{"id":7664,"date":"2025-03-12T09:54:52","date_gmt":"2025-03-12T07:54:52","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.salvador-dali.org\/dali-i-gala\/relats\/test-dali-va-transgredir-una-de-les-icones-mitiques-de-la-historia-de-lart\/"},"modified":"2025-06-30T09:54:48","modified_gmt":"2025-06-30T07:54:48","slug":"dali-transgressing-a-mythical-icon-of-art-history","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"https:\/\/www.salvador-dali.org\/en\/dali-and-gala\/stories\/dali-transgressing-a-mythical-icon-of-art-history\/","title":{"rendered":"Dal\u00ed: Transgressing a mythical icon of art history"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
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A blend of tradition and surrealism<\/strong><\/h3>\n\n\n\n

Dal\u00ed had always been fascinated by the Venus de Milo<\/em>, having even made a copy of it in clay when he was just eight years old. In 1936, he turned this icon of Ancient Greece into a perfect blend of tradition and surrealism. And he did so transgressively \u2013 in a Dalinian way, one might say \u2013 by perforating the plaster body of his Venus, the goddess of beauty, love and sensuality, with six drawers that could be opened and closed.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n\n\n\n

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Dal\u00ed gave meaning to this sculpture by noting, in reference to it, that \u2018the only difference between immortal Greece and the contemporary era is Sigmund Freud, who discovered that the human body, which was purely Neoplatonic in the time of the Greeks, is now full of secret drawers that only psychoanalysis can reveal\u2019. By incorporating these drawers into his Venus, the artist likely sought to invoke the subconscious and also, perhaps, the fears and contradictions of the modern human being.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Other 20th century artists also drew inspiration from the Venus de Milo to create their works. In the early 1920s, the dadaists Johannes Theodor Baargeld and Erwin Blumenfeld used the image in their photographic collages. Some surrealist artists were likewise greatly fascinated by this icon, as seen, for example, in Ren\u00e9 Magritte\u2019s sculpture Les menottes de cuivre (The Copper Handcuffs), from 1931. In 1973, the Ready Museum in Brussels and the Mus\u00e9e des Arts D\u00e9coratifs in Paris held the exhibition \u2018La V\u00e9nus de Milo ou les dangers de la c\u00e9l\u00e9brit\u00e9\u2019 (The Venus de Milo or the dangers of celebrity) to highlight the influence this sculpture had exerted on contemporary artists, including Dal\u00ed.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n\n\n\n

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The presentation of the Venus de Milo with Drawers <\/em>in New York<\/strong><\/h3>\n\n\n\n

In 1939, the artist presented the Venus de Milo with Drawers<\/em> to the public in New York, in a solo show held in March and April at the Julien Levy Gallery. At this point, Dal\u00ed added two keys hanging from the goddess\u2019s neck. These elements were especially symbolic and, like the drawers, recalled the most genuine iconography of his surrealist paintings.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Photograph by Eric Schaal featuring the Venus de Milo with Drawers<\/em>, presented at the Julien Levy Gallery exhibition in New York in 1939. Eric Schaal \u00a9 Gala-Salvador Dal\u00ed Foundation, Figueres, 2025.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n\n\n\n
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Keys are first found in Dal\u00ed\u2019s work in La m\u00e9moire de la femme-enfant (The Memory of the Woman-Child), from 1929, whilst drawers first appeared in 1934, in works such as Invisible Harp or Singularities. The artist may have intended the keys of his Venus de Milo with Drawers as a visual metaphor for psychoanalysis, a means of tapping into the hidden subconscious of people\u2019s \u2018drawers\u2019.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In any case, at the Julien Levy Gallery, Dal\u00ed presented this sculpture in the context of an installation \u2013 decorated with more keys and other Dalinian motifs \u2013 offering a small-scale version of the Trylon and Perisphere, the two monumental structures designed by the architects Wallace Harrison and J. Andre Fouilhoux for the Theme Centre of the New York World\u2019s Fair, which was inaugurated in April 1939. Dal\u00ed had designed the Dream of Venus<\/em> pavilion for that fair, with a fa\u00e7ade featuring a large fish-headed Aphrodite, inspired by Botticelli\u2019s The Birth of Venus<\/em>. However, the organizing committee refused to allow him to use this transgressive image, prompting him to speak out on the rights of the artist by publishing his manifesto, Declaration of the Independence of the Imagination and the Rights of Man to His Own Madness<\/em>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Declaration of the Independence of the Imagination and the Rights of Man to His Own Madness, 1939. \u00a9 Salvador Dal\u00ed, Gala-Salvador Dal\u00ed Foundation, Figueres, 2018.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n\n\n\n
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A unique Venus de Milo with Drawers<\/em> for the Dal\u00ed Theatre-Museum<\/strong><\/h3>\n\n\n\n

