salvador-dalí-landscape-of-port-lligat-with-homely-angels-and-fishermen

Sometimes a Dali Painting is Just Plain Angelic!

By Paul Chimera

Dali Historian & Journalist

 

Sweet, tranquil and charming aren’t exactly adjectives that leap to mind when one considers the art of Salvador Dali. But those of us who know better know that, indeed, there are plenty of lovely Dali paintings, Dali prints and others works by the master of Surrealism that exude a serenity and calm.

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One of those works was created in 1950, when Salvador Dali took to his easel and painted “Landscape of Port Lligat with Homely Angels and Fishermen” (private collection). Now don’t let the title of this work fool you: while the angels look a bit uncharacteristic of the ones Dali often included in his works, I wouldn’t call them homely at all – just, well, distinctive. I think their curvy look lends a special charm, in fact!

 

Curvy angels add a certain charm, despite being called "homely" in the painting's title

Curvy angels add a certain charm, despite being called “homely” in the painting’s title

Salvador Dali positively adored Port Lligat, the tiny, quiet hamlet on the Costa Brava, and on the extreme northeast corner of it, lying unassumingly at the foot of the Pyrenees Mountains. The artist proclaimed Port Lligat to be the most beautiful place in the world. It’s hard to argue with him on that contention.

 

No surprise, then, that Dali depicted his beloved neighborhood landscape in countless works, including the present painting, which is alternatively known as “The Arrival (Port Lligat).” The terraced hillside and tower have been seen in many other Dali paintings and watercolors. And angels seem fitting, since this was literally Dali and Gala’s heaven on earth.

 

The ship moored in the glistening Bay of Port Lligat may remind us of the one arriving in the new world (America) in Dali’s monumental masterwork painted about 10 years later: “The Discovery of America by Christopher Columbus” (alternately known as “The Dream of Columbus”), which hangs in the Salvador Dali Museum in St. Petersburg, Florida.

 

One might make the claim that the ship here in “Landscape of Port Lligat…” is part of the Dalian Continuity Dali cultivated throughout his career. That is, how he linked paintings with one another by carrying over elements from one picture to the next. In this case, the smaller ship here to the galleon in “Discovery of America by Christopher Columbus.”

 

That continuity clearly continues when we consider probably the most important Dali painting of the same year, 1950: “The Madonna of Port Lligat.” Not only does Dali give us a beautiful view of the Bay of Port Lligat, but the same terraced terrain with mill tower is seen, similarly positioned at the right of the canvas.

 

Same terraced cliff and tower appeared in "Madonna of Port Lligat"

Same terraced cliff and tower appeared in “Madonna of Port Lligat”

For those interested in truly understanding the art of Salvador Dali – and I’ve said this many times in previous blog posts here for The Salvador Dali Society, Inc. – it is absolutely imperative that one scrutinize the landscape of Port Lligat, Cadaques, and other regions of Spain that so defined Dali’s thoughts and guided his brush.

 

I don’t know of any other artist who loved where he lived to the point of worship, and then depicted it so often and so beautifully in his paintings.

 

 

 

sex appeal

‘World Exclusive’: Woman in Famous Dali Painting May Not be Headless After All!

By Paul Chimera

Dali Writer & Historian

 

What? There’s something about artist Salvador Dali and, specifically, about a Dali painting, that the whole world seems to agree on! Seriously?

 

It appears that way, when the subject is Dali’s tiny little jewel of an oil painting, “The Spectre of Sex Appeal,” one of the priceless treasures in the Teatro-Museo Dali in Figueres, Spain.

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This diminutive oil on panel, painted when Salvador was a mere 30 years of age, is universally heralded as simply one of his finest works. This is based on two main observations. One is that the work is absolutely exquisite in precision and detail. I’ve seen the work in the flesh – no pun intended, since the “headless” female figure is devoid of a lot of flesh – and it has a quality about it that is impeccable from a technical skill point of view.

 

In short, it reveals that Salvador Dali was simply one of the finest painters of all time.

 

The other main observation about “The Spectre of Sex Appeal” is how it essentially holds a mirror up to Dali who, in 1934, was a young man struggling with and confused about his sexuality and about sex in general. His sexual neuroses are illustrated by the little boy dressed in a sailor suit in the lower right – positively towered over by the immense and abominable central female figure.

 

The child, of course, is young Dali, who was frequently dressed in a sailor suit popular at the time. His holding a bone and hoop takes little imagination to discern the symbolism of male and female genitalia, respectively.

