The Surreal World of Salvador Dali

Before you read this post, let’s do a small exercise. What does come to your mind when the words “Salvador Dali” are mentioned? What do you know about his life and his artwork? Think about it for only 30 seconds!

This post is based on a non-fiction book called “Dali and I”, written by Stan Laurysses.

Back in the seventies, SL was an “ordinary” man living in Belgium: he worked in a cheese factory, making holes in wheels in Emmentaler cheese - how ordinary is that?!?!?! One day, he got call from the Antwerp’s weekly Panorama magazine offering him a job switch. They wanted Stan to be the weekly correspondent in Hollywood and boost Panorama’s circulation by interviewing beautiful movie faces. There was only a small issue: there were no funds available to send him to California – so, when he accepted the new challenge, all he was given was a desk, a chair and a typewriter.

Stan started fabricating “live” interviews and after a few years doing so, he came up with the idea of Dali helping Walt Disney to create the most scandalous animated porn cartoon ever. Sales skyrocketed and our boy got another unexpected phone call: the president of a multimillion-dollar company invited him to lead the fine art-investment branch of his company. “Why me? I don’t know anything about art!” – Stan asked his then future boss. And the answer was: “You know Salvador Dali”!

SL’s new job was basically to buy Dali’s artwork all over the world and to sell them as an art investment to very rich people. Every painting he bought was an opportunity for him to become closer and to investigate Dali’s world, personally and professionally.

Dali was a weird and unpredictable man, never bathed or showered and sprayed jasmine eau de cologne behind each ear to stop the stench of his continuous farting. He often organized planned to detail sex circus (also know as ballet of passion). If he couldn’t satisfy his voyeuristic impulses, he wasn’t able to work. Among his guests were gay and straight catwalk stars, Vietnam veterans, dwarfs, hermaphrodites and living lobsters (heaps of them). Guests were not allowed to use the bathroom. Can you imagine what did his swimming pool look like?

His museum in Figueres (Spain) contains, according to his founder, only 25% of genuine genuine work. Among the rest, 25% is fake genuine and 50% is fake fake. Dali and his businessmen knew that, for a certain period of time, the world was hungry for his art. They then became money-making machines selling countless works that were signed by Dali but painted or printed indeed by artists or art dealers – all hired by Dali himself. During the early seventies, there were four different artists working together for him. Is this surreal enough for you? :-P

Now that you know a little bit more about the world art, can anyone tell me who made this painting?

I guess I’m looking for a brand new place….

I have never been a person who enjoys reading. For more than 30 years I have spend my spare time playing sports, watching movies, hanging around with friends. I am person who likes learning from observing and from other people’s experience. I’m a absolutely “hands-on” type of person, the one who says and “let’s do it and let’s do it now”! Yes, I am an ESTJ (Myers-Briggs Type Indicator, for those who are familiar with that)….

But since December 2008 I have started reading and I’m currently reading a lot, maybe because I have more spare time, maybe because I have been reading books that were really interesting. Or maybe because I have realized that they are indeed a source of culture…what a late realization! Well, “prima mai che tardi”, as the Italian saying points out. One of the interesting books I have read is “The Weather Makers” by Tim Flannery. The author has published over a dozen books, spent a year teaching at Harvard and was named Australian of the year in 2007. The book is about the history and future impact of climate change.

There are so many interesting points that I want to share with you, my dear readers, that I won’t be able to do in only one post. I will try to do it in a soft and not scaring way (although the subject itself is really scaring). In this particular post I want to share that, from a climate change perspective, there’s a big difference between using gas or coal to power an economy. The next 2 paragraphs were extracted from the book…

“Because carbon causes climate change, the more carbon-rich a fuel is, the more danger it presents to humanity’s future. Black coal, for example, is almost pure carbon. Fuels derived from oil are less carbon rich, containing 2 hydrogen atoms for every one of carbon in their structure. Because hydrogen is a source of energy, which produces more heat when burned than carbon, burning oil releases less CO2 per unit than coal.

The efficiency with which power is generated by burning a fuel is also an important factor in determining how much CO2 is produced. Even using the most advanced methods (and most coal-fired power plants come nowhere near this), burning anthracite to generate electricity results in 67 more CO2 emissions thank does methane, while brown coal produces 130 per cent more.“

Getting things worse, Australia is the world’s largest exporter of coal and has the highest per capita greenhouse emissions of any industrialized country (25 per cent higher than U.S.).

Despite these sad facts, I’m still in love with this lovely country, just the way it is. Every country has room for improvement, am I right? And the title of this post refers to a song called “Spaceman” by 4 Non Blonds. It’s an old song that I’m learning to play. Hopefully, we won’t have to move to the space…

Crazy Little Thing Called Love

2008 was very difficult year for me, I had so many problems to face and not enough wisdom to deal with them. I was also very very busy. These were probably the main reasons that prevented me from posting here. But, I'm back!

My dear friend Debora got married on April 2008 and I was in charge of taking pictures of the wedding ceremony. It took place at the Royal Botanic Gardens, a lovely park in the middle of the city.

Debora and I met in July 2007 at Sydney Uni and become close friends since then. I call her "Rita Lee" because she looks like her (a very popular Brazilian singer) and also because Debora can sing and play acoustic guitar. She's open-minded, easy going and always has a smile in her face. She's calm and patient and I have been learning a lot from her. And yes, she's Brazilian!

Mark and Debora met, fell in love and got married in less than one year. So, if you have lost your faith in love, men (or women) and think that you will never find the right person for you, you might be wrong! Have you ever tried the Internet?

A small sample of the photos can be seen here:http://www.facebook.com/inbox/readmessage.php?t=1007712169878

Kisses from X.O. :-)