Salvador Dalí

The first comprehensive retrospective of the work of Salvador Dalí ever to be staged in Australia exclusive to the National Gallery of Victoria as the sixth exhibition in the Melbourne Winter Masterpieces series.

Salvador Dalí: Liquid Desire brings together more than 200 stunning works by Salvador Dalí in all media including painting, drawing, watercolour, etchings, sculpture, fashion, jewellery, cinema and photography. The exhibition is drawn from the two largest collections of Salvador Dalí in the world, the Fundació Gala – Salvador Dalí in Figueres, Spain and the Salvador Dalí Museum in St Petersburg, Florida.

Salvador Dalí: Liquid Desire explores the brilliance of Dalí through chronological sections with visitors first encountering the artist as an accomplished young Impressionist painter with what is widely considered to be his first masterpiece, Self-Portrait with Raphaelesque Neck. 

The exhibition then moves through Dalí’s experimentation with Cubism, Abstraction, Neoclassicism and New Objectivity during his student years and his leadership of the Surrealist movement in Paris during the 1930s.

Salvador Dalí: Liquid Desire also includes the most significant Dalí work held in an Australian collection, the Lobster Telephone from the National Gallery of Australia, arguably one of the most famous sculptures of the twentieth century.

A highlight of the exhibition is the return to Australia of the artist’s 1932 painting Memory of the Child – Woman. This was the first Dalí painting ever to be seen in Australia in 1939 and was met with great controversy.

Viewers will also be introduced to Dalí’s contribution to 20th century cinema, from his early collaborations with the Spanish film-maker Luis Buñuel to his involvement with Alfred Hitchcock and other directors in Hollywood during the 1940s.