Milan – “The jealousy of other painters has always been the thermometer of my success”. A success, that of the immense Salvador Dali, which was actually overwhelming. We all have in mind his dream landscapes and the imaginative figures of him, but what are the works that made him immortal
Here are the 5 most famous paintings of the great Dali. READ ALSO: Dali-Gala-Eluard, a surrealist love “triangle” 1. The great masturbator (1929)
This disconcerting and seductive work is among Dali’s most famous paintings. Kept in Madrid, in it we find all the motifs and symbols that will frequently recur in the master’s later works: a rarefied atmosphere, sunny stages dotted with floating and monstrous figurines with a dreamlike and fantastic flavor. Featuring complex Baroque iconography, this painting is a forerunner of Dali’s interest in soft structures. 2. The persistence of memory (1931)
Painted in oil and preserved at the Museum of Modern Art in New York, in the “Persistence of memory” the famous “soft clocks” make their first appearance, an unconscious symbol of the relativity of space and time, a surrealistic meditation on the collapse of our notions about an immutable cosmic system.READ ALSO: Dali-Lear, a “spiritual menage” 3. Soft construction with boiled beans: premonition of civil war (1936)
At the center of this work, preserved in the Museum of Art in Philadelphia, stands a creature made up of human limbs , which overlaps another similar one: both the two figures seem to be parts of a whole. The monster, supported by a fossilized foot and a wooden chest of drawers, overlooks some beans. In the background, Port Lligat bay and a cloudy sky stand out. 4. Swans reflecting elephants (1937) All played on an optical deception, the painting represents a rocky landscape surrounding a pond, in the center an islet with the twisted trunks of bare trees, against the background of a transparent sky. On the shores of the islet the swans stretch their elegant necks and move their white wings. What at first glance appears to be a picture resolved in the agreement of the browns of the rocks and trees and the blues of the sky and the lake, becomes a further example of the paranoid-critical method. There is not only the reflection of the swans, of the long necks and wings which, as you can imagine, turned upside down become the elephant’s trunks and large ears. But we also find the violent contrast between the volatile levity, the elegance and momentum of the neck, the softness of the wings and the heaviness of the pachyderm, the awkwardness, the character of the animal. A contrast that seems to be accentuated and prolonged in the skeletal and twisted shapes of the tree branches, while as usual a series of curious symbols populate the canvas: the fires lit on the hill on the right, the oddly shaped cloud in the sky at the top left, the man in profile, with his hands on his hips, who seems completely indifferent to the scene. As usual, the observer still has many possibilities of interpretation of what, more than a work of art, is often an occasion for trompe-l’oeil, optical illusion, or a simple play of images. the oddly shaped cloud in the sky at the top left, the man in profile, with his hands on his hips, who seems completely indifferent to the scene. As usual, the observer still has many possibilities of interpretation of what, more than a work of art, is often an occasion for trompe-l’oeil, optical illusion, or a simple play of images. the oddly shaped cloud in the sky at the top left, the man in profile, with his hands on his hips, who seems completely indifferent to the scene. As usual, the observer still has many possibilities of interpretation of what, more than a work of art, is often an occasion for trompe-l’oeil, optical illusion, or a simple play of images.DISCOVER “SALVADOR”, THE ART TOY DEDICATED TO DALI ‘! 5. Dream caused by the flight of a bee around a pomegranate just before awakening (1944) Emblem of the Surrealist movement, in this painting we find all the symbols of Freudian thought. The action in progress that we observe – the huge pomegranate from which a fish emerges that ‘generates’ two tigers behind a bayonet – represents the violent awakening of the woman from her peaceful dreams. In the painting also appears the figure of the classic elephant recurring in many of Dali’s paintings, inspired by the pedestal of the Obelisk of Minerva sculpture by Gian Lorenzo Bernini which is located in Rome and represents an elephant carrying an ancient obelisk. The painting is kept at El Museo Thyssen-Bornemisza in Madrid.
