Aphorisms and quotes by Dali

2024 Author: Leah Sherlock | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-17 05:25

How to become a surrealist artist? Comprehending the secrets of painting, endlessly practicing, studying the paintings of masters, you can become a professional, but … an artisan.

A genius surrealist artist needs to be born, because only a genius can balance between the world of reality and fantasy, transferring his visions to the canvas and making others believe in the reality of the fantasy world. Through the paradoxical nature of the statements, the originality of the artist's personality is revealed in the best possible way, as can be seen by re-reading the aphorisms and quotes of Salvador Dali.

Borderline expressed by the phrase

Salvador Dali was a mystery not only to his surroundings - he was a mystery to himself. Rereading Dali's quotes, left by him at different times and on different occasions, one can assume that his main goal was to strike the audience's imagination with a paradoxical play on words, which were a continuation of his eccentric nature.

I'm doomed toeccentricity, whether I like it or not.

Everyone talks about eccentricity, but I am completely and completely paradoxical.

My feelings, light and fragile as soap bubbles, are another matter - I could never foresee the hysterical and ridiculous course of my behavior. Moreover, the ending of my actions strikes me first.

However, the origins of eccentricity should be sought in childhood. Before the birth of Dali, a boy was born in their family, named Salvador, who died in infancy. When the future artist was born in 1904, he was also given the name Salvador. He recalled that he was possessed by a constant feeling of splitting, as if he was not living his own life or had to live for two. Later in his book "The Secret Life of Salvador Dali, written by himself" he will say:

My brother was only the first taste of myself, embodied in an impossible, absolute excess…

And later, trying to understand the reasons for his hidden desires, he will make a few more observations:

One day, choking on a fish bone, I rushed out of the dining room, coughing hysterically and convulsing. I really felt bad, but with some secret pleasure I exaggerated both coughing and convulsions, knowing unmistakably how to attract the attention of a worried family.

This excerpt from the book gives an idea of the driving force that later forced Dali to resort to literally theatrical performances that shocked others - the desire to completely own the attention of everyone who had the honor of orbitinggenius.

It's hard to get attention even for a little while. And I indulged in this occupation every day and hour.

Childhood is drawn to insects: they are curious, they generate in the soul a craving for violence against themselves and nature, and this is already an incentive for creativity.

Madness for I am very nutritious, but it grows out of buffoonery.

Don Quixote was a crazy idealist. I am also a madman, but I am also a Catalan, and my madness is not without a commercial vein.

The enduring desire to comprehend oneself makes Dali seriously interested in psychology. When meeting with Z. Freud, whom Dali idolized, he tried to find answers to his questions, but Z. Freud was more busy with the work of Salvador Dali than with the peculiarities of his personality. Disappointed Dali exclaimed:

Great psychologists even could not understand where genius ends and madness begins.

The question of his genius worried Dali from early childhood, however, as well as the question of power over other people. Apparently, these two categories were inextricably linked for him. In his book The Secret Life of Salvador Dali, Told by Himself, he describes many cases of shocking childish cruelty when he needed to determine the boundaries of his freedom. It is safe to say that almost all of them were caused by a thirst for gaining the boundaries of a chaotic "I" and confidence in one's genius.

If you play genius, you become one.

Life is harsh… but the light of eternity illuminates it.

I obscenely love life. I am grateful to fate for two things: for the fact that I am a Spaniard, and for the fact that I am Salvador Dali.

The peculiarity of my genius is that it comes from the mind. It is from the mind.

The world will have to make some room, and the question is whether it will accommodate a genius.

I think it was not easier for me to be born than it was for the Creator to create the Universe. At least he rested afterwards, and all the colors of the world fell on me.

I declare with all responsibility: I have never joked, I am not joking and I am not going to joke.

I've always said that honey is sweeter than blood. Not vice versa.

Dali's view of freedom and the state

Salvador Dali had his own special view on freedom, the state and the state system: in Dali's quotes on this topic, fear of the unbridledness of his own imagination and the desire to have someone stronger nearby who could structure his restless mind are projected.

Anarchy under a monarchy is the best state structure.

The monarch should be the guarantor of anarchy.

In fact, I can only eat what has a clear and understandable form. And if I can't stand spinach, it's only because it's shapeless, like freedom.

Running ahead of history is much more interesting than describing it.

