Tokyo gets its biggest Dali show yet

Japan's largest-ever retrospective on the Spanish surrealist Salvador Dali opened at the National Art Centre in Tokyo on Wednesday following a two-month stay at the Kyoto Municipal Museum of Art, where it drew 200,000 visitors.

Visitors to the museum in Tokyo’s Roppongi district can see about 250 works borrowed from the Gala-Salvador Dali Foundation and Reina Sofia National Art Centre in Spain, the Dali in the United States and museums in Japan.

“The Dali Foundation has brought his art to Japan three times before – in 1999, 2006 and 2007 – but this is the first time that such a big retrospective has been held there, comprising works from the three biggest collections in the world,” the foundation website Salvador-Dali.org notes.

The art covers his entire career, from youth to his last paintings in 1983. The 250 pieces include 57 from the three foreign collections and 14 from eight Japanese museums. |As well as paintings there are drawings, other graphic works and |documents – books, leaflets |and photographs from the foundation’s archives and Japanese libraries.

The exhibition illustrates how Dali – who died in 1989 – also engaged in other creative fields, such as cinema, theatre and dance. He wrote scripts for films and also collaborated with Alfred Hitchcock on the movie “Spellbound” and Walt Disney on the animated short “Destino”.

The last segment of the show|covers the 1960s to ’80s. In his later years Dali chiefly focused on large canvases and was conceiving fresh interpretations of classical works by the likes of Michelangelo, Leonardo, Raphael and Velazquez. In the 1970s he established his own museum in Figueres, the Spanish town where he was born, which the foundation now runs.

“We believe this to be the most complete Dali exhibition ever |seen in Japan,” the website says. |“We hope Japanese visitors will |not only enjoy it but also learn |more about Salvador Dali, one of the most relevant artists in Western art |history.”

The exhibition, sponsored by the Yomiuri Shimbun among others, continues through December 12.