{"id":7699,"date":"2024-12-18T18:32:24","date_gmt":"2024-12-18T16:32:24","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.salvador-dali.org\/dali-i-gala\/dali-artista-total\/pintura\/"},"modified":"2025-07-01T15:25:16","modified_gmt":"2025-07-01T13:25:16","slug":"painting","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"https:\/\/www.salvador-dali.org\/en\/dali-and-gala\/dali-the-total-artist\/painting\/","title":{"rendered":"Painting"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
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His contributions to the surrealist movement, through the paranoiac-critical method of interpreting reality, gave rise to a universe of symbols that are now firmly ensconced in the collective imaginary. At certain points in his career, he returned to the great masters of art history, especially from the Renaissance (Raphael, Michelangelo) and the Baroque (Vel\u00e1zquez, Vermeer), even as the diversity of themes found in his paintings, especially those stemming from his interest in science, make him a singular artist, a product of the century he was born in and a key figure in the history of art.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Salvador Dal\u00ed in front of Vel\u00e1zquez’s portrait of Philip IV.\u00a9 Fundaci\u00f3 Gala-Salvador Dal\u00ed<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n\n\n\n
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“At the age of six, I wanted to be Napoleon – and I wasn’t.
At the age of fifteen, I wanted to be Dal\u00ed and I have been.
At the age of twenty-five, I wanted to become <\/strong>
the most sensational painter in the world and I achieved it.
At thirty-five, I wanted to affirm my life by <\/strong>
success and I attained it.
Now, at fort-five, I want to paint a masterpiece and to<\/strong>
save Modern Art from chaos and laziness. I will succeed! “<\/strong><\/em><\/h4>\n\n\n\n

Salvador Dal\u00ed<\/h4>\n\n\n\n

This excerpt, from the dedication of 50 Secrets of Magic Craftsmanship<\/em>, one of Dal\u00ed\u2019s most important books, which he published in 1948 as a treatise on painting, is a straightforward statement that showcases the artist\u2019s awareness of his own contributions to 20th-century art and painting. Although at that point, Dal\u00ed claimed to be a painter within the classical tradition, his painting career began much earlier.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Salvador Dal\u00ed painting Visage of the War<\/em> (El rostre de la guerra), c. 1940. \u00a9 Fundaci\u00f3 Gala-Salvador Dal\u00ed<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

His earliest paintings, which date from between 1910 and 1914, are landscapes of the immediate surroundings of his hometown of Figueres. He would have begun painting them at the tender age of 6. His first contact with the world of art and painting was very likely through the Gowan\u2019s Art Books monographs, which reproduced works by the Old Masters. The volumes on Vermeer, Ingres, De Hooch and Boucher are still preserved in his personal library. One of the first painting movements to have a strong impact on the young painter was impressionism, which he discovered through the work of Ramon Pichot, an artist and member of a family with close ties to the Dal\u00eds. Its influence first became evident in 1916 and, until the early 1920s, manifested in still lifes and land and seascapes, mainly of Cadaqu\u00e9s.<\/p>\n\n\n\n\n