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Fruits and Flowers
Dali's Botanical Prints at the Pensacola Museum of Art
 | | FlorDali I, Published by Senens, 1981. Collection of the Salvador Dali Museum, St. Petersburg, left. FlorDali II, Published by Senens, 1981. Colleciton of the Salvador Dali Museum, St. Petersburg, below. |
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This summer the PMA is proud to present "Fruits and Flowers: Dali's Botanical Prints." The exhibition will open on Friday, July 7 and continue through Saturday, September 2
This collection of 24 works is comprised of four folios of lithographs and photolithographs featuring flowers and botanicals with the signature Dali quality on loan from the Salvador Dali Museum, St. Petersburg, FL.
Salvador Dali (1904-1989) from his earliest work found inspiration in the works of others often copying works from books to study at his convenience. This exhibit of folios are broken into four sets. In "FlorDali," Dali based the images on original botanical prints from the 18th and 19th Centuries. In "FlorDali-Les Fruits" the artist painted directly over an existing print. And to create "FlorDali I" and "FlorDali II" he combined images from these first two folios. According to Dirk Armstrong, Assistant Curator for the Dali Museum, "In both of the suites Dal has used wordplay to imply and define characteristics of the resulting images he has created. All of the images from the various suites are intriguing, but the images in the "FlorDal” suite are of a more playful and thought provoking nature, whereas those in "FlorDal Les Fruits" are seemingly fraught with mystery and violence."
Throughout his career, Dali used elements of collage in his works. It was not until the late 1930's though that he began to work directly over works by other artists. These works included photographs, posters, advertisements, and magazines. As he put out many, many printed multiples, Dali would often use cut and paste techniques to include previous images in his mixed media as he has done in some of the portfolios in this exhibit.
Printed botanical illustrations have existed since the 1470's. These printed works were based on an actual illustration and then cut into a piece of wood for printed reproduction. Interestingly enough, with the passage of time and the re-use of this block of wood, later prints often showed very little resemblance to the actual plant. These prints were used primarily by physicians for scientific study. In the 17th century as the printing process became less labor intensive, these prints were collected in books and became more widely circulated and
were studied not just by botanists, but also by craftsmen.
In the 19th century with the invention of the mezzotint, they became available for anyone who wished to enjoy them for study or just for aesthetics.
The Pensacola Museum of Art is open Tuesday through Friday 10a.m. - 5p.m. and Saturday - Sunday 12p.m. - 5p.m. Admission is $5.00 for adults and $2.00 for students and active duty military. For more information, please call the PMA at 850-432-6247 or visit www.pensacolamuseumofart.org.
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