Salvador Dalí: Dreams and Imagination

Salvador Dalí, Homage to Newton, 1985, Bronze.

What you need to know about the artist and the artwork:

Dalí

• Salvador Dalí once claimed “I myself AM Surrealism”. Dalí was among the leading artists in the group, and a crossover from the Dada movement of the 1920’s.
• A Spaniard raised in the Cataluñian town of Figures, Dalí was told by his parents at the age of five that he was the reincarnation of an older brother by the same name, who died 9 months before his birth.
• Dalí’s art career began at an early age with his first exhibition hosted by his father in their home. He went to study art in Madrid, & was expelled before finals as he claimed that none of the teachers were at a level to judge his work.
  With a lanky, frail frame, Dalí always attracted attention. This was accentuated when he grew a handle bar mustache, which would become his trademark.
• Dalí left Madrid in the mid 20’s & traveled to Paris, where he had his first meeting with Pablo Picasso, the famous Cubist, who had a great influence on Dalí’s early works. Juan Miró also had a large influence on Dalí.
• Many of Dalí’s works are characterized by his use of exaggeration & elongation as a form of abstraction. The idea of melting is also prominent in many of his works.
• Ultimately it was Dalí’s eccentric character that spiraled him into fame. He was known for wearing costumes in public, once showing up to a party with his wife & inspiration, Gala, as the Lindberg baby & kidnapper.
• While best known as a painter, Dalí was also an accomplished sculpture, jeweler, performance artist, script writer, set designer, & videographer.
• Dali fell sick in 1989 & died. He is buried in the Teatro y Museo Dalí in Figures, the crypt that he spent years building. The Theatre & Museum Dalí features many of Dalí’s works, including all his jewels, & can be visited by the public.

What is Surrealism?

1. Surrealism was an art movement that took place in Europe, and was founded in Paris in 1924
2. The Surrealists believed that it was possible to tap into the subconscious, or dream world, and looked to the beliefs of Freud and Jung for influence.
   
3. The Surrealists painted dream worlds, and typically juxtaposed seemingly dissimilar objects, that one placed in such a way, created a dialogue between each other.
   

The Work

Homage to Newton is just that: an homage to Sir Isaac Newton, the 17th century English scholar who discovered the law of gravity.

Here, Dalí has abstracted the form of a man, and left a hollow in his core, where his heart and innards should be, whereby a sphere hangs. The man is abstracted in typical Dalian fashion where things are not necessarily where they belong, like the spinal cord that snakes along the side of the gaping void.

There is some controversy as to whether or not Dalí actually designed this sculpture. He was in no state to create it himself. It was created in 1985 and sits in the CBD of Singapore.

By 1980, Dalí showed Parkinson like symptoms in his hands, and by 1982 his wife died. After that it is said that he lost the will to live, and from 1984 onward, following a fire outbreak in his bedroom that Dalí managed to be rescued from, he was moved to Figures to live out the rest of his life. It is rumoured that between 1982-1984 that his guardians forced him to sign blank canvases that would later be sold as original paintings, and thus the later works of Dalí hold questionable authenticity. This goes for Singapore's Homage to Newton sculpture created in 1985.


Dalí is best known for his paintings. Take a look at some examples below:


The Temptation of St. Anthony (1946), Metamorphosis of Narcissus (1937), The Persistence of Memory (1931).