not quite understand the meaning and philosophy of surrealism, even to those who are not interested in painting. Salvador Dali had a rare ability to shock others, he was the hero of the lion's share of social conversations of his era, everyone talked about him, from the bourgeoisie to the proletariat. He was probably best actor of the artists, and if the word PR existed then, then Dali could easily be called a genius of PR, both black and white. However, it is stupid to talk about what Dali was like, if you really want to understand it - just look at his paintings, which are the embodiment of his extravagant personality; brilliant, strange, crazy and beautiful.
Nuclear mysticism
After World War II, humanity moved into a new phase of existence. One of the most destructive and at the same time stimulating factors was the use of the US nuclear bomb, when the Japanese cities of Hiroshima and Nagasaki were destroyed on August 6 and 9, 1945. Of course, from a moral and ethical point of view, this event became a disgrace for the civilized world, but there was another side - the transition to a fundamentally new level of scientific and technical thought. At the same time, religious motives became more pronounced in Western European and American life.
New trends have penetrated especially deeply among the creative elite and intelligentsia. One of the most sensitive creators to tragic events was Salvador Dali. Due to his psycho-emotional characteristics, he perceived this universal catastrophe quite acutely and, against the backdrop of the specifics of his art, developed his artistic manifesto. This marked a new period in his life and work, which lasted from 1949 to 1966, called “nuclear mysticism.”
The first signs of “nuclear mysticism” appeared in the work “Atomic Leda”, where he appeared in synthesis with ancient mythology. So, after arriving from America, the theme of Christianity became the main one for Dali. Probably the first in the series of works can be considered “Madonna of Port Lligat”, written in 1949. In it he tried to get closer to the aesthetic criteria of the Renaissance. In November of the same year, he visited Rome, where, at an audience with Pope Pius XII, he presented his painting to the pontiff. According to eyewitnesses, the Pope was not too impressed by the resemblance of the Mother of God to Gala, because the church at that time was heading for renewal.
After that significant event Dali came up with the idea of a new painting - “Christ of San Juan de la Cruz”, for the creation of which he took as a basis a drawing of the Crucifixion, the creation of which was attributed to the saint himself. The huge painting depicted Jesus over the bay of Port Lligat, the view of which could be seen from the terrace of the artist’s house. Later, this landscape was repeated several times in Dali’s paintings in the 50s. And already in April 1951, Dali published the “Mystical Manifesto,” in which he proclaimed the principle of paranoid-critical mysticism. Salvador was absolutely sure of the decline of modern art, which, in his opinion, was associated with skepticism and a lack of faith. Paranoid-critical mysticism itself, according to the master, was based on the amazing successes modern science and the “metaphysical spirituality” of quantum mechanics.
With the help of his paintings, Dali tried to show the presence of a Christian and mystical principle in the atom. He considered the world of physics more transcendental than psychology, and quantum physics - greatest discovery XX century. In general, the period of the 50s became for the artist a period of intellectual and spiritual search, which gave him the opportunity to combine two opposing principles - science and religion.
Paintings by Salvador Dali
The paintings of Salvador Dali are one of the brightest examples of the embodiment of the manifesto of surrealism, that very freedom of spirit bordering on madness. Uncertainty, chaotic forms, the combination of reality with dreams, the combination of thoughtful images with delusional ideas from the very depths of the subconscious, the combination of the impossible with the possible - this is what Salvador Dali’s paintings are. And with all this, with all the monstrosity of Salvador Dali’s work, it has an inexplicable appeal, even the emotions that arise when viewing Salvador Dali’s paintings, it would seem, are simply not able to exist together. It’s scary to even think what could be going on in the head of a person capable of painting such canvases. One thing is clear - what was not there was the dullness of monotonous everyday life.
But too much crap has already been written; painting speaks louder than any words. Enjoy.
"Atomic Leda"
Today the painting “Atomic Leda” can be seen at the Salvador Dali Theater-Museum in the city of Figueres. The author of the painting, as strange as it may sound, was inspired to write it by the discovery of the atom and the reset atomic bombs on japanese islands in 1945. The terrifying destructive power of the atom did not frighten the artist at all. Information about elementary particles that never come into contact with each other and, along with this, form the surrounding reality and objects around, became a new source of the master’s creativity and the key subjects of his paintings. Moreover, Dali, who did not tolerate any kind of touch, saw in the principle of the structure of the world a special symbolism for himself personally.