 

The horrifying female figure in an orange-colored leotard or swim suit has her pelvic area and breasts supplanted by sacks, suspected to perhaps be a reference to the painting with which Dali was obsessed all his artistic career: “The Angelus” by Millet.

Millet's "The Angelus" may have influenced "Spectre of Sex Appeal" by Dali

Millet’s “The Angelus” may have influenced “Spectre of Sex Appeal” by Dali

Clearly “The Spectre of Sex Appeal” is a symbol of the young painter’s apprehension about women and their sexual nature, and how he might fit into that equation.

 

But this blogger, writing exclusively for The Salvador Dali Society, Inc., of Torrance, Calif., is putting out to the world – for the first time, so far as I’m aware – that what has been thought of as a headless figure in “The Spectre of Sex Appeal” might not be headless at all! It may actually be a figure involved in another of Dali’s famous double- or hidden-images.

 

I believe Dali may well have intended that the head of the woman be discerned in the cliffs behind her!

 

To demonstrate what I’m suggesting, I’ve used a black marker to show how the head and elongated hair of the woman extend seamlessly from her neck and shoulders area onto the rocks behind her.

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Do you see?

 

I know. I’ve stated many times that frequently people saw things in Dali’s works that he himself never intended. Is this a case of that phenomenon? Or did Dali mean to reveal the head of this curious human form in the manner I’ve just described?

 

We’ll leave this to you, dear reader, to decide for yourself.

imatge

A ‘Typical’ and yet ‘Atypical’ Dali

By Paul Chimera

Dali Writer & Historian

 

Today’s Salvador Dali painting – “Image Mediumnique Paranoiaque” of 1935 – is both typical and atypical of Dali’s imagery and style. It’s a very small picture, open and airy in parts, tight and precise in others. What was Dali thinking when the 31-year-old set up his canvas on this occasion?

 

Of the many mysteries that surround Dali the man, and his unique brand of surrealism, there’s one thing we know incontrovertibly: he was inspired very heavily by the landscape of his native Spain. In the case of “Image Mediumnique Paranoiaque,” Dali has depicted the vast, open Bay of Rosas, into which he placed some unlikely characters.

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The appearance of the Bay of Rosas falls on the typical side; he had shown this golden sand stretch of real estate many times in his paintings. But more atypical, at least to my eye, are the two chaps in the right foreground.

 

One of them seems to be looking for something on the beach (or is it something behind the other fellow?), while the other man is leaning over to write a letter. Meanwhile, in the distance, a cyclist heads toward them – or at least toward the foreground of the scene – while, at left sits a woman in water – and she’s fully clothed.

 

There can be no doubt that woman is Lidia. She was a local in Dali’s Port Lligat hamlet, considered eccentric and, not surprisingly, something of a kindred spirit with Salvador. They got along famously and he depicted her in a number of his paintings.

 

On the inanimate side of the painting’s elements, an amphora rests on the beach, along with boulders in the area where the two guys in floppy caps strike a pose.

 

What’s remarkable about this painting is Dali’s use of space, and the apparent disassociation of the images. It doesn’t make much sense, does it? Two dudes at right, one writing a letter outdoors on a beach, the other looking curious; a woman – fully dressed, seated in a patch of water as if it’s a perfectly normal, routine thing to do; a cyclist (a rather odd mode of travel on sand) approaching for no apparent reason.

 

No one is really connected to anyone else, and yet there they are. Why?

 

Sometimes it’s easy to overlook the obvious: Surrealism was about painting one’s dreams. Exploring the subconscious. Do dreams ever make much sense? No. Are they often populated with strange images in strange juxtapositions with a completely upended sense of space and time? Absolutely.

 

In “Image Mediumnique Paranoiaque,” the sun sets on a painting that is seldom considered when one thinks about the art of Dali, and yet it’s one of his most enchanting and, indeed, puzzling little jewels in the medium of oil painting.

 

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‘Espana’ (Spain) Considered one of Dali’s Best

By Paul Chimera

Dali Writer & Historian

 

“Spain” (1938) is universally regarded as one of the finest and most important paintings in all of Salvador Dali’s surrealism.

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When we try our best to get inside Dali’s head – a generally impossible task, of course – we can readily see that, in “Spain,” the artist was clearly making a statement about the Spanish Civil War, which gripped his beloved country and was a nightmarishly brutal, bloody, deadly three-year conflict.

