Sonny Jim James (Modoc 1940-2009)
On Thursday, October 29th we gathered at the Convention Center among the gorgeous red sandstone cliffs and outcrops of Red Rock State Park outside Gallup, New Mexico for the memorial gathering to honor Sonny Jim, my pledged brother of twenty-two years. The shock of his murder, along with that of the friend he was trying to help in a boundary dispute the previous Friday, was strongly reflected in the six or seven hundred people who braved the snow and ice to be there. Many (especially the large number of rodeo cowboys) had traveled from several states away.
Heather had battled her way through the Denver “Monster Snow Storm”, dealt with airline delays and foolishness and met us for the drive over to Gallup. We had spent two hours creeping over black ice and sitting in a twenty-mile long double line of idling semi-trucks and a few cars. To have over half a thousand Navajos show up on time was a unique experience in any weather.
We were given places of honor among Sunshine’s family and honored as elders and family members. I am now her only “Dad” and the four girls’ only granddad. By extension, I am also that to Sunshine’s four sisters whom I have known since they were little girls. All now have their own families. All have lost their father. So many beautiful, loving, sad people.
The convention center is huge, but was inadequate to hold all of the love shared that day. The tears were copious and the tributes all from the heart. The feast was served and the songs sung and the Medicine Man, Chester, offered a long prayer of perspective and solace.
I won’t attempt to recreate the unique experience, but I do want to share one thought. A member of the Navajo Nation Tribal Council spoke. As elders always do, he spoke in a fatherly tone and reminded the assembled Diné (people) of their heritage and pride and talked about the conditions we had braved to assemble in Sonny’s honor.
“Water,” he said, “is the source of all life and means life to us. When the clouds are low, there is mist and fog and we have rain, snow and even annoying and perhaps dangerous ice, we are being blessed with water and the gods have come down among us. Obviously, they have come to help us honor Sonny and they are among us, today.”
The lessons of the day were that there is strength in numbers, love should be expressed and when we are blessed with precipitation, even if it is annoying, the gods are walking among us.
Tuesday, November 3, 2009
Tuesday, June 2, 2009
OFF TO RIO !
OFF TO RIO !
On the eve of our departure for Rio de Janeiro to attend my son Duncan's wedding, I'm recalling what I was doing a month ago. You remember Duncan who had the Dali adventures with me in Spain? He married Mariana DeSalles three years ago and now her splendid, cosmopolitan family is giving them the full Brazilian family/social wedding. She is a smart and beautiful woman who is studying art/industrial design in Denver. This should be fun. We're staying at Ipanema.
So where was I a month ago? I was at a cattle and sheep auction in the small village of Dowra in County Leitrum, Ireland. Nothing fancy there. The village sits in a beautiful valley at the north end of Lock Allan which is part of the River Shannon system--the longest navigable river system (including many, many lakes) in Europe. It's so small it's only a six pub place.
The sales barns appear to be ancient and there are two sales going on simultaneously. It was great to be there with my brother Jon, a Colorado rancher, and my friend Enda Dolen who also has "beasties". Those guys knew what to look for in the livestock, what to listen for in the auctioneer's chant and how to judge the prices. I just enjoyed the experience.
The cattle were sold individually, but the sheep were sold in lots of ten. No buying a single darling lamb for the granddaughter. Take the lot.
What an interesting and timeless scene. The look of the farmers has not changed much in the last couple of centuries. The old tweed jackets, soft caps and ruddy complexions are enhanced by the musical conversations and amusing comments. No one's attention is ever very far from the bidding, however. This is a social occasion, but also serious business. The cattle handlers keep the animals moving down the chute, into the small ring in front of the cement stands, around the ring a couple of times and out back for loading.
The farmers standing around with shit several inches up their Wellingtons are remarkably like the art dealers standing around the edges of art auctions I attend. They also are standing in about four inches of bull shit.
On the eve of our departure for Rio de Janeiro to attend my son Duncan's wedding, I'm recalling what I was doing a month ago. You remember Duncan who had the Dali adventures with me in Spain? He married Mariana DeSalles three years ago and now her splendid, cosmopolitan family is giving them the full Brazilian family/social wedding. She is a smart and beautiful woman who is studying art/industrial design in Denver. This should be fun. We're staying at Ipanema.
