Salvador Dal\u00ed needs no introduction \u2013 his artwork speaks for him. From the melting clocks of \u201cThe Persistence of Memory\u201d to his interpretations of bizarre dreams, Dal\u00ed is the premier surrealist of his time. Dal\u00ed’s works have inspired everyone from Disney to musicians, filmmakers, and beyond. Around the world, Salvador Dal\u00ed art pieces adorn museum walls and inspire public installations. But did you know that St. Petersburg lays claim to one of the largest private collections?<\/p>\n
The Dal\u00ed is a must-see attraction just around the corner from John’s Pass at Madeira Beach. From his eccentric personality to his iconic works, Dal\u00ed’s presence resonates with St. Petersburg visitors.<\/p>\n
Born Salvador Domingo Felipe Jacinto Dal\u00ed i Dom\u00e8nech in the Spanish town of Figueres, Dal\u00ed’s passion for art began at an early age. When he was 14, Figueres’ theater hosted Dal\u00ed’s first exhibit, which his father put on. Soon after that, the aspiring artist enrolled in his first college, the San Fernando Academy of Art of Madrid.<\/p>\n
Dal\u00ed spent his Sundays studying masterpieces of the art world at the local Prado Museum. From there, he brought his inspired mind to the classroom. His study of Cubism sparked interest in his work among his peers.<\/p>\n
As Dada and Futurism (two avant-garde art movements that reject logic and reason) crept into his mind, Dal\u00ed’s eccentricity elevated. Having achieved recognition for his artistic skills, he dropped out of the Academy after four years. Rather, the Academy expelled him. He refused to accept examination by the Academy’s professors because he deemed them incompetent to judge his works.<\/p>\n
Free from the limitations of traditional education, Dal\u00ed traveled to Paris, where he would soon meet Pablo Picasso and Andre Breton. There, Breton introduced him to Surrealism, and Dal\u00ed’s interest in the bizarre blossomed. From that point on, Salvador Dal\u00ed art pieces would receive international attention.<\/p>\n
Though the man himself never visited Florida, many paintings of Salvador Dal\u00ed and by Salvador Dal\u00ed live at The Dal\u00ed in St. Petersburg. The museum’s collection includes original Salvador Dal\u00ed paintings, sketches, large-format pieces, and strange objects and sculptures that defy reality. The Dal\u00ed hosts over 2,400 Dal\u00ed works, making it the single most extensive collection of privately owned Dal\u00ed art outside of Spain.<\/p>\n
How did St. Petersburg come to be the home for such a collection? It all began with a lifelong passion for Dal\u00ed’s work curated by Albert Reynolds and Eleanor Morse.<\/p>\n
In 1943, the same year the couple married, the Morses purchased their first Salvador Dal\u00ed painting. \u201cDaddy Longlegs of the Evening \u2013 Hope!\u201d became the first in their extensive collection, for which the Morses paid $2,950. Their passion for Dal\u00ed’s work eventually led to more purchases and a friendship between Dal\u00ed and his wife, Gala.<\/p>\n
The Morses’ success in business allowed them to own more of Dal\u00ed’s work. The Injection Molders Supply Company, located in Beachwood, Ohio, founded by Reynolds Morse, became the de facto location for much of their collection. There, the Morse family founded the original Salvador Dal\u00ed Museum. As their collection grew, space came at a premium, and the couple soon found themselves with more art than they could display.<\/p>\n
Over the years, the Morses enjoyed first-choice of Dal\u00ed’s work. By the mid-1970s, the couple had amassed so many of the master’s works that they grew concerned about the collection’s separation over estate taxes. It was then that St. Petersburg stepped in with a solution.<\/p>\n
The Florida legislature, enticed by the nationwide hunt for a new location for the Dal\u00ed works, provided funds to renovate a warehouse in St. Petersburg to house the collection. Thus, the Salvador Dal\u00ed Museum, St. Petersburg, opened in 1982.<\/p>\n
The original site of The Dal\u00ed drew international attention. Visitors numbered in the hundreds of thousands by the end of the millennium. Even so, the museum faced similar issues Reynolds and Eleanor faced years before: space constraints.<\/p>\n
By 2008, plans for a new location for the Salvador Dal\u00ed art pieces came to fruition. Architect Yann Weymouth of St. Petersburg-based HOK received the task of interpreting Dal\u00ed’s signature style into architecture. To live up to the artist’s reputation, the museum features an out-of-this-world design\u00a0known simply as the \u201cenigma.\u201d<\/p>\n
The geodesic glass bubble is made up of 1,062 triangular pieces of glass and stands 75 feet tall, a homage to a similar construct at Dal\u00ed’s home in Spain. The museum has three floors, all connected by a helical staircase referencing Dal\u00ed’s obsession with DNA molecules and spirals.<\/p>\n
As with most Salvador Dal\u00ed famous paintings, there is more than meets the eye to The Dal\u00ed. Located on the Florida coast, an area prone to dangerous weather, the museum has eighteen-inch thick hurricane-proof walls that can withstand even the worst hurricane.<\/p>\n
Visitors can enjoy Spanish tapas and watch films about the artist on the first floor. On the second floor, The Dal\u00ed Museum Center for the Avant-garde offers students, researchers, and professionals resources for studying the artist, Surrealism, and the avant-garde. Guests will find the extensive collection of Salvador Dal\u00ed famous paintings on the third floor.<\/p>\n
Salvador Dal\u00ed art pieces can fetch a pretty penny. In 2011, Dal\u00ed’s \u201cPortrait of Paul Eluard\u201d sold for $22 million at auction. Enjoying the master’s work in person is a priceless experience, however. Visitors to The Dal\u00ed are only forty-five minutes from John’s Pass at Madeira Beach, west of St. Petersburg. For more information on The Dal\u00ed, visit\u00a0www.thedali.org<\/a>.<\/p>\n While Dal\u00ed himself never visited Florida, his art reflects his interest in the sea. In 1959, photographer Robert Descharnes took a photo of Dal\u00ed with a dolphin on his head. Several of the artist’s sketches feature dolphins and even mermaids. You, too, can snap a photo of a dolphin and be inspired by the sea aboard the best\u00a0St. Pete Beach dolphin cruise<\/a>,\u00a0the Dolphin Quest.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Salvador Dal\u00ed needs no introduction \u2013 his artwork speaks for him. From the melting clocks of \u201cThe Persistence of Memory\u201d to his interpretations of bizarre dreams, Dal\u00ed is the premier […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":15728,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[9],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-12800","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-dolphin-quest-blog"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/belltechwebtools.com\/STAGING\/johnspass\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12800","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/belltechwebtools.com\/STAGING\/johnspass\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/belltechwebtools.com\/STAGING\/johnspass\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/belltechwebtools.com\/STAGING\/johnspass\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/belltechwebtools.com\/STAGING\/johnspass\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=12800"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/belltechwebtools.com\/STAGING\/johnspass\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12800\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":12856,"href":"https:\/\/belltechwebtools.com\/STAGING\/johnspass\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12800\/revisions\/12856"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/belltechwebtools.com\/STAGING\/johnspass\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/15728"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/belltechwebtools.com\/STAGING\/johnspass\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=12800"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/belltechwebtools.com\/STAGING\/johnspass\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=12800"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/belltechwebtools.com\/STAGING\/johnspass\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=12800"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}