 

In this earth-colored picture, Dali achieved one of his finest double-images. A mélange of soldiers in battle, some on horseback, others on foot, simultaneously form the face of a woman (the mother country, Spain) leaning on a cabinet and looking down forlornly at the curious single-drawer piece of dismal furniture.

 

Out of that drawer hangs a red cloth, which might represent the red of the blood shed mercilessly during this dreadful time in Spain’s history.

 

A lion reposes nearby, perhaps to suggest the ferocity of the war. Or maybe it’s a nod to the frequently seen beast in Dali’s earlier surrealist paintings, in which a lion was a Freudian symbol of paternal control and intimidation.

 

Some scholars have drawn a comparison between Salvador Dali’s “Spain” (frequently written in the Spanish form, “Espana”) and Leonardo DaVinci’s painting, “Adoration of the Magi.” In the latter work, the central foreground picture is the Virgin Mary, and in the background are seen, among other details, warriors battling on horseback.

 

It is written that, when Picasso visited Dali’s studio in Paris at this time, he asked specifically to see “Spain.” Picasso apparently had the same reverence for the work that scholars and lovers of Dali art have today.

 

Dali did an extraordinarily skillful job of positioning a clutch of warriors and their horses in such a way that their positioning quite brilliantly morphs into the hidden/double-image of Mother Spain, whose fragile, transparent body exudes a ghost-like aura consistent with the melancholic message Dali was trying to convey.

 

Not taking sides in the Spanish Civil War, Dali exiled himself to other parts of Europe, and the United States, during this time.

 

Once again, at the risk of repeating myself, I underscore how Salvador Dali was certainly not just the guy who painted melting watches! “Spain” is a brilliant example of Dali’s maturity, insight, and sensitivity as a then 34-year-old painter. The work brings together magnificently Dali’s unparalleled ability to see things differently – especially his genius at double-imagery – with his great technical precision, without which this kind of hidden imagery could not be so effectively achieved.

 

Untitled-Design-for-the-Mural-Painting-for-Helena-Rubinstein-panel-1-1942

A Double Double-Image in a Dali?

By Paul Chimera

Dali Writer & Historian

 

One of the great things about Salvador Dali paintings, Dali prints, drawings and other works by the Spanish master of surrealism is that you can often see things in them that you didn’t see during earlier visits.

 

This happened to me just today, as I was contemplating part of a three-panel commission by Dali: his “Fantastic Landscape” – one of three excellent wall-mounted oil paintings he created for the New York City apartment of cosmetics queen Helena Rubinstein.

mural-painting-for-helena-rubinstein-panel-1

 

The large canvas features a central androgynous figure striking a dramatic pose on a beach. The theme continues in the background with mythical figures cavorting just off-shore. Just behind the principal figure is part of a stone column, upon which “Gala S. Dali” is chiseled.

 

The main figure has both male and female qualities, as its form from the waist up emerges from billowy clouds and a riot of sea birds.

 

As was Dali’s penchant throughout his career, “Fantastic Landscape” features a double-image, as six birds – from top to bottom – form the figure’s eyebrows, nose, lips and chin. In general, despite more masculine arms, there’s enough about the figure’s features to lean us toward the conclusion she’s female. Or at least that’s my view.

 

But wait! Why didn’t I notice this before? Look just to the right of the main face of birds. There appears to be a second face. This time, a decidedly male face, where two birds constitute his eyes, while a third bird is positioned to suggest a mustache just below his nose! The tail of the same bird serves to represent a tiny touch of beard.

 

Does this charming Dali work include not one but two hidden faces? I think it does, but viewers must decide for themselves. And therein lies one of the many reasons why the art of Salvador Dali is so fascinating and, yes, so fun. Not always, of course, but often.

 

Dali liked to engage us. He loved humor. He loved the participatory nature of modern art – his brand of modern art, that is. Art that made us wonder, made us smile, made us wince, made us sit up and take notice.

 

Of course, Dali’s double-imagery was often ultimately left up to us to decide if it was intended or random. The present case is a great example, because it’s long been a tradition for people to gaze upon the clouds and see – or think we see – all manner of objects, animate and inanimate. The triumph of the imagination is a wonderful thing.