So where was I a month ago? I was at a cattle and sheep auction in the small village of Dowra in County Leitrum, Ireland. Nothing fancy there. The village sits in a beautiful valley at the north end of Lock Allan which is part of the River Shannon system--the longest navigable river system (including many, many lakes) in Europe. It's so small it's only a six pub place.
The sales barns appear to be ancient and there are two sales going on simultaneously. It was great to be there with my brother Jon, a Colorado rancher, and my friend Enda Dolen who also has "beasties". Those guys knew what to look for in the livestock, what to listen for in the auctioneer's chant and how to judge the prices. I just enjoyed the experience.
The cattle were sold individually, but the sheep were sold in lots of ten. No buying a single darling lamb for the granddaughter. Take the lot.
What an interesting and timeless scene. The look of the farmers has not changed much in the last couple of centuries. The old tweed jackets, soft caps and ruddy complexions are enhanced by the musical conversations and amusing comments. No one's attention is ever very far from the bidding, however. This is a social occasion, but also serious business. The cattle handlers keep the animals moving down the chute, into the small ring in front of the cement stands, around the ring a couple of times and out back for loading.
The farmers standing around with shit several inches up their Wellingtons are remarkably like the art dealers standing around the edges of art auctions I attend. They also are standing in about four inches of bull shit.
Monday, May 18, 2009
IS THEY IS, OR IS THEY AIN'T? Part 3
So what about this independent and disinterested business that I keep harping on with reference to myself as opposed to the other people who claim to be "Dali Experts" and who offer to provide "authentications" of the Master's work? I have recently done a re-evaluation of the topic while writing my book Artful Dodgers in Ireland. My conclusion is that it is a really critical issue.
After all, it's all about credibility and we must not forget that:
So what about this independent and disinterested business that I keep harping on with reference to myself as opposed to the other people who claim to be "Dali Experts" and who offer to provide "authentications" of the Master's work? I have recently done a re-evaluation of the topic while writing my book Artful Dodgers in Ireland. My conclusion is that it is a really critical issue.
After all, it's all about credibility and we must not forget that:
If a person has integrity, nothing else matters.
If a person does not have integrity, nothing else matters.
When you are considering having an artwork authenticated it is a very good idea to ask yourself if the person who claims to be an authenticator could possibly benefit financially or in any other way from the opinions they give.
For instance, a dealer may have all sorts of potential conflict-of-interest problems. Has he ever sold this particular artwork? Has he sold another piece from the same edition? Does he have one in stock? Does he have a relationship with the publisher or distributor? Has he ever published an opinion concerning the artwork? You get the idea.
Former "secretaries" to Salvador Dali have played all sorts of games with the "authentication" process because they have had a number of relationships with the Master's work and one has even been known to state that if he did not receive a commission on the original sale, he did not consider the work genuine. Great.
It is also potentially dangerous to rely on an "archivist" as an authenticator, especially if he is not the person who accumulated the archived information, but is, rather, the administrator.
The very best authenticator (that is, one who gives opinions of authenticity) for atworks attributed to Salvador Dali would be one who meets the following criteria:
- Fully independent.
- Disinterested in that he has never bought, sold or brokered a Dali artwork. In other words, he has lived his professional life outside the market.
- Has extensively developed his connoisseurship and seen a great many genuine artworks by the artist, hopefully more than anyone else.
- Has developed his examination techniques and uses the Scientific Method as an Art Detective.
- Has been relied upon by museums and foundations which specialize in Dali's art.
- Has met the major collectors, been trusted by them and had access to their documentation as well as photographs, stories and, of course, artworks.
- Been repeatedly accepted in courts of law at all levels as an expert.
- Served as an expert for numerous law enforcement and regulatory agencies at all levels of government.
- Published articles on the artist.
- Given lectures at museums, galleries and other art venues.
- Never been proved wrong in court or by the IRS or been accused of an ethics violation.
These and other criteria are extensively discussed in my upcoming book Artful Dodgers: Fraud and Foolishness In The Art Market. Where would one find such a professional if one wanted to have a Dali artwork authenticated? I can think of only one place: http://www.bernardewell.com/.
Sunday, April 26, 2009
IS THEY IS, OR IS THEY AIN'T?
IS THEY IS, OR IS THEY AIN’T?
AUTHENTICATING DALI ARTWORKS, Part one
While writing about art authentication for my book Artful Dodgers in a cottage overlooking Culdaff Bay in Donegal, Ireland, it occurs to me that it is a useful topic to address in reference to artworks attributed to Salvador Dalí. After all, that’s who I am—the Dalí Expert—and so I do a lot of that. It’s also worth taking a look at the several other sources of “authentication” for Dalí artworks. Some of them are not what and who they say they are.
