Test yourself! Take this The Life of Salvador Dali Quiz | People

Answer: Figueres, Spain

Figueres is in the Catalonia region of Spain, near Barcelona. His body is interred at the Teatro-Museo Dali in Figueres, a museum Dali himself designed and created. Oh, by the way he was born in 1904, and died in 1989.

Answer: Salvador

Early in his life, Dali had a severe identity crisis because of this. He was born exactly nine months after his brother's death, and his parents actually told him that he was the reincarnation of his dead sibling. Throughout most of his life he believed that he was only a part of one {personality;} what he called the four Salvadors, his father, his dead brother, himself, and the Christian messiah, Jesus Christ (Salvador in Spanish).

This goes a long way towards explaining Dali's eccentric personality.

Answer: All of these

Dali showed great talent in these all of these styles before he was ever exposed to surrealism. Had he died in the late 1920's he may well have been remembered as one of the great cubist painters, on a par with Picasso and Braque.

Answer: Sigmund Freud

In the years 1928 and 1929, three things happened in Dali's life that profoundly changed him and his art. The first was that he was exposed to Freud's theory of the unconcious mind, as presented in his book, 'Interpretation of Dreams'. The second was that he met and began working with a group of artists and writers in Paris, known as the 'Surrealists', led by the poet Andre Breton. And the third was ...see next question.

Answer: Gala

Gala was Russian by birth and nine years older than Salvador. They met on the beach at Cadaques, Spain in 1929, where they both were vacationing. At the time they met, Gala was married to the poet Paul Eluard, but they immediately started a romantic relationship, and within a few months, they were living together.

She eventually divorced Eluard, and married Dali in 1934. Dali used his wife as a model for many of his paintings. A couple of my favorites of these are 'Galacidalacidesoxyribonucleicacid' and 'Leda Atomica'.

By the way, if you can pronounce that first one, you're doing better than I can! Gala was a major force in encouraging Dali to establish and cultivate his flamboyant public image.

Answer: Pablo Picasso

Dali and Picasso were friends on and off for most of their lives. They first met in 1925 when Picasso, already famous at the time, came to see Dali's first solo exhibition in Barcelona. Apparently, he liked what he saw. Picasso also booked and paid for Dali's passage to America in 1940, just weeks before the Nazis rolled into France.

During Dali's second trip to the United States in 1936, he made the cover of Time magazine. Incidentally, Dali and Walt Disney did have a connection. In 1948 Dali worked on a series of drawings for an animated feature called 'Destino' that the Disney studio was developing. The project was shelved, however, when uncle Walt decided the tone of the piece was a little too dark for his audience. Bummer!

Answer: He avoided supporting either side

Much later, after World War II, Salvador Dali became a staunch Roman Catholic and a supporter of Franco.

Answer: A deep sea diving suit

That's right, a diving suit, complete with brass helmet and lead boots. He loudly proclaimed that this unweildy costume was the source of his creative energy. Dali was a shameless self promoter, he never missed an opportunity to shock or bemuse his public.

This famous incident was typical of Dali's outlandish and eccentric behavior. He was probably more concerned with moulding his public persona than any other artist of the twentieth century.

Answer: Spellbound

Dali designed the sets used in the dream sequence of 'Spellbound' in 1946. I don't have any information on how he and Hitch hit it off, but I'll bet it was pretty interesting!

Answer: Luis Bunuel

Dali and Bunuel had known each other since their art school days in Barcelona. I've seen 'Un Chein Andalou', and I must say that some of the images presented are particularly disturbing. I won't go into details here, but let's just say it ain't exactly 'Mary Poppins'. Released in 1930, 'L'age d'or' was banned in Spain for 49 years because of its anti-Catholic message.

It is considered by many film historians to be a ground breaking masterpiece.

Answer: Daniel in the Lion's Den

All of these were painted after 1940, a period in which Dali tried to stress what he called the 'classical' aspects of his art. By the way, 'Daniel in the Lion's Den' was painted by Peter Paul Rubens, the sixteenth century Flemish master, you know, as in Rubenesque.

Answer: The Persistence of Memory

This painting is the seminal work of Dali's career. It is at once both beautiful and grotesque. A perfect blend of stark realism and dreamlike fantasy.

Answer: The Marx Brothers

The screenplay never made it to production, but Dali remained friends with Harpo for many years after this.

Answer: Paranoic-Critical Activity

This method involves entering an altered state of conciousness, such as dreaming or meditation, and then once out of the altered state being able to remember and reproduce images created by the subconcious mind. Dali said that all humans engage in this at some level.

It's the same process we use when looking at objects such as clouds, and being able perceive other unrelated shapes and images. Some of Dali's most famous works employ this type of 'double imaging'. My favorites of these include 'The Hallucinogenic Toreador' and 'Gala Contemplating the Mediterranean Sea Which at Twenty Meters Becomes a Portrait of Abraham Lincoln-Homage to Rothko'.

This aspect of Dali's art is what I think is the reason for his universal appeal. All of us can remember images created solely by our own minds, Dali just took the extra step and produced them in crystal clarity in the form of paintings.

Answer: Marquis of Pubol

The Chateau Pubol is a castle that Dali purchased in 1967, renovated, and gave as a gift to his wife, Gala. She moved into the castle to live separately from Dali in 1969, and died there in 1982 at the age of eighty-eight. Dali rarely visited Gala in her castle, he was only allowed there by formal invitation.

After Gala's death, Dali moved to the castle and lived there alone until 1984 when he was severely burned in an fire. He created his last paintings here in 1983. After this, he moved to the Torre Galatea, next door to his museum in Figueres, and lived there as a recluse until his death in 1989. If you are interested in in seeing some of Dali's work, there are many sites dedicated to him on the web.

The best one I have found is at www.dali-gallery.com It has over 1500 images of his paintings, drawings, and objects.