Salvador Dalí
Master surrealist, Persistence of Memory
Most quoted
"The fact that I myself, at the moment of painting, do not understand my own pictures, does not mean that these pictures have no meaning; on the contrary, their meaning is so profound, complex, coherent, and involuntary that it escapes the most simple analysis of rational intuition."
— from The Secret Life of Salvador Dalí
"The fact that I myself, at the moment of painting, do not understand my own pictures, does not mean that these pictures have no meaning; on the contrary, their meaning is so profound, complex, coherent, and involuntary that it escapes the most simple analysis of logical intuition."
— from The Secret Life of Salvador Dalí
"I am painting pictures which make me die for joy, I am creating with an absolute naturalness, without the slightest aesthetic concern, I am making things that inspire me with a profound emotion and I am trying to paint them honestly."
— from Letter to André Breton, 1929
All quotes by Salvador Dalí (305)
Have no fear of perfection; you'll never reach it.
The first man to compare the cheeks of a young woman to a rose was obviously a poet; the first to repeat it was possibly an idiot.
I don't do drugs, I am drugs.
Surrealism is destructive, but it destroys only what it considers to be shackles limiting our vision.
Intelligence without ambition is a bird without wings.
The only difference between me and a madman is that I'm not mad.
Mistakes are almost always of a sacred nature.
At the age of six I wanted to be a cook. At seven I wanted to be Napoleon. And my ambition has been growing steadily ever since.
The elephant is a horse designed by a committee.
I am not strange, I am surreal.
Drawing is the honesty of art.
The secret of my influence has always been that it remained secret.
Beauty should be edible, or not at all.
I seated myself before 'I Am That I Am' and began to cry.
Surrealists are not bums.
The thermometer of my passion is at 40 degrees.
Every morning when I wake up, I experience an exquisite joy—the joy of being Salvador Dalí.
I do not paint dreams or nightmares, I paint my own reality.
The difference between false memories and true ones is the same as for jewels: it is always the false ones that look the most real, the most brilliant.
Let the Jubilee begin!
Contemporaries of Salvador Dalí
Other Visual Artss born within 50 years of Salvador Dalí (1904–1989).