The first thing to understand about art authentication, however, is that The only person who can authenticate an artwork is the person who created it. If that person is not available (dead, in an asylum, or suffering from dementia) then all you can hope for is to get the best opinions from the best people available. The operable word is “opinion”.
The “best people available” means those who are accepted as experts in the artist’s work through their relationship with the artist (family or collaborator), their authorship of a reliable catalog, scholarship or extensive experience examining the artist’s work and doing research. There are two other critical factors: connoisseurship and the credibility that comes with being independent and disinterested. In other words, they must not have any conceivable way of materially benefiting from the opinion they give.
When the art of Salvador Dalí is the topic, authenticity becomes even more important than it would normally be. Why? Because there are probably more fakes attributed to Dalí than to almost any other artist of any era. After all, he was a sick recluse (or prisoner) for the last nine years of his life and many people proceeded to produce fakes and sell then as genuine with the assurance that the artist would die on Thursday and the values would shoot up. This was especially true of editions (usually 1,000) of prints which were sold with forged signatures—many thousands of them.
So let’s look at the subject of the fake prints first. Since the topic is complex and unraveling it represents the work I’ve done over almost three decades, this must be a somewhat simplified telling of the tale.
Actually I was very fortunate. I benefited from my opportunities to serve as the expert for a long list of federal and state law enforcement and regulatory agencies because each criminal prosecution or civil lawsuit brought me endless opportunities to examine good prints and forgeries of every type as well as piles of files and information. For example, when the Federal Trade Commission went after Pierre Marcand of Magui Publishing, there was a particularly rich windfall.
Pierre lived in a mansion in Beverly Hills where he hosted lots of out-of-work actors and actresses who paid their rent by hand-coloring the fake prints he produced on his own presses. At one point he decided he needed a larger mansion. Unfortunately for him, it would not be available for his occupancy until after he was committed to vacating the old one. Consequently he had to move to a hotel for four months and put all of his belongings in storage. He called Beverly Hills Storage and they sent over several trucks and packers.
Within an hour of the arrival of the loaded trucks at the warehouse, everything Pierre owned (except what he had at the hotel) was under Federal Court order and I was on my way from my home in Colorado. For the next couple of weeks I had access to all of Pierre’s stuff. I ignored the personal items, but was elated to have his printing plates and presses, 1,000 sheets of blank paper with (forged) Dalí signatures, 3,000 fake prints and some of the drawings and transparencies used to create the fakes.
Using my art detective techniques, I collected all of the clues the material offered that I was later able to use in Federal Court to prove the prints fakes and the signatures forgeries. Such an opportunity added tremendously to my knowledge and understanding of the activities of the crooks. No one else has had access to this type of material, and I did in case after case.
This is the sort of experience that has permitted me to develop the information, understanding and connoisseurship that makes me the expert I am today. Having examined 53,000 prints attributed to Salvador Dalí, I have more hands-on experience than anyone else. Having actually done the various printmaking techniques myself I am in a unique position and it has added a great deal to my ability not only to determine authenticity, but also to explain it to juries and judges.
I’ll share many more adventures and experiences in future blogs.
AUTHENTICATING DALI ARTWORKS, Part one
While writing about art authentication for my book Artful Dodgers in a cottage overlooking Culdaff Bay in Donegal, Ireland, it occurs to me that it is a useful topic to address in reference to artworks attributed to Salvador Dalí. After all, that’s who I am—the Dalí Expert—and so I do a lot of that. It’s also worth taking a look at the several other sources of “authentication” for Dalí artworks. Some of them are not what and who they say they are.
The first thing to understand about art authentication, however, is that The only person who can authenticate an artwork is the person who created it. If that person is not available (dead, in an asylum, or suffering from dementia) then all you can hope for is to get the best opinions from the best people available. The operable word is “opinion”.
The “best people available” means those who are accepted as experts in the artist’s work through their relationship with the artist (family or collaborator), their authorship of a reliable catalog, scholarship or extensive experience examining the artist’s work and doing research. There are two other critical factors: connoisseurship and the credibility that comes with being independent and disinterested. In other words, they must not have any conceivable way of materially benefiting from the opinion they give.
