Sarah Winter

In Review Salvador Dali: Liquid Desire

Salvador Dali: Liquid Desire at the National Gallery of Victoria in Melbourne is so good it's almost worth a trip from Canberra just to see it. For the dedicated art lover or Dali fan, do not miss the chance to see Australia's first comprehensive retrospective of the life and work of this creative genius. Featuring jewellery, cinema, fashion and photography as well as his paintings, drawing ands etchings most of us will be more familiar with, the exhibition gives an incredibly varied account of an artist who breaches the confines of traditional art forms. For those who have never quite 'got' what surreal images represent, the exhibition supplies the explanations many need to fully grasp the depth, symbolism and psychological (Freudian) intensity of Dali's unique juxtaposition of malformed images. Suddenly these foreign landscapes and the inner psyche or subconscious they often depict can align.

The exhibition is incredibly well curated. The introductory images (filmed by the NGV) of Dali's home town, Cadaquez, a landscape which profoundly influenced his art, aid understanding of the proceeding works. The attention to this kind of detail, coupled with the always fascinating journey from a young artist (Dali's earliest painting in the exhibition dates from the age of 13) to a fully-formed legend allows an unusually deep understanding of not only Dali's art, but the wide-ranging intellectual and philosophical discourses in which he was personally interested. Sex, time, science, impotency, love and the subconscious provide ongoing themes. A highlight was the two cinematic pieces, one of them a collaboration between Dali and Walt Disney which was only completed (by proxy) in 2002, well after the death of both men, called Destino.

The exhibition is expensive, at over $20 a pop for adults, but well worth it for its length; I recommend putting aside a whole afternoon to enjoy it without becoming overloaded and desensitised. Avid fans may note the absence of certain famous works, but this is no loss to the exhibit and actually allows a more comprehensive understanding of Dali's art.

Seeing Dali's incredible genesis from a traditionally trained artist into the father of surrealism only proves to viewers the epic genius required to revolutionise art in this way. His concern for the subconscious also allows a revealing picture of his own psyche, leaving him as a disturbed yet brilliant man, and an even more disturbing and brilliant artist.