Salvador Dali

Salvador Dali

Salvador Dali is known as one of the great surrealist painters of the 20th century. Salvador was born May 11, 1904, in the Catalan town of Figueras, near Barcelona, Spain. Dali first began painting at the age of 10 and at the age of 12 he went on a vacation with an artistic family, the Pichots. Ramon Pichot was Dali's first role model when it came to painting, he greatly influenced Dali with his artwork. Dali later attended the Municipal Drawing School, where he received his first formal training in art, drafting, painting, and engraving. Dali's first exhibition was his charcoal drawing organized by his father in 1917 in his home. In 1918, Salvador's first drawing was purchased by a Catalan newspaper, the Patufet.

Dali was greatly exposed to many types of art movements such as; Impressionism, Post-Impressionism, and Futurism. Salvador was accepted to the Academia de San Fernando in Madrid, which he was expelled from in 1926.

The Dali Atomicus, photo by Philippe Halsman (1948...

Salvador Dalí, The Persistence of Memory (1931), ...

English: portrait of Salvador Dali taken in Mauric...

After Dali was expelled he explored Cubism, Neo-Classicism, and Realism in his paintings. The year 1929 was Dali's most important year, during this time he made his first Surrealist film, Un Chien Andalou (An Adualusian Dog) with former classmate Luis Bunuel. Dali joined the Surrealist group, and he met Gala Eluard, the wife of Paul Eluard, a Surrealist poet. She eventually became his wife, his muse, and an influence behind many of his paintings. Dali had many other inspirational people in his life, Picasso, Miro, the architect Guadi, and especially the landscape of Catalonia.

Salvador's surrealist ideas came from Freudian psychology. Many of Dali's work during the 1930's were intaglio prints that accompanied Surrealist books and periodicals. These prints included "L' Immaculee Conception," and "La Femme Visible." Eventually, in 1934 Dali separated from the Surrealist group, because of his conflicting...