 

When I was publicity director of the Dali Museum in Ohio (before it moved to Florida), I loved hearing Eleanor Morse – co-benefactor of the museum’s collection – explain that Dali would find it amusing when people told him they said they saw this or that in his surrealist compositions. “You eez having one very good idea,” Dali would reply, “but Dali nevair theenk of it!!”

 

 

palladio-s-corridor-of-dramatic-surprise

Italian Architect Influences a Dramatic Dali!

By Paul Chimera

Dali writer & historian

 

What motivated Dali? What inspired him? What was in his head before he set brush to canvas? Intriguing questions – ones often not easily answered.

 

But today let’s try to answer them as they apply to a work from the 1930s – a period most critics agree was Dali’s most fertile and important period. For the record, I don’t necessarily agree with that contention, since I believe his post-surrealist, Nuclear-Mystical period yielded some of Salvador Dali’s best work.

 

But clearly in the 1930s a young Dali produced some of his best work. Including “Palladio’s Corridor of Dramatic Surprise” of 1938. This is not exactly a Dali painting that leaps to mind when one thinks about the kingpin of surrealism. It definitely has something of a different feel to it, in comparison to other Dali works.

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The year this painting was created, 1938, put things in the middle of the Spanish Civil War. Dali traveled to Italy during this time, and became acquainted and fascinated with the Italian architect, Palladio, and, in particular, with his Teatro Olimpico in Vicenza, located in northern Italy.

 

The photo here of Palladio’s architectural marvel makes it clear that Dali was influenced by the illusion of deep perspective in the long hallway or corridor. Dali depicts this in his painting, together with a reference to the large archway.

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The overall tone of the picture is forlorn and melancholic, if not sinister. Strange, rather foreboding figures stand in seemingly endless lines, and our eye is drawn to the young fleeing girl in a white dress at the most distant point in the painting. Up front, a buxom woman rests on a cabinet as she’s handed a telephone by a partially visible figure lying on the ground, perhaps in a state of defeat or anguish.

 

Telephones have symbolized communication breakdowns in other so-called war pictures of Dali, inspired by the telecommunications, for example, that occurred between Nevil Chamberlain and Adolf Hitler during WWII.

 

Dali reportedly visited Sicily during this time and saw Palermo’s catacombs, where, propped against the walls, one could see an array of mummified corpses. It’s a good bet that they inspired the dreadful-looking figures lining the corridor in Dali’s dramatic canvas.

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The foreground cabinet reminds us of another great Dali painting – “Espana” (“Spain”), which employs one of the artist’s best double-images as it, too, makes a pictorial comment about the Spanish Civil War. The drawers seen in the present work were oft-seen elements in Dali’s surrealist paintings, reflecting Freudian symbolism suggesting hidden desires and perhaps unknown mysteries. At the time, Dali, like everyone else, didn’t know what the outcome of the civil war would be, but was of course deeply concerned about it and anxious because of it.

 

On a more painterly level, the overall tone of “Palladio’s Corridor of Dramatic Surprise” exudes a kind of dark, even sort of menacing reality, which serves well Dali’s intention to make a comment about a conflict that would change his native Spain, and the course of history, forever.

 

 

FeatherEquilibrium

Dali’s Unusual, Ingenious ‘Atomic Still Life’

By Paul Chimera

Dali Writer & Historian

 

I have a feeling Dali art aficionados are not ambivalent about his 1947 oil on canvas, “Intra-atomic Equilibrium of a Swan’s Father” (often shortened to simply “Feather Equilibrium”). They either really admire the work, or find it flat and somehow lacking in emotional impact.

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Your humble blogger has always been intrigued by this unique Dali painting and I definitely fall on the side of those who admire it. Let me examine it some, in the hopes you’ll gain a bit more insight into this admittedly different Dali.

 

I often talk in this space about the “Dali difference.” How the master of surrealism always managed to put a special twist on whatever project he took on. That certainly applies in “Feather Equilibrium,” as we find a mélange of objects floating in space, against a first-draft background with construction lines still visible.

 

Once again, Dali has linked a classical aura with a then-contemporary vibe in this most unusual “atomic still life.” The painstaking precision with which he painted the watermelon, sculpture-like hand, swan’s head and feather, ink well, bird leg with string around it, partly peeled potato, and several other elements exude an almost Renaissance-like sensibility. Especially given the mathematical underpinnings Dali employed to ensure that the disparate objects nevertheless “hang together” in a harmonious way.

