"Intelligence without ambition is a bird without wings."

Salvador Dali

Aside from sports, fashion, reading and music… art has become one of my most recent interests. I’m well aware of more than a handful of Salvador’s works and his abstract imagination and influences from Freudian psychology have certainly sparked my eagerness to start understanding his works. What puzzles me is that this man was actually still alive in our recent history. Usually, with a man of his stature and brilliance you would most likely be persuaded to believe he was a part of the Renaissance Era with the likes of Donatello, Leonardo Da Vinci, Michelangelo and Raphael (think, “Ninja Turtles”, that’s how I remember them).

Born in Spain, in 1904, this surrealist artist is probably most well-known for his work, The Persistence of Memory (1931). He passed in 1989 from heart failure.

The Persistence of Memory, 1931

A few of my personal favs include:

The Three Sphinxes of Bikini, 1947

“The experimental atomic explosions on the atoll of Bikini, as well as the bombs dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki inspired this Dalí work. Two human heads and a tree become hallucinatory double images of the mushroom cloud produced by a nuclear explosion.” (Explanation from: dali-gallery.com)

Ballerina in a Death's-Head, 1939

Living Still Life, 1956

Perfect irony created in this painting. Using the minds subconscious perception of gravity to create a sense of movement in what would traditionally be a still life portrait.

Metamorphosis of Narcissuss, 1937

And here is a short video displaying some of his works as well. The music in the video is from Clint Mansell - Requiem for a Dream, which is coincidentally my favourite music for basketball player highlight compilations (I’m sure you’ll recognize it).