The Dalí Theatre and Museum (, ; ) is a museum dedicated to the artist

Salvador Dalí Salvador Domingo Felipe Jacinto Dalí i Domènech, Marquess of Dalí of Púbol (11 May 190423 January 1989), known as Salvador Dalí ( ; ; ), was a Spanish Surrealism, surrealist artist renowned for his technical skill, precise draftsmanship, ...

in his home town of

Figueres Figueres (; ) is the capital city of Alt Empordà county, in the Girona region, Catalonia, Spain. The town is the birthplace of artist Salvador Dalí, and houses the Dalí Theatre and Museum, a large museum designed by Dalí himself which att ...

, in

Catalonia Catalonia is an autonomous community of Spain, designated as a ''nationalities and regions of Spain, nationality'' by its Statute of Autonomy of Catalonia of 2006, Statute of Autonomy. Most of its territory (except the Val d'Aran) is situate ...

Spain Spain, or the Kingdom of Spain, is a country in Southern Europe, Southern and Western Europe with territories in North Africa. Featuring the Punta de Tarifa, southernmost point of continental Europe, it is the largest country in Southern Eur ...

. Salvador Dalí lived there from 1984 to 1989, and is buried in a crypt below the stage. The museum received 1,368,755 visitors in 2016.

Museum

The heart of the museum is the town's theatre that Dalí knew as a child. It was where one of the first public exhibitions of young Dalí's art was shown. The old theatre was burned during the

Spanish Civil War The Spanish Civil War () was a military conflict fought from 1936 to 1939 between the Republican faction (Spanish Civil War), Republicans and the Nationalist faction (Spanish Civil War), Nationalists. Republicans were loyal to the Left-wing p ...

and remained in a state of ruin. In 1960, Dalí and the mayor of Figueres decided to rebuild it as a museum dedicated to the town's most famous son. In 1968, the city council approved the plan, and construction began the following year. The architects were Joaquim de Ros i Ramis and Alexandre Bonaterra. The museum opened on September 28, 1974, and it expanded through the mid-1980s. The museum now includes buildings and courtyards adjacent to the old theatre. The museum displays the single largest and most diverse collection of works by Salvador Dalí, the core of which was from the artist's personal collection. In addition to Dalí paintings from all decades of his career, there are Dalí sculptures, three-dimensional

collage Collage (, from the , "to glue" or "to stick together") is a technique of art creation, primarily used in the visual arts, but in music too, by which art results from an assembly of different forms, thus creating a new whole. (Compare with pasti ...

s, mechanical devices, and other curiosities from Dalí's imagination. A highlight is a three-dimensional

anamorphic Anamorphic format is a cinematography technique that captures widescreen images using recording media with narrower native Aspect ratio (image), aspect ratios. Originally developed for 35 mm movie film, 35 mm film to create widescreen pres ...

living-room installation with a '' Mae West Lips Sofa'', a custom sofa that looks like the face of

Mae West Mary Jane "Mae" West (August 17, 1893 – November 22, 1980) was an American actress, singer, comedian, screenwriter, and playwright whose career spanned more than seven decades. Recognized as a prominent sex symbol of her time, she was known ...

when viewed from a certain spot. The museum also houses a small selection of works by other artists collected by Dalí, ranging from

El Greco Doménikos Theotokópoulos (, ; 1 October 1541 7 April 1614), most widely known as El Greco (; "The Greek"), was a Greek painter, sculptor and architect of the Spanish Renaissance, regarded as one of the greatest artists of all time. ...

and Bougereau to

Marcel Duchamp Henri-Robert-Marcel Duchamp (, ; ; 28 July 1887 – 2 October 1968) was a French painter, sculptor, chess player, and writer whose work is associated with Cubism, Dada, Futurism and conceptual art. He is commonly regarded, along with Pablo Pica ...

and John de Andrea, In accordance with Dalí's specific request, a second-floor gallery is devoted to the work of his friend and fellow Catalan artist Antoni Pitxot, who also became director of the museum after Dalí's death. A glass

geodesic dome A geodesic dome is a hemispherical thin-shell structure (lattice-shell) based on a geodesic polyhedron. The rigid triangular elements of the dome distribute stress throughout the structure, making geodesic domes able to withstand very heavy ...

