MASTERPIECE: The Persistence of Memory

The Persistence of Memory is an abstract painting by the Spanish painter Salvador Dalí, painted in 1931. Performed by the technique of oil on canvas, is a figurative style. The images that are presented are watches that seem to be melting on the branches, and ants that devour greedily pocket. Dali was indisputable not a traditional painter. The background of the painting is clearly a beautiful representation of the landscape of Port Lligat in native Catalonia Dali, but as a whole, works like an amazing hallucination: full of fascinating and confusing details, the type of blended images we experience when we dream. Dali and his surrealist contemporaries were responsible for leading the masses through an immensely important and challenging new art movement. This painting is really striking.

I’m really into his work. The scenery is simple; the sea in the background and a small rock formation on the right appears. The work depicts a dreamlike landscape, large dilated spaces, in which the elements are associated in an unusual way. In the foreground on the left, probably a block of wood, which serves as a table, on which two watches and an incomplete tree with one branch without leaves have observed. The largest clock is soft, has a fly on it and falls, slipping over the edge of the table. The small, closed like a pocket watch and ants move about it. Pending a third clock tree, too soft. A strange figure that simulates a soft head, the neck is diluted in the dark in the center of the work. Particularly striking is the enormous nose, the kind of language coming out of it and the closed eye with long eyelashes. The figure seems to sleep on the sand. The artist has placed this figure fourth watch, equally soft and it also seems to melt or run off. The elements described above are set in what looks like a deserted beach, with the sea and a cove surrounded by cliffs in the background. The sky and sea merge. I think his work is very disturbing.

This painting is indisputably his famous work. The objects are painted in detail, although they are not lifelike, and an almost photographic realism is involved. The artist uses a bright color that contrasts strongly with the warm tones cold. Light plays a powerful role and contributes to shaping a dreamlike and delirious atmosphere.  It’s definitely my taste of art.

Table seems to be divided into a high luminance portion and a shadow. Regarding the composition scheme is predominantly horizontal, interrupted only by the vertical marking, the tree trunk, by the curving lines of watches and the central figure. Which appear to have been introduced to provide a slow movement to the stillness of the beach. He’s one of my all-time favorites.