Discover Salvador Dali (1904-1989)

Artist of the week Salvador Dali (1904-1989) Salvador Dali (1904-1989) was born north of Barcelona in Spain, between the sea and the mountains. He lived in the area for most of his life and he often included the surrounding landscape in his paintings. Below is a photograph of him on holiday with his family in 1910, when he was about six years old. Can you spot him sitting in the middle, between his father and his aunt? When Dali was a child he was already good at writing, here is a poem that he wrote when he was only eight years old! Do you think you could draw a picture of the star and the worm in his poem? A night at the end of June, a child takes a walk with his mother. It's raining falling stars. The child picks up one and carries it in the palms of his hands. At home he deposits it on the table and locks it in a reversed glass. The next morning, getting up, he lets escape a scream of terror: A worm, during the night, has nibbled his star! Dali was a member of a group of artists known as the Surrealists. These artists wanted to change our view of the real world and to do this they sometimes used their dreams as inspiration for their work. Have any of you ever tried to write about or draw your dreams? Some of you might recognise this painting? It is Salvador Dali’s best-known work, and it is one of the most famous of the Surrealist paintings. The Persistence of Memory (1931) Dali liked to use images of food in his work, bread and eggs were among his favourites. In this painting, you can probably spot his famous melting watches, which he said were inspired by camembert cheese melting in the sun! Dali wasn’t only a painter and sculptor, he made his work using lots of different methods, including drawing, photography, poetry and film. Here is one of his drawings, it is called ‘Two Dancers’. Drawing people when they are moving is quite a difficult thing to do, but why not give it a go? Two Dancers (1949) Sometimes Dali would put objects together that you wouldn’t usually see next to each other and make sculptures... Lobster Telephone (1936) …or he would put strange things together in his paintings… how long are those elephants’ legs! The Elephants (1948) What two things do you think you would put together to make a Surrealist sculpture like Dali’s? Salvador Dali used his imagination to make incredible art, he also had a fantastic moustache! If you would like to know more about his life or his work, I would recommend having a look at the Dali Museum https://thedali.org or one of his houses, where you can take a little tour around! https://www.salvador-dali.org/en/museums/house-salvador-dali-in-portlligat/ Activity Have a look at the picture above, provided by the Tate gallery in Liverpool. It has a strange dream-like feeling to it. Try answering the following questions and see what you would add to this picture? What is inside the house? What grows on the tree? What animal would you make the string into? What might the key unlock? If you can, print the picture and add your own drawings to it, if you can’t print it, then take a piece of plain paper and try drawing your own picture of a dream. .

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