The sweetness of dreams

Illusions Through The Paintings Of Salvador Dali

Автор: klassa.bg
Date: 14.7.2010
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by Petar PLAMENOV

"Surrealism is destructive,
but it destroys only what it considers to be shackles limiting our vision.''
- Salvador Dalí, Declaration, 1929.

Illusions Through The Paintings Of Salvador Dali. An Optical Illusion is when one thing looks like two or more different things.
These are paintings of relatively unexamined aspect of the work of Salvador Dali: his fascination with optical effects art. These paintings present Dali’s use of various pictorial techniques, photography, and holograms to further his exploration of visual perception and the ways that optical illusion affects our sense of reality. Practically this is collection of his development of the famous double image, the “paranoiac-critical method” that produced images that could be “read” in multiple ways.

This visually gripping virtual exposure focuses on these central but relatively rarely studied motives of art of Dali. In these pictures Dali experimented with anamorphosis, the perspectival distortion that produces on the canvas elongated forms demanding an oblique viewpoint. It also note Dali`s interest in other more conventional forms of perspective and their sources in both Dutch and Italian art.
Dali`s reveal his fascination with optical effects and three-dimensional illusions that is apparent in his post-war work: the "screen-dot" paintings like Sistine Madonna or Portrait of my Dead Brother, in which an image emerges from a "pointillist" surface; the striking stereometric paintings he began in the early 1970s -- twin panels that have to be viewed through special lenses; and his holograms.

Swans Reflecting Elephants - Salvador Dali, 1937
The swans and the twisted trees are reflected in the lake as elephants. Dali called this technique paranoiac-critical, where hallucination and reality seem to merge.
Soldier Take Warning - Salvador Dali, 1942
Dali made this painting to warn the soldiers against venereal diseases during the second world war. I guess they had other things on their mind.
Face of Mae West Which May Be Used as an Apartment (Volto di Mae West) - Salvador Dali, 1935
Your first impression of the painting would be that this is the face of a woman (Mae West in particular). But then you see that the mouth is a red sofa. And the eyes are paintings on a wall ... And the hair is a curtain ...
The Image Disappears - Salvador Dali, 1938
A somewhat mysterious picture of a bearded man (Dali himself ?) and, on closer sight, a scene with a woman. Dali's moustache is her arm, his eye is her head and his beard is her skirt.
Human Skull Consisting of Seven Naked Womens Bodies (In Voluptate Mors) - Salvador Dali, 1951
Photograph by Philippe Halsman after a drawing by Dali.
Old Age, Adolescence, Infancy (The Three Ages) - Salvador Dali, 1940
The landscape reveals three busts of men in different stages of their life : old man, adult, baby. You can see the town of Port Lligat through the arches of the ruins of Ampurias.
Apparition of a Face and Fruit Dish on a Beach - Salvador Dali, 1938
Maybe you don't like this painting at first sight. But it's a work of a genius. There are four scenes in one : you can see an Afghan dog, a face, a table with a fruit dish in the middle and a desert landscape looking out on the sea. The bridge in the landscape is the dog's collar, the figure in the desert is nose and mouth of the face. Оne part looks like a dog but also looks like a bridge leading to a road, on a mountain, with a tunnel going through the mountain. One part is a fruit dish but also looks like a face or a lady sitting.

Gala Contemplating the Mediterranean Sea - Salvador Dali, 1976
The full title is "Gala Contemplating the Mediterranean Sea Which at Twenty Meters Becomes the Portrait of Abraham Lincoln". And that's exactly what's happing here. Take a look at the picture, get out of your chair and take some distance, then look again. You'll see Lincoln ! There are several versions of this picture, sometimes also called "Lincoln in Dalivision".
The Skull of Zurbarán - Salvador Dali, 1956
The buildings look like a skull from a distance, the priests being the teeth. The buildings are also ambiguous: you can see them as a blok or as hollow, depending on how you look at them.