Salvador Dalí: Les Chants de Maldoror January 11 - February 8, 2024

 

Curators' Conversation and Reception

Tuesday, January 30, 5:30pm. Wilson Hall's Concert Hall.

Join us for a conversation with co-curators Professor King and Dr. Michael R. Taylor, Chief Curator and Deputy Director for Art and Education at the VMFA. Both the exhibition and curators' conversation are free and open to the public. The Dalí exhibition will be open for viewing directly before the curators' conversation and during the reception.

About The Exhibition

Hours: Monday through Friday from 10:00am to 4:00pm. Free and open to the public.

Between 1933 and 1934, Salvador Dalí created 44 illustrations for Les Chants de Maldoror, a fantastical 1869 text written by Isidore Ducasse, better known by his pen name, the Comte de Lautréamont. Lautréamont's book had nearly vanished into obscurity when it was rediscovered in the 1920s by the French Surrealists, who championed its rebellious spirit and bizarre prose—elements Dalí complemented with an arsenal of personal visions drawn from his creativesubconscious. Celebrating the 2024 Centennial Anniversary of the founding of the Surrealist movement, and in partnership with the Virginia Museum of Fine Arts—which recently acquired the complete set of etchings that the artist made for the original 1934 edition—this exhibition will present Dalí's astonishing Maldoror prints with researched didactic materials by W&L students, as well as Surrealist catalogs and ephemera from the collection of Dr. Elliott King, Associate Professor of Art History at W&L. The exhibition is co-curated by Professor King and Dr. Michael R. Taylor, Chief Curator and Deputy Director for Art and Education at the VMFA. This exhibition was organized by the Virginia Museum of Fine Arts.

Image credit: Salvador Dalí (Spanish, 1904-1989), Plate (facing page 96) from Les Chants de Maldoror (The Songs of Maldoror), 1934, Etching with drypoint in black ink on Vélin d'Arches paper with full margins and remarques, Virginia Museum of Fine Arts, Arthur and Margaret Glasgow Endowment, 2018.421.17