Salvador Dali: Cool, Crazy and Creative.

These are the words our just-turned-nine year old used to describe Salvador Dali today having spent three hours perusing his works at the Dali museum in his birthplace, Fuegeres, Spain. Now, just so we don’t get ahead of ourselves, she was really tired and pretty fed up by the time we left, and we did have to rush the 21st and 22nd rooms a bit. But still, its great that she was able to come up with such positive words to describe Dali’s work. Let’s face it, there could easily have been harsher words used to describe it. And she was quick to point out that it is his work that is cool, not him. Him, apparently, not cool at all. What with that mustache and the crazy eyes…
She was fascinated by the constant reappearance of Gala, and spent a while speculating on who she might be, and whether she would have been mad that he painted her with her boob showing. Because its disgusting, obviously, and if it were her, she would have been furious.
The older two girls would have been happy to spend more time there – there is so much to see in every picture, you could spend an hour on each one. (I couldn’t, but apparently they could). That would mean we’d have been there until next Wednesday, I think. They are not kidding when they say much of his life’s work is housed there! Some of the kid’s other thoughts today:

It’s amazing that he could do really normal paintings and sculptures, and then do these!
I wonder why he decided to do his Soft Self Portrait with a piece of grilled bacon…I guess everything’s better with bacon.
Who would think to put corn around someone’s neck, and a baguette on their head?
Do you think Dali was a poacher? (in response to the one with all the stuffed squashed pheasants)

They loved it though, which quite surprised me. I guess when you think about it, the eyes of a child are the perfect eyes for a lot of this work. No judgement really, just fascination and wonder. We have lots of questions for Google tomorrow.
And I think we almost succeeded in our attempt to pass it off as a Halloween Field Trip. One of them even suggested they could do a Dali inspired Halloween picture tomorrow since so much of the crazy fits in well with Halloween. All in all, I think he was a big hit. And our children continue to amaze me with their incredible insight and open-mindedness.
Road School is so enlightening. For all of us.
By the way, it was very cool, and well worth a visit. But make sure you have lots of time, because you really could spend the day.