Galatea of the Spheres

by Bob Williams

Original - Not For Sale

Price

Not Specified

Dimensions

20.000 x 24.000 x 1.000 inches

Title

Galatea of the Spheres

Artist

Bob Williams

Medium

Painting - Oil On Canvas

Description

This is an 24 x 20 oil painting on canvas, it is like an inch smaller than the original. I painted the under painting and layout in acrylic , then changed to oil and repainted over all the acrylic.

Galatea of the Spheres is a painting by Salvador Dalí made in 1952. It depicts Gala Dalí, Salvador Dalí's wife and muse, as pieced together through a series of spheres arranged in a continuous array. When Salvador Dalí fell in love with Gala she was married to the French poet Paul Éluard, while the Spaniard was on the brink of gaining recognition for his visionary talent. It was three years before Dalí would paint his memorable work, The Persistence of Memory. Dalí worshipped Gala – she was his muse and the love of his life. He painted her frequently, often in religious contexts, like Virgin Mary in The Madonna of Port Lligat. Galatea of the Spheres is one of the many portraits Dalí did of his wife, in this instance depicting her head and shoulders as fragmented into spheres that seem to float in space.
Now, you may be wondering why the title says Galatea and not Gala. Dalí called her by many affectionate names and, in this instance, he is referencing the Greek legend of Pygmalion, the Cypriot sculptor who fell in love with the statue he carved out of ivory, which he named Galatea. With Aphrodite’s blessing, the statue came to life when Pygmalion kissed her lips and the two of them then married. By calling her Galatea, Dalí was recognizing Gala’s beauty and perfection, attributes one would find in a flawless, Greek statue, while also alluding to the interrelatedness of love and creation as the foundation of their relationship.

Uploaded

December 16th, 2021

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