This article takes you beyond the iconic mustache and melting clocks. Dalí wasn't just a surrealist painter—he was a showman, a dreamer, and a master of self-invention who blurred the line between life and art.
Salvador Dalí
Dalí claimed he remembered being in the womb and once said he wanted to be a chef before becoming an artist.
He believed he was the reincarnation of his dead older brother, also named Salvador.
His iconic mustache was inspired by 17th-century Spanish painter Diego Velázquez—and he styled it daily with wax.
Dalí didn’t just paint—he designed jewelry, furniture, and even a surreal dream sequence for Alfred Hitchcock’s film Spellbound.
He collaborated with Walt Disney on a short animated film called Destino, which was completed decades later in 2003.
Salvador Dalí often gave lectures wearing a diving suit, claiming it helped him enter the subconscious.
He once rang the doorbell of a friend’s house with a lobster instead of his finger.
Dalí was expelled from art school for saying no one was qualified to judge his talent—not even his professors.
The melting clocks in The Persistence of Memory were inspired by cheese, not time.
He loved money and would often pay restaurant bills with doodles, knowing no one would cash them.
Salvador Dalí and his wife Gala lived in a castle—she had to give written permission before he could visit her.
He designed the Chupa Chups logo, which is still used on the candy today.
Dalí turned his home in Figueres, Spain into a museum filled with bizarre installations—including a room shaped like Mae West’s face.
He once declared, “I am not a surrealist. I am surrealism.”
Dalí faked madness during his military service to avoid being drafted into war.
