Research: Salvador Dalí

I truly admire the works of the surrealist painter Dalí by the way he artistically captures a dramatic scene, whilst simultaneously making a connection with psychological theory. Many of his paintings include explicit and exaggerated symbols, referring to Freud's idea of our dreams and how they have a latent meaning, connected to our mind-set.

CASE STUDY: Melting clocks painting 

The Persistence of Memory (1931)

Saussure's concepts of the signifier and signified can be applied to study this painting, whereby the former refers to the sign and the latter refers to the meaning.

The signifiers: 

• Desert setting 
• The landscape is desolate 
• Use of bright golden light 
• There are clocks bent out of shape, looking as if they are melting 
• Head like object lying on the ground, it resembles a whale 
• Ants gather round on an orange clock 

The signified: 

• Melting clocks are symbolic of the passage of time- we lose the perception of time in our dreams, hence the reason the clocks appear to be distorted and out of shape. Time is not a concern whilst we are dreaming, instead as the title The persistence of Memory suggests, within our dreams we are reminded about different periods within our lives, within a chaotic order. 
• Head like object lying on the ground- The eyes are closed assuming the position of a dreamer. This signifies that the surroundings are observations within the dream. 
• desolate atmosphere- wide scope of possibilities as to what we dream about 
• Signifies that dreams are linked but at the same time separate to reality. 
• Ants gather round on an orange clock- The ants can be interpreted as attacking the clock. This can relate to our unconscious anxiety, regarding time. Maybe we are anxious to accomplish a specific goal by a certain time? To get to work on time? 

Other influential works by Dalí: 

Dream Caused by the Flight of a Bee Around a Pomegranate a Second Before Awakening (1944)

The Dream (1931)

MY APPLICATION: 
I observed how surrealist artists, including Dalí transform very ordinary objects like clocks, into an unrealistic form, within what we perceive to be reality. This brought up a really interesting idea about the nature of dreaming and how the familiar becomes unfamiliar. Dalí's work are a visual inspiration for me and will help me with the development of the development of my screenplay, with particular consideration to the visual aesthetic, cinematography and dream sequences. Ultimately, the works by Dalí have encouraged me to make use of meaningful symbols in my film, as opposed to very literal representations.