When the art of Salvador Dalí is the topic, authenticity becomes even more important than it would normally be. Why? Because there are probably more fakes attributed to Dalí than to almost any other artist of any era. After all, he was a sick recluse (or prisoner) for the last nine years of his life and many people proceeded to produce fakes and sell then as genuine with the assurance that the artist would die on Thursday and the values would shoot up. This was especially true of editions (usually 1,000) of prints which were sold with forged signatures—many thousands of them.
So let’s look at the subject of the fake prints first. Since the topic is complex and unraveling it represents the work I’ve done over almost three decades, this must be a somewhat simplified telling of the tale.
Actually I was very fortunate. I benefited from my opportunities to serve as the expert for a long list of federal and state law enforcement and regulatory agencies because each criminal prosecution or civil lawsuit brought me endless opportunities to examine good prints and forgeries of every type as well as piles of files and information. For example, when the Federal Trade Commission went after Pierre Marcand of Magui Publishing, there was a particularly rich windfall.
Pierre lived in a mansion in Beverly Hills where he hosted lots of out-of-work actors and actresses who paid their rent by hand-coloring the fake prints he produced on his own presses. At one point he decided he needed a larger mansion. Unfortunately for him, it would not be available for his occupancy until after he was committed to vacating the old one. Consequently he had to move to a hotel for four months and put all of his belongings in storage. He called Beverly Hills Storage and they sent over several trucks and packers.
Within an hour of the arrival of the loaded trucks at the warehouse, everything Pierre owned (except what he had at the hotel) was under Federal Court order and I was on my way from my home in Colorado. For the next couple of weeks I had access to all of Pierre’s stuff. I ignored the personal items, but was elated to have his printing plates and presses, 1,000 sheets of blank paper with (forged) Dalí signatures, 3,000 fake prints and some of the drawings and transparencies used to create the fakes.
Using my art detective techniques, I collected all of the clues the material offered that I was later able to use in Federal Court to prove the prints fakes and the signatures forgeries. Such an opportunity added tremendously to my knowledge and understanding of the activities of the crooks. No one else has had access to this type of material, and I did in case after case.
This is the sort of experience that has permitted me to develop the information, understanding and connoisseurship that makes me the expert I am today. Having examined 53,000 prints attributed to Salvador Dalí, I have more hands-on experience than anyone else. Having actually done the various printmaking techniques myself I am in a unique position and it has added a great deal to my ability not only to determine authenticity, but also to explain it to juries and judges.
I’ll share many more adventures and experiences in future blogs.
Monday, April 13, 2009
BERNARD IN THE FINAL FIVE
BERNARD IN THE FINAL FIVE
The Appraisal Foundation in Washington, D. C. put out a call for applications for appointment to The Appraisal Standards Board—the body which sets the professional rules for the appraisal profession through writing and promulgating The Uniform Standards of Professional Appraisal Practice, known as USPAP. Bernard, believing that he had something to offer after thirty-six years as a fine art appraiser, applied. He thought this would be a good way to contribute to the development of a profession that has been good to him. After all, he hasn’t done much of that since he taught Valuation Law to appraisers at various universities and other venues. It was also about time that the membership of The Appraisal Standards Board included a personal property appraiser.
In time he was contacted by Appraisal Board member Elizabeth von Habsburg and a telephone interview was scheduled. That went very well and Bernard was invited to fly to Newport, Rhode Island for a face to face interview with the nominating committee. The Appraisal Foundation Board was meeting at the Hyatt Regency on Goat Island in the beautiful playground of robber barons and yachtsmen.
Apparently 106 appraisers had submitted applications and five were invited for the all-expenses paid week end so they could be available for fifteen minute interviews.
When the results were reported to the Board, Bernard was not one of those selected for one of the three openings on the Appraisal Standards Board. It turns out the three who were are old time insiders, two of whom had been on the board previously and the third was coming off the Board of Directors, but wanted to remain active..
Bernard refuses to feel rejected. He has been told repeatedly by Appraisal Foundation members that he is “the cream of the cream” and that if he’ll reapply next time there is an opening, he’ll almost certainly be selected. How nice it would be to go into the interview knowing what the questions will be, as the three successful applicants did.
Bernard, who was a week away from departure for Thailand, Cambodia, India and Dubai (and has since spent a month in Mexico and is about to leave for Ireland for a month) actually feels some relief. He has been saved from about forty hours of work a month for three years and has been selected by his peers as one of the best, if not one of the insiders.