"Atomic Leda" was written in 1949. The picture is based on the ancient Greek myth about Leda, the ruler of Sparta, and Zeus, the god of all gods of Olympus, who fell in love with the queen and appeared to her in the guise of a swan. After this, the queen laid an egg, from which three children hatched - Helen of Troy and the twin brothers Castor and Pollux. The master identified his older brother, who died before his birth, with Castor.
Two more important objects in the picture are a square and a book. A square and a ruler, in the form of a shadow, are integral tools used in geometry. They also indicate a mathematical calculation, and in the artist’s sketches the proportions of the pentagram, called the “golden ratio,” can be traced. Dali was assisted in these calculations by the famous Romanian mathematician Matila Ghica. The book, according to many assumptions, is a bible and an indication of the artist’s return to the Catholic Church.
The background of the painting is land and sea, like all parts of the painting that are not in contact with each other. Salvador Dali interpreted this point using the example of one of the sketches, explaining that this is how he sees the projection into reality of the origin of the “divine and animal.” The rocks on the sides of the picture are part of the Catalan coast where the artist was born and raised. It is known that when Dali was working on the canvas, he was in California, thus, the longing for his native landscapes spilled out in the creator’s pictures.
"Face of War"
Salvador Dali could not see how Hitler's troops burst into his native France. He left for the USA with his wife, leaving his favorite places, realizing with pain and bitterness that everything would be destroyed and broken.
The horror of war, fear, bloodshed overwhelmed the artist’s consciousness. Everything that was sweet and dear for many years was trampled, burned and torn to pieces in an instant. It seemed that all dreams, all plans were buried alive under the fascist boot.
In the USA, Dali was waiting for success, recognition, his life there was very happy and eventful, but then, when the artist was sailing on a ship, leaving France, he still did not know this. Every nerve of his was taut like a string, his emotions demanded an outlet and, right there, on the ship, Dali began his painting “The Face of War” (1940).
This time he deviated from his characteristic manner; the picture was painted extremely simply and intelligibly. She screamed, she burst into consciousness, she shackled everyone who beheld her with horror. The eye sockets and twisted mouth repeat this nightmare many times over. Skulls, skulls, skulls, and also inhuman horror - that’s all that war brings to everyone who stands in its way. There is no life next to war, and in itself it is nightmarish and dead.
Numerous snakes are born from the head and eat it. They look more like vile worms, but their mouths are open and it seems that even now their evil hissing can be heard. The viewer of the picture is not an outside observer; it is as if he is right here, just looking at the nightmarish face from the cave. This feeling is reinforced by the hand mark in the corner of the picture.
Dali seems to want to call to reason - now, when you are under cover, in a cave, think - is it worth going there, where there is only a lifeless mask of death, is it worth starting wars that devour their own founders, that bring endless suffering and are doomed to terrible death.
"Dream caused by the flight of a bee around a pomegranate"
The famous masterpiece of the outrageous surrealist Dali, created in 1944 and inspired by Freudian psychoanalysis, can be briefly called “The Dream”. Thus, Freud's extensive work on the theory of dreams turned out to be useful not only in the field of scientific psychology and psychiatry, but also served as a clear inspiration for adherents of surrealism. It must be said that the psychoanalyst himself did not recognize this creativity, but one cannot deny the uniqueness of these paintings and the presence of many fans of such art.
Dreams can last seconds, creating the impression of a complete performance in the arena of the unconscious. Freudianism insists on the ability of external stimuli to “penetrate” a dream, transforming into various symbolic images. So, on the canvas by Salvador Dali, the focus is on a nude model (Gala’s wife) and a small pomegranate with a bee hovering above it. These are objects real world. The rest of the composition's drawings are the product of the dream. The vast sea personifies the human unconscious, full of deep secrets. Bernini's ghostly elephant on “stilts” conveys the fragility and instability of a sleepy state. A fruit with scarlet berries takes on increased size in a dream.
The woman’s body hovers above the rocky plane, which conveys to the audience the possibility of the impossible, familiar in dreams. Just a little more, and Gala will wake up... We see a foggy moment before her departure into the conscious world from the abyss of the unconscious. Now residents and tourists of Madrid have the opportunity to admire the painting with their own eyes. Other art lovers are familiar with the work from the pages of the World Wide Web and from reproductions.
