"The Persistence of Memory" is a piece of art of the 20th century (1931) and has become an icon to capturing the art of surrealism. Dali most importantly in all his work captured his true identity and character. However, this did not come without mastering the art of oil on canvas as for example on his work of ‘The persistence of memory’.
Dali would begin with a detailed illustration on his canvas and layer by layer starting with the background base colours. As you can see in the bright sky Cobalt blue, yet all shadows in Dali’s work tend to have a mixture of Ivory Black and raw umber so as to soften his tones as much as possible giving the smooth transgression of shadow and light..
After the background bas colours were in place Dali continues to work these areas with the same colours this way he is creating the distance between the background and foreground objects. He displaces the colours and blends them using a soft fan brush, but also the dry brush method was used to blend his colours in this case he started from the objects nearest.
The middle stage, probably the hardest and most time consuming of all; Firstly, Dali had to identify the colours which would enable his work to have depth. In this piece you can see that the most persistent tones of Burnt Siena and Yellow Ochra with a blend of Burnt umber. The light shining on the water in the background gives more contrast to his piece making more intense shadow and enhancing the dream look.
Adding light to objects, creating dimension was unique to Dali’s technique the smoothness showed patience in his work and it is obvious that for such results huge amounts of time were put into this piece.
Attention to detail is extremely important. Dali managed to do this without losing the initial outline. If you notice the mountains and how the shadow is smooth yet he manages to keep the crisp outlines of the cracks giving his piece an almost three-dimensional look. Finally Dali finished his piece by adding his light source and how each item re affected with o fine coat of titanium white.
Furthermore, this painting undoubtedly forms a connection of ideas that can be seen through the different objects. What is interesting is the way each object is being placed in the painting and this is what forms the connection between them.
Watches, in reality are hard and metallic, in this painting these are melted and their shape has changed into a more simplistic form. This can be seen as a transformation of something hard to something smooths as for example the character or mood of a person.
However, Dali’s inspiration of making the watches look melted came from his sensation of how cheese melts softly into someone’s mouth, hence his idea of the melted watches (In Haakon 1993).
The tree figure in this painting is dead with no hope to survive. Kenneth Wach (1996) refers to the meaning of this tree and he suggests that this is “suggests that the tree is “in reference to the Spanish Civil War”, and alongside the useless and impotent watches, the lifeless self-portrait, the barren beach, the ants and the fly, it helps to create, a landscape fraught with despair.
Another interesting figure of this painting is the white figure that lies in the middle of the painting on the beach. It looks almost like a human figure, which lies on the beach and he is covered from a white sheet. Under other situations, I would have seen this as a positive image, but in this case it seems disturbing. I feel that this human is not pleased and that something very bad has happened to him as he almost seems in pain. A range of commentators recognise this as Dali’s self-portrait and point out that he has shown this specific figure in other of paintings too.
When I look at the sky and the ocean, I think of it as a positive place; a place I feel I can relax and just enjoy the beauty of it, a place of hope. On the other hand, looking at the beach and the objects lying around I feel a sense of mystery and exploration overtaking me to find out what it all means while at the same time it makes me feel sad and melancholic as this place looks dead , with no life.
However, even though these two places are very different and opposite I see a link and connection between them. This comes from the colour blue which is significant at the back of the painting-in the ocean or the sky- but is also shown in the inside part of the watches. When I immediately see the watch, I am directed to the sky and suddenly all feels alive, the watches start to work, the tree has leafs and the human figure starts to move pleasantly
The Persistence of Memory’ is undoubtedly an enigmatic and interesting piece of art that challenges every observer’s mind. Dali often makes up confusing explanations about his paintings to purposely mislead people. The painting’s various and possible interpretations and meanings provoke a feeling of frustration at first, but at the same time encourage and determine you to explore what is behind it.