The Appraisal Foundation in Washington, D. C. put out a call for applications for appointment to The Appraisal Standards Board—the body which sets the professional rules for the appraisal profession through writing and promulgating The Uniform Standards of Professional Appraisal Practice, known as USPAP. Bernard, believing that he had something to offer after thirty-six years as a fine art appraiser, applied. He thought this would be a good way to contribute to the development of a profession that has been good to him. After all, he hasn’t done much of that since he taught Valuation Law to appraisers at various universities and other venues. It was also about time that the membership of The Appraisal Standards Board included a personal property appraiser.
In time he was contacted by Appraisal Board member Elizabeth von Habsburg and a telephone interview was scheduled. That went very well and Bernard was invited to fly to Newport, Rhode Island for a face to face interview with the nominating committee. The Appraisal Foundation Board was meeting at the Hyatt Regency on Goat Island in the beautiful playground of robber barons and yachtsmen.
Apparently 106 appraisers had submitted applications and five were invited for the all-expenses paid week end so they could be available for fifteen minute interviews.
When the results were reported to the Board, Bernard was not one of those selected for one of the three openings on the Appraisal Standards Board. It turns out the three who were are old time insiders, two of whom had been on the board previously and the third was coming off the Board of Directors, but wanted to remain active..
Bernard refuses to feel rejected. He has been told repeatedly by Appraisal Foundation members that he is “the cream of the cream” and that if he’ll reapply next time there is an opening, he’ll almost certainly be selected. How nice it would be to go into the interview knowing what the questions will be, as the three successful applicants did.
Bernard, who was a week away from departure for Thailand, Cambodia, India and Dubai (and has since spent a month in Mexico and is about to leave for Ireland for a month) actually feels some relief. He has been saved from about forty hours of work a month for three years and has been selected by his peers as one of the best, if not one of the insiders.
Saturday, March 14, 2009
ARTFUL DODGERS MOVING AHEAD
ARTFUL DODGERS IS MOVING AHEAD
Here we are at the end of a month in San Miguel de Alliende, Guanajuato, Mexico. It has been a month of rich rewards, lovely friendships, marvelous food, beautiful Spanish colonial city and towns, excursions into the campo and lots of hours spent working very hard on writing Artful Dodgers . It will be the first book to really reveal how the art market works.
Artful Dodgers will explain the fact that there are more than one art market and each works in different ways and is governed by different rules. It will explain the Six Myths That Drive The Art Market, look at the scams, swindles and con men (and women) who populate the market, and give shocking details about the games many people play. The book will also offer the first informed evaluation of the personal property appraisal profession ever. It's a pretty disappointing report, I'm afraid.
The book as a whole, however, is designed to provide an enormous amount of information. The response of many readers is expected to be the same as that which always greeted my columns in ART-talk magazine: "Bernard reveals and states a lot of stuff which I thought was probably true, but no one ever says out loud."
Artful Dodgers is being written in a very accessible and understandable style and there is a minimum of "art bull shit". It is a work of narrative non-fiction that I expect will get a lot of attention. Hopefully no death threats.
We now return to Santa Fe were I have a very heavily scheduled month of hard work before we
leave for a month in Ireland at the cottage in Donnegal where I shall continue work on the book in the hope that when I return it will be close to completion. The writing requires that I spend four to six hours a day at my computer, but is exciting and rewarding.
Here we are at the end of a month in San Miguel de Alliende, Guanajuato, Mexico. It has been a month of rich rewards, lovely friendships, marvelous food, beautiful Spanish colonial city and towns, excursions into the campo and lots of hours spent working very hard on writing Artful Dodgers . It will be the first book to really reveal how the art market works.
Artful Dodgers will explain the fact that there are more than one art market and each works in different ways and is governed by different rules. It will explain the Six Myths That Drive The Art Market, look at the scams, swindles and con men (and women) who populate the market, and give shocking details about the games many people play. The book will also offer the first informed evaluation of the personal property appraisal profession ever. It's a pretty disappointing report, I'm afraid.
The book as a whole, however, is designed to provide an enormous amount of information. The response of many readers is expected to be the same as that which always greeted my columns in ART-talk magazine: "Bernard reveals and states a lot of stuff which I thought was probably true, but no one ever says out loud."
Artful Dodgers is being written in a very accessible and understandable style and there is a minimum of "art bull shit". It is a work of narrative non-fiction that I expect will get a lot of attention. Hopefully no death threats.
