Dali, Salvador

* 11.05.1904 Figueras - † 23.01.1989

biography

Dali was born on May 11, 1904, the son of a notary in Figueras, Catalonia (Spain).

From an early age he behaved strangely and was prone to violence against animals, people and himself.
On the other hand, he seemed to have a talent for painting, so his parents sent him to Ramon Pitchot, a family friend living in the countryside. After some time, Dali returned to his hometown and attended the art class of a Senor Nunez.
In 1921 he went to Madrid, where he began studying at the Academy of San Fernando.
There he was expelled from the Academy in 1925 for rebellion. When he returned to Figueras, the Guardia Civil arrested him and imprisoned him for a month because they suspected that he had been involved in the rebellious atmosphere in the country. When no evidence of this could be found, Dali was released and withdrew to a solitary stay on the Mediterranean. From there he returned to the Academy in Madrid and devoted himself to Cubism.
In 1927 he traveled to Paris, where he met Pablo Picasso and the circle of surrealists around Joan Miro and André Breton.

Gala, the wife of the poet Paul Eluard, stayed with Dali; he declared her his muse, so that she became the subject of many of his paintings.
In 1934, there was finally a rift between Dali and the Surrealists around Breton, whereupon the latter announced the official exclusion of Dali from the Surrealist movement.
Dali spent the following years in Italy, where he was influenced by Renaissance and Baroque painting.
He spent the period between 1940 and 1948 with Gala in the USA before returning to Port Lligat in Spain and converting to Catholicism. In the following years he turned to a classicist style that included religious motifs.
Thirty years after their first meeting with Gala, they married in 1958.
In 1964, Dali was awarded a lifetime achievement award in Spain and in 1973 a Dali Museum was opened in his hometown of Figueras.

He died here on January 23, 1989.