 

At the same time, Dali was expressing the scene through the lens of modern science – specifically his fascination with current discoveries in nuclear physics, which found that there’s actually space between the atoms of which matter is made. Dali conveys the phenomenon by depicting everything floating and touching nothing, albeit the white cloth does seem to rest upon the sand-colored shelf, into which “Feather Equilibrium” is partially chiseled in ancient Roman style.

 

Interestingly, some of the floating objects relate to others, such as the swan’s head, the feather, and the bird leg. Two potatoes are seen (the smaller one unpeeled), and the hand appears to be that of a statue’s rather than a human’s. In Dali’s surrealist iconography, the ink well and pen were well-known symbols of the female and male sex, respectively, while one critic noted that the empty snail shell suggests the impermanence of life.

 

I imagine Salvador Dali had three key things in mind when he painted this unusual and magnificent painting. He wanted to continue his near-obsession with current discoveries in particle theory. He wanted to demonstrate his exceptional technical skill as a realist painter whose capabilities rivaled the Old Masters.

 

And, finally, he wanted to be….different! Although devoid of melting watches, burning giraffes, crawling ants and flitting flies, “Intra-atomic Equilibrium of a Swan’s Father” is unmistakably Dalinian. I think it is a stunning work.

 

 

 

 

 

leda-atomica

Dali marries Myth and Science Masterfully in ‘Leda Atomica’

By Paul Chimera

Dali Writer & Historian

 

A small Dali painting with a huge impact and following, “Leda Atomica” (1949) is one of Salvador Dali’s best works – masterfully painted and among the true treasures in the permanent collection of the Teatru-Museu Dali in Figueres, Spain.

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Certain paintings by Dali seem to have a jewel-like quality about them, a kind of precise perfection. I’m thinking of similarly small works such as “Ghost of Vermeer of Delft, Which Can be Used as Table”; “The Weaning of Furniture Nutrition”; and “Specter of Sex Appeal,” among others. “Leda Atomica” – a bit larger than the aforementioned pictures – comfortably joins this list.

 

Conceptually, Dali was driven by two primary influences in this painting, one being his long-standing love and knowledge of Roman and Greek mythology. In this case, the classic myth of Leda and the swan. Leda was the wife of the king of Sparta, and in the Leda and the swan scenario Leda is ravaged by Zeus, disguised as a swan. It seems intimations of sex never veered far from Salvador’s mind!

 

The second major influence that informed “Leda Atomica” was Salvador Dali’s keen interest in science and, in this case, atomic theory, revealing that solid matter is actually comprised of particles – atoms – that never touch one another.

 

This, then, accounts for why everything in “Leda Atomica” is floating in space – parts of the pedestal, water droplets, a metal angle, what appears to be a small red prayer book, an egg shell. Even the sea backdrop is suspended above the beach below. Whether or not Leda’s (Gala’s) left hand is actually touching the head of the swan (Zeus, supreme ruler of the gods) is unclear, though I would argue that, consistent with everything else in the composition, her hand does not actually make contact with the formidable bird.

 

Authors Elizabeth Keevill and Kevin Eyres wrote that Dali compared his relationship with Gala “with the complex, amoral and often incestuous relationships between the gods and mortals.”

 

It should also be noted that the construction of “Leda Atomica” was done along rigorously exact mathematic lines, ensuring a compositional harmony that contributes to the sense of eye-pleasing perfection in such a masterful oil painting.

 

Also in 1949 (which happens to be this blogger’s birth year), Dali painted his first, smaller version of “The Madonna of Port Lligat,” once again putting Gala on a pedestal (figuratively speaking), this time as the Virgin Mary. (In 1950 he painted a wall-size version of the same theme.)

 

“Leda Atomica” is another of those examples of Dalinian surrealism that counters the belief that all Dali painted were melting clocks and crawling ants! It is a supreme example of his turn from pure surrealist visions of the 1930s to his Nuclear-Mystical vision, melding science, math, religion/mysticism to create some of history’s most compelling works of art.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

SI Exif

Dali, Roosevelt and Lincoln on this President’s Day!

By Paul Chimera

Dali Writer & Historian

 

On this President’s Day in the U.S.A., I thought we’d take a look at a little-known and rather unusual Dali mixed-media piece that spotlights the U.S. president at the time the work was created, 1942 – President Franklin Delano Roosevelt, better known as FDR.

SI Exif

SI Exif

Salvador Dali and his wife Gala were in exile in the United States during the 1940s, due to the war, spending time at Pebble Beach, California, as well as New York City and, for a period, Hampton Manor in Virginia.