We now return to Santa Fe were I have a very heavily scheduled month of hard work before we
leave for a month in Ireland at the cottage in Donnegal where I shall continue work on the book in the hope that when I return it will be close to completion. The writing requires that I spend four to six hours a day at my computer, but is exciting and rewarding.
Tuesday, March 10, 2009
ALONE WITH DALI AND DUNCAN PART 5
Finally we are going to mount the stone steps within the Castel Gala Dali at Pubol, Catalonia, Spain. They lead us to the interior of the castle which Salvador Dali bought for his wife Gala so she could have a retreat--which he could visit by written invitation only. (see Alone With Dali and Duncan part 4)
The Fundacio Gala-Salvador Dali had arranged for my son Duncan and I to have exclusive after-hours visits to both the Teatro-Museo Salvador Dali in Figures and the Casa Dali home at Port Lligat near Cadaques. They had made no special arrangements for our visit to Castel Gala Dali and I was alone since Duncan was in the city of Gerona.
The experience of the Castle of Pubol aka Castel Gala Dali is a mixture of experiences. There is the obvious experience of the physical space, the architecture, the arrangement of rooms etc.
Then there are the surface decorations created by Salvador Dali and they are both decorative and fun. There is the set of rich blue drapes decorated with gold Fleurs-d-Li that flank a shuttered window and double stone window seat that break up one of the plastered walls in the Room Of The Escutcheons. The drapes were painted there by Dali, as is a doorway with open door showing part of the next room. The iron radiators were ripped out durring renovation because Dali thought them ugly. He then replaced them with iron radiators of the same design which he painted on the walls where the originals had been! He must have been having great fun.
The ceiling is painted with an elaborate vaulted double scene of the inside of a dome and the swallow-filled sky, and there are six coats of arms painted on the upper walls. Throughout the castle, these Dali-painted effects can be found. Doorways have painted stone quoining around them and there are other trompe-l'oeil effects.
By far, the most imposing of the Dali wall decorations is to be found over the entrance to the Piano Room. A full-length portrait of Gala appears to be either barring admission or asking the visitor if he is worthy to enter. Her countenance is somewhat severe and she is holding some sort of staff that appears to be a potential weapon. On second look, it becomes apparent that Gala is depiced as a cariatid holding up the corner of a carved stone and brick edifice. Oh, how allegorical.
The pissed-off looking portrait is a notice to all that beyond lie the private apartments of the woman herself. It was within that she entertained a series of beautiful young men, including Jeff Fenholdt, the lead in Jesus Christ Superstar. Neither Gala nor Salvador Dali ever expressed much interest in music and this room was used as a private living room and it was here that Dali spent most of his time when he visited.
A third level of experience at the castle is the furnishings--personal property that had belonged to Gala and Salvador Dali. How nice that Gala's dresses, furniture, bric-a-brack and personal items are displayed here where they lived instead of glass cases in a museum at a distance. It makes it so much easier to imagine the rather extraordinary personalities who walked these halls.
So many of the objects in Gala's apartments were familiar to me from photographs of the surreal couple, because they appear in Dali's paintings, or because I had seen hundreds of the Master's drawings and many were made of random objects around him.
Most people seemed to move through the castle in about thirty to fourty minutes. I needed two hours because in addition to seeing everything I could, I was also trying to feel the presence of Gala or Dali. I was no more successful than I had been at Casa Dali. It just didn't feel as if there was any part of those strong personalities still there. Perhaps next time (I have been back) with much more time.......
After leaving the castle, I again visited the grounds with their grotesque Dali sculptures and other surprises, then walked through the village of Pubol. It really is tiny and all those houses and other buildings really are connected to each other as if for defence. Some villagers were setting up tables in the small plaza and it appeared as if preparations were underway for a festival the next day. Too bad Duncan and I needed to return to Barcelona.
The castle and adjoining church and the conjoined village are all built of rather dark brown stone with little visually breaking up the hulking mass. In all directions, however, the beautiful countryside flows off across fields, streams and clumps of trees.
That is the last of my memories of my first, marvelous visit to Catalonia--Dali Country. It is exciting to see Dali paintings in everything one looks at around the district. Duncan kept pointing out the locations of Dali paintings and various features of the landscape which the Master used as material for his paintings and drawings. We also had great meals at Dali's favorite restaurant.
On my next visit to Catalonia, I was accompanied by my wife Melinda and, in addition to again visiting all three of the Dali locations, I met residents of Figures and Cadaques who knew Dali and shared with me their small collections of original drawings he had given them.