"Galatea of the Spheres"
All Dali's paintings are distinguished by their unusual appeal. I would like to carefully examine every corner so as not to miss a single detail. So it is in his famous and great Galatea of the spheres. Looking at her, you wonder: how did the artist so masterfully manage to depict a face through a set of spheres? One can only marvel at the perfection and harmony of their merging. Only a true master can create such a masterpiece.
Salvador Dali painted his picture back in 1952 during the period of nuclear mystical creativity. At that time, the artist studied various sciences and came across the theory of atoms. This theory impressed Dali so much that he began to write new picture. He depicts his wife’s face from many small spheres of atoms merging into one whole corridor. The symmetry of these circles creates a powerful perspective and gives the painting a three-dimensional appearance.
Galatea's lips are the shadow of a row of balls. The eyes are like two separate little planets. The outlines of the nose, oval of the face, ears, hair seem to break these spheres into separate atoms. Color combinations and contrasts make them appear voluminous, convex and embossed. It’s as if Galatea is a transparent shell consisting of color contrasts of many small ideal spheres.
Only some of its elements reflecting Gala’s face, her hair, lips, and body are painted in natural colors. The whole composition as a whole fascinates and enchants the viewer. It creates the impression of circles moving. It’s as if Galatea is spinning with the help of every single living atom.
"The Great Masturbator"
Painting, painted in 1929 in the style of surrealism, in this moment exhibited at the Reina Sofía Art Center in Madrid (Spain). In the center of the painting is a deformed human face looking down. A similar profile is also depicted in Dali’s more famous painting “The Persistence of Memory” (1931). From the lower part of the head rises a naked female figure, reminiscent of the artist’s muse Gala. The woman’s mouth reaches out to the male genitals hidden under light clothing, hinting at impending fellatio. The male figure is depicted only from the waist to the knees with fresh bleeding cuts.
Under human face, on his mouth sits a locust - an insect of which the artist had an irrational fear. Ants crawl along the locust's belly and over the central figure - a popular motif in Dali's works - a symbol of corruption. Under the locusts there is a pair of figures casting one common shadow. In the lower left corner of the painting, a lone figure hurriedly moves away into the distance. In addition, the canvas also contains an egg (a symbol of fertility), a pile of stones and (under the woman’s face) a calla flower with a phallus-shaped pistil.
"The Great Masturbator" has great importance to explore the artist’s personality, as it is inspired by his subconscious. The painting reflects Dali's controversial attitude towards sex. During his childhood, Dali's father left a book on the piano with photographs of genitals affected by sexually transmitted diseases, which led to the association of sex with decay and turned the young Dali away from sexual relations for a long time.
"Portrait of Luis Buñuel"
This painting was painted in 1924. Originally in the collection of Luis Buñuel. Currently located at the Reina Sofía Art Center in Madrid. Dalí met Luis Buñuel at the Royal Academy of Fine Arts in Madrid during his studies from 1922–1926. Buñuel was one of those who greatly influenced El Salvador. Dali later took part in the filming of two Buñuel films: Un Chien Andalou (1929) and The Golden Age (1930).
The portrait of Luis Buñuel was painted when the future director was 25 years old. He is depicted as a serious and thoughtful man with a gaze looking away from the artist and the audience. The picture is made in gloomy colors. Subdued colors create an atmosphere of seriousness and emphasize a thoughtful look.
This Dali masterpiece achieves a remarkable unity of active form and concentrated psychological characteristics. A beautifully painted face is instantly recognizable, just as the features of someone gaining maturity are immediately “grabbed.” individual style Dali, the artist’s ability to exercise strict self-control when choosing painting media.
"Melancholy"
Salvador Dali was a genius (perhaps a little crazy, but this is generally characteristic of geniuses who were ahead of their time) - even those in whose hearts his paintings do not find a response agree with this.
After all, these paintings, even more than any other art, need to be understood by the heart, the center of the soul, which hurts, pulls, knocks and beats. After all, even if you understand with your brain that the artist meant this, achieved this and generally protested against the Second World War and discrimination, for example, against blacks, you will not be able to love the paintings. They need to be felt. Feel the freedom beating in them - they are endless, despite the fact that they are limited by the narrow space of the canvas.
So “Melancholia” is full of desert, which stretches from edge to edge. The mountains on the horizon do not limit it; on the contrary, they seem to help it grow further, expand further. Clouds twisting into strange shapes widen the sky. Faceless cupid angels are mischievous, one of them plays the lyre. The table, with carved pillars, like a bed, looks almost ridiculous in the desert, and violates all the laws of human perception. A man with a blank face looks into the distance, bored and silent.
