PERSONAJES: Centenario de Salvador Dalí.

A stamp has been issued that depicts Dalí’s 1921 painting, Self Portrait with the Neck of Rafael, from the Gala-Salvador Dalí Foundation’s collection.

Both the personality and prolific output of Salvador Dalí are widely celebrated and continue to arouse a great deal of interest, and in 2004, the centenary of his birth, the artist’s life and work will find still wider audiences both in his native Spain and abroad, as the result of a wide-ranging programme of activities and celebrations planned throughout the year. All of these activities are aimed at offering a more complete and comprehensible view of the personality of this controversial and brilliant artist. At the same time, these centenary celebrations will offer us all the opportunity to reacquaint ourselves with the provocative, eccentric and surrealist Dalí and his creations. Salvador Dalí i Domenech, was born the son of a notary on 11 May 1904. From his early childhood he showed an exceptional talent for drawing. His early paintings and sketches were inspired by the artist’s observation of his own surroundings and depict the contents of his visual memory expressed in terms of a very real environment. His inspiration for these compositions were two strong memories from his childhood: the Catalan coast and the landscapes of the Ampurda region. But the elements that appear as a constant from his early work all the way through to the end of his life are the light and colour of the Mediterranean, a persistent and characteristic feature of his highly individual output. In 1921 he was accepted at the San Fernando School of Fine Art and lived in the Students’ Residence Hall. There he became friends with García Lorca and Buñuel. He subsequently travelled to Paris, where he met up with the French poet Paul Éluard and the surrealists,a group whose ideas he identified with. In 1929 he met Helena Ivanovna, Gala, the woman who became both muse and companion, and in 1930 he introduced his Paranoid-Critical Method, a new and individual version of surrealism. In 1949 he began his Madonna of Port Lligat series, and the beginning of the 1950s saw the publication of his Mystic Manifesto. From then until the 1980s, Dalí cultivated a wide range of artistic techniques and languages that had sprung from the avant-garde of the 20th century: post-impressionism, cubism, futurism, Dadaism, surrealism, figurative and abstract expressionism and hyperrealism. His long and prolific life finally came to an end at Torre Galatea on 23 January 1989.