http://www.artstyles.org/famous-renaissance/
Renowned Spanish maestro Salvador Dali (1904-1989) was a multi faceted artist with skills ranging from painting and sculpturing to films and photography. He was a prominent figure of the ‘Surrealist’ Movement, who often drew his inspiration from the ‘Renaissance’ artists. Salvador’s most famous work of all times is “La persistencia de la memoria (The Persistence of Memory),” which truly embodies his penchant for the eccentric and the fantastical.
“La persistencia de la memoria (The Persistence of Memory),” lesser known as “Melting Clocks,” is a remarkably small-scale oil work on canvas, measuring 9.4″ x 13″. Created in 1931, the artwork has been gracing the Museum of Modern Art in New York, since 1934. The central idea of this enigmatic piece is the passage of time, where the painter has tried to signify the fundamentals of science and their association with the mundane life through his recurrent theme of the tussle between ’softness’ and ‘hardness.’ The vision for the ‘Surrealist’ work, “La persistencia de la memoria (The Persistence of Memory),” is said to have come from Dali’s observation of melting cheese under the influence of heat and due to an impulse in his dream.
The painting revolves around a dismal representation of decay and demise with the flow of time. It prominently features four pocket watches, of which, three appear to be ‘melting’ and eventually disfiguring. Noticeably, all the three ‘melting clocks’ have blue dials, believed to be inspired from the broken sundial in front of Dali’s residence in Port Lligat. One of the three clocks is lying over a platform on the extreme left side. There is a fly sitting on its dial, partly placed over the platform and partly, flowing over the edge of the raised ground, to reinforce the theme of the painting.
The second clock is hanging on the extended branch of a dried olive tree, which shows no signs of life. The third clock is placed over the mid-section of a monstrous creature with huge eyelashes, widely believed to be Dali’s ‘Abstract’ self-portrait. This creature is shown in deep slumber to indicate that the whole setting is a part of a dream, as happened with Salvador himself. The fourth clock, red-orange in color, is stopped and therefore, not ‘melting’ but is covered by a colony of ants, another symbolization of decease. The scene is set against the backdrop of golden escarpments touched by the seawaters and lit by, what appears to be, the evening sky. This landscape is purported to be the Catalonia Coast, Dali’s native place, which was his favorite background for many of his works.
Since the painter has deliberately cloaked the interpretation of his work in obscurity, other explanations are also put on this work. For instance, it is often associated with Einstein’s theory, which propounds that the speed of the passage of time is relative and not constant for all the beings, as was previously assumed. Dali has captured this concept to profess the irrationality of conventional measurement of time and its tools, the clocks in this case. This is also evident from Dali’s remark, “soft watches are nothing else than the tender, extravagant and solitary paranoiac-critical camembert of time and space.” No matter how “La persistencia de la memoria (The Persistence of Memory)” is understood, this timeless piece of art, continues to intrigue its viewers and maintains its position among the greatest works of the modern era!
Annette Labedzki received her BFA at the Emily Carr College of Art and Design in Vancouver, B.C. Canada. She has more than 25 years experience. She is the founder and developer of an online art gallery featuring original art from all over the world. It is a great site for art collectors to buy original art. Is is also a venue for artists to display and sell their art . Artists can join for free and their image upload is unlimited. Please visit the website at http://www.Labedzki-Art.com
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