The whole picture resonates in the soul - melancholy, the wind in the desert, the chime of strings on a lute - but does not resonate in the brain, because the brain cannot feel it, that’s what the heart is for.
"A geopolitical baby watching the birth of a new man"
The artist spent the difficult period of World War II in America. His beloved Spain was at the very center of the bloody events, and, of course, worries about the fate of humanity resonated in the soul of the genius. The painting was painted in 1943, at the height of hostilities in Europe. In the center is a huge egg, symbolizing the planet. A crack runs through it and a hand can be seen tightly grasping the shell. The outlines inside say what kind of torment he is experiencing New person, and a drop of blood falls onto the white cloth spread under the planet. In the right corner stands a woman with hair flowing in the wind and bare breasts, pointing to the baby hugging her knees at the complex action of the birth of a new consciousness of humanity. The universe is depicted as a desert, where lonely silhouettes can be seen. Written in yellow-brown tones, symbolizing the sick state the world is in.
"The Persistence of Memory"
Inspiration for one of best works Salvador Dali became piece of Camembert cheese. A deserted beach with quiet surface of water became an unconscious person. A melted clock resembling the shape of a cheese hangs on the branch of a broken tree. In the center lies a bizarrely shaped creature, in which you can see closed eyelids with long eyelashes, on which there is also a soft watch. A peculiar idea of time, which slowly flows away in the quiet haven of human consciousness.
"Invisible Man"
It is based on a human outline, which is lost in his fantasies and imagination. The author created a work of amazing depth, the boundaries are blurred, and the space becomes cosmically endless. The same feeling is conveyed by connecting time periods of human history. Antiquity and the Middle Ages remained through the means of columns and architecture, modernity is represented by clear forms of cubism. The painting contains many images understandable only to the artist. Salvador Dali's fascination with Freud's theories is evident in The Invisible Man.
"Crucifixion"
On the chessboard in the left corner there is a woman in Renaissance clothes, in front of the sea surface of water. The gaze of the woman, who is recognizable as the artist’s wife, is directed upward, where Jesus Christ is crucified. The face is not visible, the head is thrown back, the body is stretched out like a string, the fingers are bent in a painful spasm. Geometric cube shapes and perfection young body merge and at the same time become antipodes. The cold surface of the crucifixion is human indifference and cruelty, on which love and kindness die.
Activities outside of painting
- In addition to painting, Dali’s ebullient nature found its expression in other areas of art: sculpture, photography, and cinema, which at the beginning of the 20th century was considered the most magical and promising of the arts.
- Dali visits America, where he meets and becomes friends with the famous animator Walt Disney and even draws a little for cartoons.
- He also willingly appears in advertising, but commercials with his participation are too eccentric and shocking. I will remember for a long time the chocolate advertisement where Dali takes a bite of a piece of chocolate, after which his mustache curls and he says in a euphoric voice that he has just gone crazy from this chocolate.
- The creative legacy of Salvador Dali is simply enormous: a lot amazing paintings, each of which costs at least millions of dollars.
- The artist died in 1989, but his paintings will live forever, surprising us and more than one generation of our descendants with their mysterious, crazy, eccentric beauty and genius.
The great and terrible Salvador Dali lived a bright, full of contradictions life. From childhood, he was distinguished from his peers by his obnoxious character and masterful ability to manipulate adults. A strange, incomprehensible child could not fit into the norms of behavior, for which he was often ridiculed. His actions could not be assessed from the point of view of the logic of an ordinary person.
The genius that the Catalan boy realized in himself very early made it difficult for everyone around him to live. The parents idolized the child, because his older brother died of meningitis, so all-consuming love fostered narcissism and self-centeredness from an early age. Permissiveness and freedom of choice gave the world masters of surrealism, in whose works dreams, phobias and childhood memories are encrypted.
Painted in oils in 1925, refers to early works genius. The clear, geometric lines of Cubism were not chosen by chance. The creation of two heroes Harlequin and Pierrot by means of visual deception, a paper collage located in the middle of the room symbolizes the dual nature of man, in which opposing images of clowns are layered. The palette is quite muted, only purple is revealed outside the window. seascape with a lonely sailboat. After the death of his mother, Dali was left without a family and without support, which did not smooth out the intransigence of his life attitudes.
