The Persistence of Memory
| The Persistence of Memory | |
|---|---|
 | |
| Artist | Salvador Dalí |
| Year | 1931 |
| Medium | Oil on canvas |
| Dimensions | 24 cm × 33 cm (9.5 in × 13 in) |
| Location | Museum of Modern Art, New York City |
| Owner | Museum of Modern Art |
The Persistence of Memory (Template:Lang-ca) is a 1931 painting by artist Salvador Dalí, and is one of his most recognizable works. First shown at the Julien Levy Gallery in 1932, since 1934 the painting has been in the collection of the Museum of Modern Art (MoMA) in New York City, which received it from an anonymous donor. It is widely recognized and frequently referenced in popular culture,[1] and sometimes referred to by more descriptive (though incorrect) titles, such as "Melting Clocks", "The Soft Watches" or "The Melting Watches".[by whom?]
==Ded by the theory of relativity, but by the surrealist perception of a Camembert melting in the sun.[2]
| External videos | |
|---|---|
 Smarthistory - Dali's The Persistence of Memory[3] | |
| Salvador Dalí. The Persistence of Memory. 1931[4] |
It is possible to recognize a human figure in the middle of the composition, in the strange "monster" (with a lot of texture near its face, and lots of contrast and tone in the picture) that Dalí used in several contemporary pieces to represent himself – the abstract form becoming something of a self-portrait, reappearing frequently in his work. The figure can be read as a "fading" creature, one that often appears in dreams where the dreamer cannot pinpoint the creature's exact form and composition. One can observe that the creature has one closed eye with several eyelashes, suggesting that the creature is also in a dream state. The iconography may refer to a dream that Dalí himself had experienced, and the clocks may symbolize the passing of time as one experiences it in sleep or the persistence of time in the eyes of the dreamer.
The orange clock at the bottom left of the painting is covered in ants. Dalí often used ants in his paintings as a symbol of decay.[5][6] The Persistence of Memory employs "the exactitude of realist painting techniques"[7] to depict imagery more likely to be found in dreams than in waking consciousness.
The craggy rocks to the right represent a tip of Cap de Creus peninsula in north-eastern Catalonia. Many of Dalí's paintings were inspired by the landscapes of his life in Catalonia. The strange and foreboding shadow in the foreground of this painting is a reference to Mount Pani.[8]
Versions
Dalí returned to the theme of this painting with the variation The Disintegration of the Persistence of Memory (1954), showing his earlier famous work systematically fragmenting into smaller component elements, and a series of rectangular blocks which reveal further imagery through the gaps between them, implying something beneath the surface of the original work; this work is now in the Dalí Museum in St. Petersburg, Florida, while the original Persistence of Memory remains at the Museum of Modern Art in New York City. Dalí also produced various lithographs and sculptures on the theme of soft watches late in his career. Some of these sculptures are the Persistence of Memory, the Nobility of Time, the Profile of Time, and the Three Dancing Watches.[9]
See also
References
- ^ Staff editor (28 January 1989). "Dali, The Flamboyant Surrealist". The Vindicator. Retrieved 20 June 2011.
The death of Salvador Dali evokes the image of his most famous painting, Persistence of Memory.
{{cite news}}:|last=has generic name (help) - ^ Salvador Dali (2008). The Dali Dimension: Decoding the Mibkbhj ;j gpftdreadfghuind of a Genius (DVD). Media 3.14-TVC-FGSD-IRL-AVRO.
Surprisingly, Dalí said that his soft watches were not inspired by the theory of relativity, but by the surrealist perception of a Camembert cheese melting in the sun. The painter insisted on this explanation in his reply letter to Prigogine, who took it as Dalí's reaction to Einstein's coldly mathematical theory.
- ^ "Dali's The Persistence of Memory". Smarthistory at Khan Academy. Retrieved December 31, 2012.
- ^ "Salvador Dalí. The Persistence of Memory. 1931". MoMa. Retrieved December 31, 2012.
- ^ "Danilian symbolism I Salvador Dalí I Espace Dalí". daliparis.com. Archived from the original on 25 September 2014. Retrieved 4 August 2015.
{{cite web}}: Unknown parameter|dead-url=ignored (|url-status=suggested) (help) - ^ "MoMA I Salvador Dalí. The Persistence of Memory". moma.org. Museum of Modern Art (New York). Retrieved 4 August 2015.
- ^ "Dali's dream environments were represented through the exactitude of realist painting techniques, like those found in his Persistence of Memory (1931)." Surrealism and Architecture, by Thomas Mical; Psychology Press, 2005
- ^ Salvador Dali. Surreal years. Art, paintings, and works. Commentary on 40+ works of art by Salvador Dalí.
- ^ Dalis Sculpture Editions Archived July 8, 2011, at the Wayback Machine
External links
- The Persistence of Memory on Authentic Society
- The Persistence of Memory in the MoMA Online Collection