Salvador Dalì, born on 11 May 1904 in Spain, died on 23 January 1989, was a Spanish surrealist painter and printmaker, known for exploring the imagery of the subconscious. Alongside with Picasso and Matisse, he is considered one of the three most iconic painters of the 20th century. 

He studied fine arts in Madrid and Barcelona and has practiced many artistic styles. However, it was not until the late 1920s that his painting style matured because of two factor. First, he discovered Freud’s important work on sexuality and subconsciousness, and second, he befriended a group of talented Parisian surrealists, artists and writers who worked to prove that the human subconscious is a "greater reality" than reason.

“Le surréalisme, c'est moi” Dalì says. He became a leader of the Surrealist movement and true practitioner of the Surrealist manifesto. His unsparing imagination and raging madness eventually led him to be deposed by the movement. In a 1966 video, he was asked by the interviewer wether he thought he was “crack pot,” which means a crazy person. He replied: “sometimes Dalì is almost crazy. But the only difference between a crazy person and Dalì is that Dalì is not crazy.” 

One year later, in 1967, he drew this signature. This is cut from the engraved cover of a book and put into a frame. The name and the content of the book is here irrelevant. One can almost imagine the initial excitement of the author when he got Dalì, the famous artist, to draw the cover of his book and how he only got a pretentious signature which actually did get his book very popular. I’d imagine this way because I didn’t find any significance in the book until I realized this fish shaped doodle spells out Dalì and the year. 

In fact this is not the only painting of his name from Dalì. The manager and secretary of Salvador Dalí even published a book dedicated to the genuine and original Signatures of Salvador Dalì, which is a catalogue: “Les 678 Trés riches Signatures de Salvador Dalì”. Among the 678 samples, some “Dalì” are incorporated into a background, some are barely legible scribble, and some are pictorial. Then, as he was falling deeper into madness, Dalì’s signature is not a sign on his painting but the painting. When Dalì reached the stage of his life where he was unable to paint anymore, he would instead sit for hours signing his name on thousands of blank pieces of lithographic support. Dalì would then sell these signatures on, in full knowledge that most were being used to create forgeries of his work.

Dalì’s signature has an introspective purpose beyond the extrinsic purposes of signifying authorship or a lucrative trademark. Playing with his name with a lunatic enthusiasm is a way to self-investigate and self-construct. The hundreds of different forms the four simple letters take are representation to erratic mentality. They are also an internal conversation with the artist himself and articulate something that’s perhaps unconscious and inexpressible. 

Sources

Dalí, ed. by Victoria Charles, New York: Parkstone Press International, 2011.

DeLue, Rachael Ziady. Arthur Dove : Always Connect. The University of Chicago Press, 2016.

Glicksberg, Charles I. “The Madness of Salvador Dali”, New Mexico Quarterly, 1947

Guide to the genuine & original signatures of Salvador Dalí, ed. by John Peter Moore, Vienna: Collectors Club, 1984.

Shanes, Eric. The Life and Masterworks of Salvador Dalí, New York: Parkstone International, 2012.