 

Dali has depicted FDR in the upper right, below which several less distinct images are seen, including a kind of murky recreation of the Roosevelt image directly below the clear one, and a portrait of Abraham Lincoln to FDR’s right.

 

Framing these central images are what appear to be flying lobsters, and a fire-spewing dragon-like creature, while parachutists populate other areas of this bizarre work. Roosevelt’s and Lincoln’s hair doubles as sensuous angels in flight. Indeed, the entire composition has a sense of movement to it – perhaps symbolizing the notion of America’s influence and imminent victory wafting over the world at the time.

 

It is unclear why this picture – issued in print form by The New York Graphic Society – was undertaken by the surrealist master, although his own handwriting on the work may give us a prophetic clue. Part of it reportedly reads “…future victories of the sky.”

SI Exif

SI Exif

 

Was this a statement by Dali about the war in general, and America’s eventual victory in particular, thanks to formidable U.S. air power?

 

Of course, the far better known presidential work by Salvador Dali is his large “Lincoln” oil painting, of which he painted two versions – one in the Teatru-Museu Dali in Figueres, Spain, the other in the Salvador Dali Museum in St. Petersburg, Florida. They are among the most popular and loved of all Salvador Dali works.

 

Dali’s affinity for painting images of important world leaders, Spanish and American, perhaps stems from his love of pageantry, ceremony and monarchy. He also painted regal portraits of Francisco Franco’s granddaughter and son.

It’s significant to note that, while we focus heavily on the Catalan artist’s paintings, there are also a tremendous volume of remarkable Dali prints, Dali drawings, Dali watercolors, sculptures, and a host of mixed-media works as well.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

sleep

‘Sleep’ Among Salvador Dali’s Best-Known Works

By Paul Chimera

Dali Writer & Historian

 

“Sleep” is one of the best-known surrealist paintings by Salvador Dali; practically every book featuring representative examples of Dali’s art includes this painting from 1937.

 

People seem to love it – perhaps because of its relative simplicity, while at the same time due to its bizarre expression of the phenomenon of sleep.

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The huge balloon-like head stretched across the width of the canvas – the heavy form held up by a handful of fragile crutches – recalls the famous “great masturbator” head form seen in countless Dali paintings of this period. That strange head originated out of a now-famous rock at Cape Creus in Spain, which Dali had long imagined to be an anguished human head with its long nose pressed to the ground.

 

In “Sleep,” however, Dali includes lips (not seen in the other “great masturbator” images) as well as a strangely placed cloth where we might expect an ear to be.

 

Crutches were a ubiquitous symbolic element in Dali’s surrealism, and their meaning has been variously explained. In the present Dali painting, we might infer that sleep itself is a fragile state, easily disturbed (on undone altogether) sometimes by the slightest action – in this case by even one of those precarious crutches falling away.

 

Crutches have also been explained – by Dali himself in his autobiography, The Secret Life of Salvador Dali – as fixtures that are needed to prop up a decadent society. And yet, there seems little doubt that they also came to connote Dali’s oft-referred to and alleged impotence – often seen holding upright otherwise phallic, floppy forms.

 

Could “Sleep” – painted during the Spanish Civil War – also be a statement about the precariousness of his native Spain, whose future was held in the balance?

 

Sleep, of course, was a kind of gateway to the subconscious, whose mysteries and discoveries really underpinned the whole notion of Surrealism as an art movement. Dali spoke frequently about how that period just before one falls asleep was fertile territory for him, from which he mined many of his remarkably imaginative ideas and images.

 

Dali once said somewhat flippantly to an American television host that he spent most of his time in Spain painting, after spending most of his time in New York sleeping! There was some truth to his humorous comment, because many of Dali’s ideas were nurtured in the States and then brought to life on canvas only after he and Gala returned to Port Lligat after wintering in the United States.

 

“Sleep” is bathed in a kind of gauzy blue and white, creating a misty, dream-like background, barren save for a small hillside city, a boat, and a dog who itself is supported by a crutch. A small human figure also appears near the animal.

 

But of course the focus in on the head, a rather monstrous, anguished one – and some might conclude that the monster-like look suggests that our dreams are often not very tidy or pleasant experiences. As the BBC’s Russel Hardy remarked in the narration of the 1975 film documentary, “Hello, Dali”: “God alone knows what this man dreams about!”