skull with it's lyric appendage leaning on

a night table which should have exact temperature of a cardinal bird nest

That is the title of this painting by Salvador Dali.  I found the title of the painting humorous because it sounds like something my brother or I would say.  When we were younger we would speak to each other with this strange accent and made up words that, to an outsider, would appear we were conversing in some foreign language.  Neither one of us had a clue what we were saying.  We just had fun faking it.

My sister and I, on the other hand, well, we tend to find our humor in the mundane everyday.  For example, the road sign "BEAR LEFT" will never be the same for me.  We even came up with this really wacky road song.  Something like "Stop! Bear left! Caution! Yield!  Slippery When Wet!"

But what this blog is really about is the Salvador Dali museum in St Petersburg, FL.  We finally made it there and I got to see some of his paintings.  WOW!  I always enjoyed all the optical illusion paintings he is so well known for.  But I remain stunned by the depth and breadth of his artistic talent.  I still cannot wrap my mind around how someone can get a vision in their mind, transfer that to canvas that is 14 feet high and still maintain the desired dimensions!

Another thing I admired about his art are the many hidden images within the painting.  You can view the same painting from three different positions and see images in each position that cannot be seen in the others.  In one painting there is what appears to be three stone archways.  However, when you step back a few feet and look at the picture, you can see that the archways actually form three different faces.

Dali was also known for the "perverse" in his art.  He had a strong attraction to the psychology of Freud and his fascination with sexuality is clearly reflected in his paintings.  One of my personal favorites is Profanation of the Host.   It is the first painting that completely blew my mind and began my true appreciation for his talent.  I stood a few feet back from the painting trying to identify some of the many different images within it.  Some are obvious, while others are not quite so obvious.  The bottom left corner of the painting is dark and difficult to see the detail unless you get very close to the painting.  Standing back from the painting it just appears to be a sexually explicit orgy scene.  As I was standing there taking in the painting, a couple came up next to me and began talking to one another about how sick he was and the sexual imagery.  While secretly wishing they would be quiet so I could continue to savor the painting, I realized that something just wasn't connecting right in my mind. 

Have you ever seen that email going around in which there is a sentence and the letters in each word are all jumbled up or letters are missing, but you can usually still read the sentence?  It's called "matrixing" in which our minds fill-in-the-blanks for us.  (Thanks to Ghost Hunters for that little 411.  LOL)  Our brain will scan for similiar images until it finds an appropriate fit, producing you with the "correct" image.  (Amazing, actually, if you think about it.  Your brain can process that quickly when you glance at a word and within seconds it has scanned every word you've ever seen and returns the word in a way you can comprehend.)

Anyway, this is what I was feeling with this painting.  I could make out the image but something ... just ...wasn't ... right.  So I got closer.  That's when I realized all the women in the painting had a penis!  Even the hairy man/woman-beast-thing had a human penis!  I almost shouted "EUREEKA!!" right there in the museum.  What so impressed me was his ability to take color, shading, light and form to provide an illusion that appears to be one thing, but upon close inspection is revealed as something else.  It's akin to hiding something in plain sight.

There were other paintings that were equally as compelling.  Here is one of Troy's favorites and probably my second most favorite painting.  This painting is called The Font.  It's another painting with so much meaning and detail that even after staring at it for 15 minutes, I felt I had only just barely begun to see all that it contained.

If you ever have the opportunity, vist the Dali museum.  It's $17 for adults; however, you can go to their web site and print out a coupon for $2 off.  A little pricey, IMHO, but still worth it.  We intend to go back again.  There is so much in there to contemplate that I believe your brain just goes into overload and shuts down.  You can no longer appreciate everything you are seeing with the same attention to detail as you could when you first started with fresh eyes and fresh mind.