Dali about life and death

Dali was multifaceted: he was fascinated by different aspects of both real life and mysticism, among his friends and acquaintances there were peopleleft a mark in art and literature, cinema and psychiatry. Each of these people had their own unique memories of the artist, which they remembered, including a lot of quotes from Salvador Dali, which were born spontaneously, but stuck in their memory and remained in it for a long time.

Death wish can often be attributed to a strong impulse to return to where we came from.

All poets strive for the Angel, but natural negativism has spoiled tastes - and they are looking only for fallen angels.

I was already fascinated by three things: weakness, old age and luxury.

Being mediocre, there is no need to go out of your way to prove that you are mediocrity: it shows.

A hero, if he is a real hero - always on his own. A hero is one thing, a servant is another.

Love is one, but its faces are many

In the life of Salvador Dali there was only one beloved woman - Gala: it was her that he painted many times, it was about her that his thoughts, his statements that became Dali's quotes.

A Gala Gradiva celle qui avance. GALA GRADIVE the one that led me forward.

With this phrase, Dali began the description of his life in the book "The Secret Life of Salvador Dali, written by himself." In this book, among the many memories of different periods of Dali's life, one can find an explanation for the mutual attraction of two opposites, which were Gala and Dali. Dali was and remained throughout his life incredibly far frompracticality:

No practical action was alien to me - and the signs of the outside world increasingly frightened me.

Gala was a very knowledgeable lady in matters of earthly life, in particular - in matters of the value of works of art. And their union was simply preordained from above.

However, as a connoisseur of beauty in all its manifestations, Dali was fascinated by several women throughout his life, one of which, the famous singer Amanda Lear, remained his girlfriend for more than ten years, which allowed Dali, relying on the strength that gave him Gala, to be an authority for the young Amanda. This "love trio" lasted for about fifteen years, allowing each of its members to show their affection without losing their individuality.

Find yourself in each of them

With each of his women, Dali could reveal different sides of his contradictory nature: for some of them he was a great master, for some he was a stunning man, and Gala gave him that confidence in himself and his greatest talent, which he constantly needed.

Gala is my only muse, my genius and my life, without Gala I am nobody.

Suffering, I have fun. This is my old custom.

However, Dali felt affection not only for women: his relationship with the great poet G. Lorca is still being discussed. They had a really very tender relationship, and withthe sides of G. Lorca are even passionate, but Dali was able to very delicately place accents in these relations, leaving them only friendly. And this is confirmed both by the memories of Dali's friends and by the studies conducted by his biographer. Most likely, these people were bound by spiritual bonds that allowed each of them, despite a strong emotional attraction, to remain a unique person, appreciating the freedom of the other.

What I really am, only a few know.

Probably, the genius of surrealism needed to explore all aspects of the emotional connections between people in his characteristic close and thorough manner, as evidenced by Salvador Dali's quotes about love and other strong feelings.

I hold the hand of my joy in my hand and think in deep tenderness: "After all this, I can kill you!"

Great geniuses always produce mediocre children, and I don't want to be a confirmation of this rule - I want to leave only myself as a legacy. Dali is a drug you can't do without.

Enemies I throw flowers in the coffin.

Dali about creativity and artists

The great mystifier Dali did not tolerate mediocrity: you can see this by reading Dali's quotes about art and artists.

Maybe you see the Mother of God, like all people, but I see the scales.

I'm a bad artist because I'm too smart, and to be a good artist you have to be a little stupid.

For an artist, every touchbrushes to the canvas - a whole life drama.

First, learn how to draw and write like the old masters, and only then act on your own and you will be respected.

I'm perfectly normal. And the one who does not understand my painting, the one who does not like Velasquez, the one who is not interested in what time it is on my spread dials is abnormal - they show the exact time.

It is good taste that is fruitless: for an artist, there is nothing more harmful than good taste.

More than anything else, I despise Rodin, who sculpted this "Thinker": in this position, not only to think - it's even uncomfortable to shit.

All my life my obsession was pain, which I wrote countless.

I had a motto: the main thing is to let people talk about Dali. At worst, let them speak well.

People wouldn't be so worried if I was a mediocre artist. All great artists have been faked.

I think we are in the Middle Ages now, but someday the Renaissance will come.

In his characteristic shocking manner, not caring about the impression he made, Salvador Dali spoke about what was always his essence, his vocation, the meaning of his life - about creativity. That is why the artist's thoughts on art can be considered the best quotes from Salvador Dali.