cupola crowns the stage of the old theatre, and Dalí is buried in a

crypt A crypt (from Greek κρύπτη (kryptē) ''wikt:crypta#Latin, crypta'' "Burial vault (tomb), vault") is a stone chamber beneath the floor of a church or other building. It typically contains coffins, Sarcophagus, sarcophagi, or Relic, religiou ...

below the stage floor. The space formerly occupied by the audience has been transformed into a courtyard open to the sky, with

Dionysian The Apollonian and the Dionysian are philosophical and literary concepts represented by a duality between the figures of Apollo and Dionysus from Greek mythology. Its popularization is widely attributed to the work ''The Birth of Tragedy'' by Fri ...

nude figurines standing in the old balcony windows. A Dalí installation inside a full-sized car, inspired by '' Rainy Taxi'' (1938), is parked near the centre of the space.

Art collection

The Dalí Theatre and Museum holds the largest collection of major works by Dalí in a single location. Some of the most important exhibited works are ''Port Alguer'' (1924), ''The Spectre of Sex-appeal'' (1932), ''Soft self-portrait with grilled bacon'' (1941), ''Poetry of America—the Cosmic Athletes'' (1943), ''Galarina'' (1944–45), '' Basket of Bread'' (1945), '' Leda Atomica'' (1949), '' Galatea of the Spheres'' (1952), ''Crist de la Tramuntana'' (1968), and '' Dalí Seen from the Back Painting Gala from the Back Eternalised by Six Virtual Corneas Provisionally Reflected by Six Real Mirrors'' (1972-73). There is also a set of works created by the artist expressly for the Museum, including the ''Mae West'' room, the ''Palace of the Wind'' room, the ''Monument to Francesc Pujols'', and the ''Cadillac plujós''. A collection of holographic art by Dalí, and a collection of

jewellery Jewellery (or jewelry in American English) consists of decorative items worn for personal adornment such as brooches, ring (jewellery), rings, necklaces, earrings, pendants, bracelets, and cufflinks. Jewellery may be attached to the body or the ...

he designed are on display. Another room contains a

bathtub A bathtub, also known simply as a bath or tub, is a container for holding water in which a person or another animal may Bathing, bathe. Most modern bathtubs are made of thermoformed Acrylic resin, acrylic, porcelain enamel, porcelain-enameled s ...

and a side table with an open drawer and a lamp, all of which Dalí had installed upside-down on the ceiling. An extension to the museum building contains a room dedicated to

optical illusion In visual perception, an optical illusion (also called a visual illusion) is an illusion caused by the visual system and characterized by a visual perception, percept that arguably appears to differ from reality. Illusions come in a wide varie ...

s, stereographs, and anamorphic art created by Dalí. The artist's final works, including his last oil painting, '' The Swallow's Tail'' (1983), are on display here.

Gallery

File:Musée Salvador Dali Figueres.JPG, Museum entrance File:Catalunya en Miniatura-Torre Galatea (Museu Dalí de Figueres).JPG, Scale model, at Catalunya en Miniatura File:Teatre Museu Dalí Façana.JPG, Fantastic figures adorn the south façade File:Figueres 15.jpg, Sculpture next to entrance File:DaliMuseum1.jpg, Courtyard, with Cadillac installation at lower right File:Editathon at Fundació Dalí september 2012 (31).JPG, Inside view of the copula File:Figueres 28.jpg, Roof parapet with giant eggs File:Salvador Dali Crypt in Figueres.jpg, Dalí's crypt File:Editathon at Fundació Dalí september 2012 (28).JPG, Wikipedia Edit-a-thon in the interior stage space (2012) File:Editathon at Fundació Dalí september 2012.JPG, View of stage during the Edit-a-thon (2012)

References

External links

Dalí Theatre Museum English language web page

Dalí Theatre-Museum situation map in Figueres
{{DEFAULTSORT:Dali Theatre And Museum 1974 establishments in Catalonia Art museums and galleries in Catalonia Art museums and galleries established in 1974 Biographical museums in Spain Buildings and structures in Figueres Former theatres in Spain Salvador Dalí museums Visionary environments Eggs in culture Burned buildings and structures in Spain

Museum

Art collection

Gallery

See also

References

External links