Salvador Dalí

Proliferating ants, lace-clad rhinoceroses, apocalyptic horse, rotten donkey, spidery elephant, pet ocelot, and anteater on a leash… Salvador Dalí imagined a fantastical bestiary revisiting ancient mythology, medieval representations, and those of artists such as Breughel and Bosch.

Transgressing scientific classifications of the animal world, this bestiary is unique because it is linked to Dalí’s theory of the irrational and the psyche of human beings, primarily that of the artist himself. Fantasies, dreams, phobias, metamorphoses, hallucinations, and chain symbolisations become symptoms for analysts and fuel an imaginary world of chimeras, supernatural and divine creatures.

This accompanying exhibition catalogue offers an immersion in the Dalí universe and its extraordinary bestiary through more than 90 works rarely shown to the public, whose diversity (paintings, drawings, engravings, sculptures, photographs, films, etc.) is a reflection of Dalí’s polymorphous talent.

Text in French with an English section at the back.