Salvador Dali
Surreal Artist 1904-1989
Born in the town of Figueras in Northern Spain to an affluent family and a son of a notary.
At ten years old he received his first drawing lesson. He went to study art at the Royal Academy in Madrid.
His art is classified as Surreal. Salvador Dali was a Spanish painter, sculptor, graphic artist, and jewelery designer. His work is definitely electric. He loved being an extreme exhibitionist in style, which was always an attention getter.
He used his imagination to intensify his art with unique style of his subconscious mind which sometimes was the bizarre in erotic imagination. Dali was ahead of his time. His work was realistic and detailed.
One time he appeared in a skin diving suit to introduce the opening of a London Surrealist exhibition in 1936. He stated that this was the source of his creative energy.
Dali created "Dream of Venus" for the World's Fair held in 1939. The Fair was held in Flushing Meadows and the theme was "Building of Tomorrow" and had many exhibits but none of them were as controversial as Dali's.
"Dream of Venus", was a fun house and had little connection with the theme or the main exhibition. But the director of exhibits loved the idea. The fun house was a sort of "spook house " which contained Freudian dream symbolism, very controversial and ahead of it's time. Dali has great work's not only in paintings but also sculpture, jewelry and design.
He wrote a book called "Hidden Faces" and worked on a film made with Luis Bunuel called "Un Chien andalou", and " L'Age d'Or, " both in Surreal style.
Salvador Dali has a museum in St Petersburg Florida and also in Figures Spain his hometown.
Galerie Michael Art Exhibit 
The Inspiration of Artist Pablo Picasso--Art Exhibit January 17, 2008
This evening I had the pleasure of attending an exhibition at Galerie Micheal located in Beverly Hills, California, dedicated to Pablo Picasso. It featured a complete and rare set of progressive proofs and prints illustrating the process from inception to the final state.
Pablo Picasso is a celebrated artist of the Twentieth Century born in southern Spain. He began to draw when he was only seven years old under the eye of his father who was a teacher of painting.
Picasso was considered the driving force of the visual avant-garde. His art evolved into many diversified experiments and constant innovations of many moods. While admiring his creativity and talent I also felt a great sense of romance and passion about his great works of art. I read that Picasso's art revolved around the various relations he had with his wives and mistresses. Many of the portraits are actually of his wives, mistresses and children. He was inspired by affairs of the mind and the heart, it drove him into wild passion and he immortalized them in his art.
One of his affairs was with Genevieve Laporte, who became an award-winning documentary style film-maker and poet. This affair began when the 17 year old Mme Laporte met Picasso when she interviewed him for her school magazine in 1944. I remember reading that their initial conversation included the following exchange:
"Mr Picasso, young people do not understand your paintings," she said. Picasso was furious , "What is that?'' He answered "Since when do you have to explain the language of painting? Do you understand the language of potato chips". Although it was an unusual beginning the painter then 63 and the schoolgirl 17 started a platonic relationship discussing art and literature. This later evolved in a very passionate affair.
Mme Laporte remembers him as an extremely intelligent, wonderful and respectful man, she fell in love with.
His art was a constant driving force which was inspired by passion and led him into artistic sense of spirit. Sketching and painting women he adored through his artistic dynamism and immortalizing their image in his mind and the public view forever.
Mmmmmmm, how totally romantic.......................................
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