Salvador Dali (1904 to 1989)

At the age of fourteen, the "art pompier", genre painting of the 19th century, became the model in his attempts to paint. He painted since childhood and already at the age of a teenager his paintings were exhibited for the first time in Figueras. He continued his education in various places to develop his art at a young age.

After the end of the war in 1918, Dalí joined a group of anarchists and believed in the Marxist revolution. In 1921, he and his friends founded the socialist group "Renovació Social". In June 1922 Dalí finished school with the Bachillerato (high school diploma).

In 1925 the artist showed the first solo exhibition in Barcelona. He gained international recognition through the exhibition at the Carnegie Institute of Pittsburgh three years later. He met André Breton in 1929, who was considered a key figure in Surrealism. The Surrealists followed Sigmund Freud's theories of unconsciousness and the dream state and incorporated them into their works. "The Persistence Of Memory" is considered one of Dali's most important works from this period.

In the early 1930s, Salvador Dali began to develop his paranoiac-critical method. He made findings of psychoanalysis fruitful for painting. Dali drew, painted, experimented, wrote, and participated in exhibitions of surrealists in the United States. His own exhibition in New York in 1934 was a triumphant success. This was followed by his participation in the International Surrealist Exhibition in Paris and a visit to Sigmund Freud.

Salvador Dali was expelled from the circle of Parisian Surrealists in 1934 because he was suspected of "repeatedly painting anti-revolutionary acts with a tendency to glorify fascism à la Hitler". Whether Dali actually sympathized with Hitler or only wanted to provoke is disputed. Instead of moving in the Surrealist circle, however, he now moved among financially strong art lovers and gallery owners.

"The Sacrament of the Lord's Supper" became one of his most important works. It was completed in the post-war period (1955). In it he processed his awakened interest in science, region and optical illusion. He found it interesting to live as a devout Catholic in the modern atomic age and tried to combine traditional Christian icon painting with images of decay. This is particularly evident in his work "The Madonna of Port Lligat," which Dali completed six years earlier.

Dali left behind a wealth of works of art. The Dali Museum in Figueras, which he designed, provides an insight into the diversity of his work. In addition to painting, he also worked as an illustrator, object artist, filmmaker and writer. He created stage sets, designed film sets, wrote screenplays.

Salvador Dali, not immodest, considered himself a genius, and he was not lacking in self-absorption and egocentricity: "Every morning when I wake up, I experience the greatest joy of all: that of being Salvador Dali." 

In 1965 Salvador Dali met the young Amanda Lear in Paris, whose beauty he became addicted to and whom he portrayed in 1974 in the painting "Saint George and the Girl". His wife Gala was of course initially jealous but later akezpt this love triangle. Amanda accompanied Salvador for about 10 years on his undertakings and festivities. Gala withdrew more and more to a castle, which Dali bought her. She created there a "ghost castle" and received also Dali only after written invitation.

She also no longer wanted to participate in his numerous undertakings and festivities and had Amanda Lear represent her for a decade. Lear, however, did not fulfill the deputy role assigned to her by Gala and from 1976 on devoted herself to her music career. Dalí painted only rarely and no longer fulfilled his contracts. He was plagued by loneliness, fame and sources of money dried up. Gala's wish for a quiet retirement was not fulfilled, as Dalí fell seriously ill in 1975. She returned to him and nursed him until she herself became a nursing case after several falls. She died on June 10, 1982, next to the sleeping Dalí in Portlligat. Dalí fulfilled her wish to be buried in Púbol and secretly transferred the body to her castle.

From 1981, Dali suffered from Parkinson's disease. As a consolation, Spain's King Juan Carlos I awarded him in July 1982 the title "Marqués de Dalí de Púbol". Dalí had already portrayed the king in 1973/74 in the painting "The Prince of Sleep". After the painful loss of his beloved wife Gala who died in 1982, he lived alone and in seclusion in Púbol from 1983, where he painted his last painting in May of that year.