As of today, Figueres has a new Dalinian claim that wants to be a “complement” to the Teatre-Museu, the great work that the artist Salvador Dalí left in his hometown, and also to the rest of the cultural facilities that help to get to know the surrealist genius as the Gala-Dalí castle in Púbol and the house-museum of Portlligat, in Cadaqués.
The house where the surrealist genius was born and grew up during the first eight years of his life, number 6 Narcís Monturiol Street in Figueres, has opened its doors today after 28 years. This is the time that has passed since 1995, when the then mayor Marià Lorca bought a part of the ground floor and mezzanine of the property, now converted into municipal facilities. A fact, until its opening, that has involved six mayors of different political ideologies.
The immersive tour, lasting one hour with an audio guide, allows you to discover the personal, family, intellectual and cultural environment of the artist and begins on the mezzanine, where a hologram reconstructs the notary office of Dalí's father, Salvador Dalí Cusí.
A character with a “strong, irascible character and outgoing personality” - according to a voice-over, that of the narrator, who accompanies the visitor on his journey - who in 1900 chose Figueres as his destination, advised by his childhood friend in Cadaqués Pep Pitxot. .
The itinerary allows you to enter the room where the genius was born in 1904, whom his parents named Salvador, the same name they gave to their first son, who died when he was less than two years old due to an intestinal infection. The painter was born nine months after that event and grew up with the presence of the memory of his deceased brother and the feeling that he usurped a place that did not belong to him.
A fact that Dalí would remember throughout his artistic career. As a child, it was difficult for him to enter his parents' room because of a reproduction of Velázquez's Christ, hanging on the wall, and also because of the portrait of his brother who was absent from him.
"To differentiate myself from my dead brother, I have to commit all the eccentricities in the world," says a voice during the tour that evokes Dalí in the first person, from fragments of his thoughts, writings, quotes, interviews or statements.
The kitchen, the only room in which Dalí was prohibited from entering, and the gallery, where the Dalís invited friends and from which the sardanas of the Rambla could be heard, are other rooms that the visitor can explore and imagine thanks to to the excellent recreation of these spaces. The young Dalí spent hours spying on the women who were messing around in the kitchen and such was his obsession that at the age of six he said that he wanted to be a cook, in feminine terms.
It was in the gallery, where Dalí began to make his first drawings, scratching the red paint on a small table with a spoon and fork, according to his sister Anna María. Until Gala's emergence into the artist's life in 1929, Anna María was a friend, confidant and model for her brother. In her early years she painted up to fifteen oil paintings in which she appears as the famous 'Figure in a Window' (1925).
The turning point that marked the death of his mother, when he was 16 years old, the relationship of admiration and hatred towards his father or the characters that helped awaken in him his artistic vocation also appear in this tour that shows the public the facet more personal of the genius but also his character dimension.
Among those names that marked him during his childhood, Josep Puig Pujades stands out, who was his mentor; his first drawing teacher, Joan Núñez, who taught him technique and encouraged him to capture what surrounded him, or his maternal grandmother, Maria Anna Ferrés, who lived on the second floor of the property, and who entertained the Dalí brothers by telling them stories. and suggesting crafts.
According to Anna Maria Dalí, in her memoir Salvador Dalí vist per la seva germana (1949), shortly before she died, the grandmother told the doctor who visited her that her grandson was going to be a great painter. "The best Catalan painter," the old woman sensed.
During the journey, one also discovers the time in which the young Dalí moved to Madrid, in 1922, to the Royal Academy of Fine Arts, from where he was expelled twice, the second time permanently. "I said that none of those professors had enough status to examine me," reproduces a voice that emulates Dalí.
His time in the student residence is also explained, where he was considered "pathologically shy" and he is reminded to "dress like a dandy." It was there where he met the Granada poet and playwright Federico García Lorca and the filmmaker Luís Buñuel, with whom he collaborated on two films: Un chien anadalou (1928) and L'age d'or (1930).
The visitor also discovers the two moments that marked a turning point for Salvador Dalí with his family. In 1929, already immersed in the surrealist movement, he wrote this phrase in the painting 'Parfois je crache': 'Parfois je crache par plaisir sur le portrait de ma mère' (Sometimes I spit for pleasure on the portrait of my mother.') father disinherited him and kicked him out of the house.
The other moment that caused a great family stir was the moment he met Gala, a Russian woman, separated, ten years older than him, with whom he fell in love and who from then on played a fundamental role in his artistic consolidation.
In the house where he was born, the visitor will also discover his interest in science and mysticism, as after his presence in 1936 on the cover of Time he never ceased to be in the news, his happenings and performances or the relationships he maintained with characters such as Walt Disney (his soft watches appeared in the 2003 film Destino), Hitchcock, Mae West or the Marx Brothers, who he considered "the three great American surrealists", especially Harpo. He sent him a harp made with wires like ropes and spoons.
An itinerary full of curiosities about the character Dalí, such as the images of the diving suit that he wore during a conference in 1936, during the Surrealist Exhibition in London, which almost left him breathless. Or the characteristic mustache that he grew in 1927 until his death in 1989. Twenty-five centimeters from tip to tip.
The itinerary ends in a room where one is immersed in the Empordà landscapes, such as the area of Tudela, in Cap de Creus, or the bay of Portlligat, which were a source of inspiration for Dalí.
The councilor for Culture of Figueres, Mariona Seguranyes, explains that the opening of the museum "is the city's tribute to Salvador Dalí." "He could have located his Theater-Museum in any city in the world but he chose Figueres, a fact that indicated that his hometown was very important to him," she explains.
For his part, the director of the Salvador Dalí Birthplace, Eduard Bech, explains that the visit to the birthplace "is a complement" to the visit to the Dalí Theatre-Museum and the rest of the Dalí facilities in the Empordà. Bech highlights that the birthplace allows us to discover the "most intimate" Dalí but also the "spectacle Dalí", the two identities of the same person.
The inauguration ceremony, held today, was attended by the Acting Minister of Transport, Mobility and Urban Agenda, Raquel Sánchez; the Minister of Culture, Natàlia Garriga, among other authorities.
This weekend and until next October 25, the facility is open to the residents of Figueres, upon reservation. Later it will be opened to the public. Entry to the space costs 12 euros; eight, in the case of retired people and those under 18 years of age and six, for groups. Access, being a small space, allows groups of a maximum of 8 people.