Before meeting Gala, the artist's younger sister was best friend Salvador Dali and this The only job dedicated to her. On cardboard, in oil, in 1924, Anna Maria is depicted sitting on a chair. Childhood unity and spiritual closeness remained with them in their youth. A beauty with bottomless eyes in a light white dress sits with her face bowed. This was the golden time of brother-sister friendship. But, the marriage with Gala forever destroyed all family relationships, Anna Maria’s reproaches and jealousy and all the support of her wife in her work made the choice obvious, and only one faithful muse remained.
Geopolitical baby watching the birth of a new man
The artist spent the difficult period of World War II in America. His beloved Spain was at the very center of the bloody events, and, of course, worries about the fate of humanity resonated in the soul of the genius. The painting was painted in 1943, at the height of hostilities in Europe. In the center is a huge egg, symbolizing the planet. A crack runs through it and a hand can be seen tightly grasping the shell. The outlines inside say what kind of torment the New Man is experiencing, and a drop of blood falls onto the white cloth spread under the planet. In the right corner stands a woman with hair flowing in the wind and bare breasts, pointing to the baby hugging her knees at the complex action of the birth of a new consciousness of humanity. The universe is depicted as a desert, where lonely silhouettes can be seen. Written in yellow-brown tones, symbolizing the sick state the world is in.
One of Salvador Dali's best works was inspired by piece of Camembert cheese. A deserted beach with quiet surface of water became an unconscious person. A melted clock resembling the shape of a cheese hangs on the branch of a broken tree. In the center lies a bizarrely shaped creature, in which you can see closed eyelids with long eyelashes, on which there is also a soft watch. A peculiar idea of time, which slowly flows away in the quiet haven of human consciousness.
It is based on a human outline, which is lost in his fantasies and imagination. The author created a work that is striking in its depth, the boundaries are blurred, and the space becomes cosmically endless. The same feeling is conveyed by connecting time periods of human history. Antiquity and the Middle Ages remained through the means of columns and architecture, modernity is represented by clear forms of cubism. The painting contains many images understandable only to the artist. Salvador Dali's fascination with Freud's theories is evident in The Invisible Man.
A desert, lined with a yellow horizon, an unnatural, wrinkled face, destroying human lives. Instead of hair, there are hissing snakes with open mouths. In the eye sockets and mouth there is also a skull with the same filling. War is identified with the death that devours everything, progressing endlessly and leaving behind nothing living, only endless yellow sands.
You can look at the paintings of Salvador Dali for hours, peering at the images and silhouettes hidden by metamorphoses and the author’s imagination. “Galatea of the Spheres” seems to have been created with the help of modern high technology. How can you paint the transparent outlines of a permanent muse with the usual tools of an artist in a variety of spheres? The three-dimensional image carries you into infinity, sky blue tones create a universe consisting of a thousand atoms and creating one beautiful woman.
In the center is an image of a vase, which is nothing more than a beautiful, antique face. Blurred cheekbones turn into a tablecloth, where rope, a scarf and nails are carelessly thrown. In the background you can see human silhouettes and a seascape. Towering above the vase are two dogs, which the author makes part of nature, creating visual metamorphoses.
On the chessboard in the left corner there is a woman in Renaissance clothes, in front of the sea surface of water. The gaze of the woman, who is recognizable as the artist’s wife, is directed upward, where Jesus Christ is crucified. The face is not visible, the head is thrown back, the body is stretched out like a string, the fingers are bent in a painful spasm. The geometric shapes of the cube and the perfection of the young body merge and at the same time become antipodes. The cold surface of the crucifixion is human indifference and cruelty, on which love and kindness die.
The last creation of the hand of the great master dedicated to his beloved wife. On the horizon you can see turquoise sea and a clear sky, and in the center, gradually decreasing, 3 female profiles belonging to Gala are visible. The smile that lit up her face is no less mysterious than that of Leonard da Vinci's Mono Lisa. Looking at the canvas from top to bottom, you can identify the very first image, golden, fuzzy, blurry, symbolizing the first years together. The second person is erected on a pedestal, at this stage of life Dali deified his love, his narcissism receded before the perfection of an amazing woman. The last profile, larger in size than the others, is gray in color, devoid of warm gold. This is his Gala, real, with vices and virtues, forever remaining the main and irreplaceable for the genius.