GALA BY SALVADOR DALI: HIS MUSE, HIS LOVER, HIS EVERYTHING
Gala Dali was Salvador Dali’s wife. It was his muse, his inspiration, his business manager and dealer. She was an intriguing woman that many called haughty, ambitious, aggressive, power-hungry and promiscuous. And she was also elegant, intelligent, independent, sophisticated and intuitive.
Salvador Dali and Gala spent together 53 years, from the moment they met in Cadaques in 1929, until her death in 1982 also in Cadaques. Dali painted her countless times, and her face and body made history. But she remained an enigmatic character that preferred to stay in the shadows and work behind the scenes to help Dali become legend.
You can learn more about her in Gala’s biography we published in our blog. But in today’s post we’ll be reviewing the most famous Salvador Dali Gala paintings, we’ll dig into their meaning and through them we’ll get to know a little better Gala and her role in Dali’s life and career.
Top Salvador Dali’s Gala paintings:
1
Imperial Monument To the Child-Woman (1929)
We start our list of Gala paintings with the very first appearance of Gala in Dali’s works. It was the Summer of 1929 that Salvador Dali and Gala met in Cadaques, where the artist spent the holidays and received guests from Paris. Although Gala had arrived with her husband, the poet Paul Eluard, Gala and Dali fell in love.
This painting was started during the brief spell when Gala and Eluard went back to Paris and Dali headed to his hometown of Figueres, before joining Gala in Paris to be finally together. The painting is not completed, and it simbolizes how Gala will help him exorcize his terrors and fears, but also will be the cause of his family rejecting him.
SEE IT IN: Museo Nacional Centro de Arte Reina Sofia (Madrid, Spain)