In 1964, Dal\u00ed authorized a limited edition of bronzes of the Venus de Milo with Drawers<\/em>, including the one currently conserved in the permanent collection of the Dal\u00ed Theatre-Museum in Figueres. The artist endowed the piece with certain unique characteristics that set it apart from the other casts from the edition, likely to make it a unique work of art, intended to be kept permanently at his museum.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Unique original version of Venus de Milo with Drawers<\/em> from the Gala-Salvador Dal\u00ed Foundation\u2019s own collection. \u00a9 Salvador Dal\u00ed, Gala-Salvador Dal\u00ed Foundation, Figueres, 2025.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n\n\n\n
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Dal\u00ed wanted one of the bronzes of the Venus de Milo with Drawers<\/em>, namely, the one identified as \u2018Exemplaire Gala Dal\u00ed\u2019, to be part of the works permanently on display at his Dal\u00ed Theatre-Museum in Figueres. Unlike the plaster sculpture from 1936 and the other casts from the 1964 edition, there are no pompoms on the knobs of the drawers of this cast. With this creative gesture, Dal\u00ed probably intended to distinguish the work at his museum from the other bronzes conserved around the world. Perhaps, he sought to turn this sculpture into a unique copy, one that condensed the physiognomy of the original work from 1936 \u2013 to which the pompoms were added only subsequently.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The artist placed the sculpture on the first floor of his Theatre-Museum, in a semicircular corridor in which visitors can also contemplate other objects evoking its genesis. These include, in particular, the display case with The Tragic Myth of Millet\u2019s Angelus<\/em> and the bust of Sigmund Freud, which crowns the space dedicated to Moses and monotheism<\/em>, two key elements for understanding Dal\u00ed\u2019s contribution to surrealism.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n\n\n\n

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Exhibiting the Venus de Milo with Drawers<\/em> in the 21st century<\/strong><\/h3>\n\n\n\n

The 1936 Venus de Milo with Drawers is a plaster sculpture currently conserved at the Art Institute of Chicago. An exceptional and unique work, it is also quite delicate, due to the fragility of its material. In 2022, the Gala-Salvador Dal\u00ed Foundation requested the loan of this work from the Art Institute of Chicago, for a temporary exhibit at the Dal\u00ed Theatre-Museum. Specifically, it requested a digital loan, to ensure the work\u2019s conservation.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Photograph by Hansel Mieth featuring Salvador Dal\u00ed and Edward James at the opening of the Salvador Dal\u00ed 1939<\/em> exhibition at the Julien Levy Gallery in New York, 1939. \u00a9 Hansel Mieth\/The LIFE Picture Collection\/Shutterstock.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n\n\n\n
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The temporary exhibition \u2018Transgressing Venus\u2019, organized by the Gala-Salvador Dal\u00ed Foundation in 2022 at the Dal\u00ed Theatre-Museum in Figueres, exceptionally brought together the plaster Venus de Milo with Drawers<\/em> from Chicago and the bronze cast from the Theatre-Museum\u2019s own collection.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

It did this by presenting the sculpture from the Art Institute of Chicago in digital format, by means of an innovative technology. Specifically, high-resolution photographs were used to produce a holographic recreation of the sculpture, into which 360\u00ba animation was digitally introduced. This three-dimensional creation was then projected on a transparent LG T-OLED screen, allowing visitors to take in all the details of the work, which is conserved in the United States, from a gallery of the Dal\u00ed Theatre-Museum in Figueres.
With this digital loan, the Gala-Salvador Dal\u00ed Foundation seeks not only to embrace the use of technological resources in the sphere of exhibitions, but also to reaffirm its commitment to the sustainability of international loans and the preservation and conservation of original works of art.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n\n\n

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Do you want to know more?<\/h2>\n

If you want to learn more about this Dalinian creation, we invite you to explore additional content below related to the study and conservation of this iconic work of art.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n <\/div>\n \n\n \n \n

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