This was and is very important because the only way to develop connoisseurship in the works of an artist is to see a tremendous amount of his work. I really believe that through all of the experiences I have had over the past thirty years as a well-known Dali expert, that I have seen more original Dali artworks than anyone else.
The Fundacio Gala-Salvador Dali had arranged for my son Duncan and I to have exclusive after-hours visits to both the Teatro-Museo Salvador Dali in Figures and the Casa Dali home at Port Lligat near Cadaques. They had made no special arrangements for our visit to Castel Gala Dali and I was alone since Duncan was in the city of Gerona.
The experience of the Castle of Pubol aka Castel Gala Dali is a mixture of experiences. There is the obvious experience of the physical space, the architecture, the arrangement of rooms etc.
Then there are the surface decorations created by Salvador Dali and they are both decorative and fun. There is the set of rich blue drapes decorated with gold Fleurs-d-Li that flank a shuttered window and double stone window seat that break up one of the plastered walls in the Room Of The Escutcheons. The drapes were painted there by Dali, as is a doorway with open door showing part of the next room. The iron radiators were ripped out durring renovation because Dali thought them ugly. He then replaced them with iron radiators of the same design which he painted on the walls where the originals had been! He must have been having great fun.
The ceiling is painted with an elaborate vaulted double scene of the inside of a dome and the swallow-filled sky, and there are six coats of arms painted on the upper walls. Throughout the castle, these Dali-painted effects can be found. Doorways have painted stone quoining around them and there are other trompe-l'oeil effects.
By far, the most imposing of the Dali wall decorations is to be found over the entrance to the Piano Room. A full-length portrait of Gala appears to be either barring admission or asking the visitor if he is worthy to enter. Her countenance is somewhat severe and she is holding some sort of staff that appears to be a potential weapon. On second look, it becomes apparent that Gala is depiced as a cariatid holding up the corner of a carved stone and brick edifice. Oh, how allegorical.
The pissed-off looking portrait is a notice to all that beyond lie the private apartments of the woman herself. It was within that she entertained a series of beautiful young men, including Jeff Fenholdt, the lead in Jesus Christ Superstar. Neither Gala nor Salvador Dali ever expressed much interest in music and this room was used as a private living room and it was here that Dali spent most of his time when he visited.
A third level of experience at the castle is the furnishings--personal property that had belonged to Gala and Salvador Dali. How nice that Gala's dresses, furniture, bric-a-brack and personal items are displayed here where they lived instead of glass cases in a museum at a distance. It makes it so much easier to imagine the rather extraordinary personalities who walked these halls.
So many of the objects in Gala's apartments were familiar to me from photographs of the surreal couple, because they appear in Dali's paintings, or because I had seen hundreds of the Master's drawings and many were made of random objects around him.
Most people seemed to move through the castle in about thirty to fourty minutes. I needed two hours because in addition to seeing everything I could, I was also trying to feel the presence of Gala or Dali. I was no more successful than I had been at Casa Dali. It just didn't feel as if there was any part of those strong personalities still there. Perhaps next time (I have been back) with much more time.......
After leaving the castle, I again visited the grounds with their grotesque Dali sculptures and other surprises, then walked through the village of Pubol. It really is tiny and all those houses and other buildings really are connected to each other as if for defence. Some villagers were setting up tables in the small plaza and it appeared as if preparations were underway for a festival the next day. Too bad Duncan and I needed to return to Barcelona.
The castle and adjoining church and the conjoined village are all built of rather dark brown stone with little visually breaking up the hulking mass. In all directions, however, the beautiful countryside flows off across fields, streams and clumps of trees.
That is the last of my memories of my first, marvelous visit to Catalonia--Dali Country. It is exciting to see Dali paintings in everything one looks at around the district. Duncan kept pointing out the locations of Dali paintings and various features of the landscape which the Master used as material for his paintings and drawings. We also had great meals at Dali's favorite restaurant.
On my next visit to Catalonia, I was accompanied by my wife Melinda and, in addition to again visiting all three of the Dali locations, I met residents of Figures and Cadaques who knew Dali and shared with me their small collections of original drawings he had given them.
This was and is very important because the only way to develop connoisseurship in the works of an artist is to see a tremendous amount of his work. I really believe that through all of the experiences I have had over the past thirty years as a well-known Dali expert, that I have seen more original Dali artworks than anyone else.
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