Painter, if you want to ensure for yourself a prominent place in Society you must,
in the first flush of your youth, give it a violent kick in the right leg.
– Dalí, Dalí on Modern Art, 1957
in the first flush of your youth, give it a violent kick in the right leg.
– Dalí, Dalí on Modern Art, 1957
In 1948 Dalí and Gala returned to Europe and moved directly back into their house in Port Lligat, in Catalonia, Spain. After that they divided their time each year between Paris and Catalunya, where Dalí did much of his painting, and New York, with the occasional foray to Pebble Beach, California. Dalí was greatly affected by the explosion of the atomic bomb over Hiroshima in 1945, and as the decade came to a close, his artistic direction transitioned from his “classic” phase into one he called Nuclear Mysticism. This approach combined his interest in atomic science with Catholicism, and was to inform his work of the late 1940s and a good part of the 1950s. These years saw the production of Dali’s grand, highly symmetrical and largely religious paintings combined with futuristic elements, such as the famed Corpus Hypercubus of 1954, and The Sacrament of the Last Supper of 1955. While this style was decidedly more grandiose and grounded in later twentieth century innovations, it still retained references to the Old Masters, and saw an increasing commitment to academic style and subject matter, drawing heavily from the conventions of Christian renaissance art.
Throughout the decade Dalí continued to rail against much modern art, and abstraction and automatism in particular. This he outlined in his anti-modern treatise of 1956, aptly-named Dalí on Modern Art: The Cuckolds of Antiquated Modern Art. “What is more cuckolded, more betrayed, more afflicted with cracks than this modern art with its mania for the sterilized cleanliness of functional forms and aseptic surfaces,” he asks, or claims that “Barely had they been successively betrayed by the ‘ugly’ and the ‘modern,’ then by ‘technique,’ than our dithyrambic critics were once more . . . cuckolded then and there by ‘abstract art.’” Despite this stance, however, the artist continued to be remarkably experimental and, Nuclear Mysticism aside, his innovations not infrequently marched in tandem with those in the contemporary art world.
Dalí continued to produce society portraits for American clients throughout the 1950s at the very regular rate of about two to three per year. While he was experimenting significantly with styles and techniques in his general artistic practice, with a few exceptions this did not affect his American society portraiture in any notable way. He did produce a number of portraits of Gala in his particulated Nuclear Mystical style, and two portraits of other women in a similar vein, although only one of these has been tentatively identified, and was of an Italian subject. Perhaps in response to his critic’s disapproval of the previous decade of his crammed canvases, exemplified in the horror vacui of his Portrait of Mrs. Harrison Williams, Dalí’s portraits of the 1950s become noticeably sparser. They also became more formulaic, and both new developments likely had to do with speeding up production on this regular source of income.
In the 1950s subjects were increasingly posed against backdrops based more or less on Dalí’s now “trademark” Port Lligat vista, and usually included a horse, often with a naked rider, the odd angel, and his habitual tiny figures in the background to enhance the perspectival illusion the sense of vast space. Subjects largely appear in bust or three-quarter length poses which, it should be noted, was often determined by cost. Dalí charged a few thousand extra to include hands, which are difficult and time-consuming to paint, and this arrangement sometimes resulted in odd placement of the figure on the canvas, presumably to eliminate the subject’s hands when working from photographs. Despite the streamlining, Dalí did continue to personalize his work in regards to his sitter’s personalities or preferences, largely through the use of botanical symbolism and other coded imagery.
Dalí’s announcement in the 1945 Dalí News of the unrealized portrait show in the fall of 1946 was the last time he wrote in any significant way about his portraits. It seems that by the 1950s he preferred to keep this commercial venture quiet and distinct from his more visible artistic practice. Society portraits continued to crop up in his shows and publications, but more often they were simply quietly handed over to clients, who immediately hung them in their homes, and where many still hang today having been passed on to relatives. This avoidance of the public eye may also have had to do with the increasing roster of clients who were dissatisfied with the works, and the 1950s also saw a number of Dalí’s patrons state privately that they were not fond their portraits, and several commissions that were rejected outright. The most notable example of this was a widely-publicized controversy over a portrait of showgirl-turned-society-matron and would-be killer Ann Woodward. She was so appalled by Dalí’s 1953 depiction of her that the press reported “It’s something she would not have in her home . . . She would throw it in the river.”[2]
Throughout the decade Dalí continued to rail against much modern art, and abstraction and automatism in particular. This he outlined in his anti-modern treatise of 1956, aptly-named Dalí on Modern Art: The Cuckolds of Antiquated Modern Art. “What is more cuckolded, more betrayed, more afflicted with cracks than this modern art with its mania for the sterilized cleanliness of functional forms and aseptic surfaces,” he asks, or claims that “Barely had they been successively betrayed by the ‘ugly’ and the ‘modern,’ then by ‘technique,’ than our dithyrambic critics were once more . . . cuckolded then and there by ‘abstract art.’” Despite this stance, however, the artist continued to be remarkably experimental and, Nuclear Mysticism aside, his innovations not infrequently marched in tandem with those in the contemporary art world.
Dalí continued to produce society portraits for American clients throughout the 1950s at the very regular rate of about two to three per year. While he was experimenting significantly with styles and techniques in his general artistic practice, with a few exceptions this did not affect his American society portraiture in any notable way. He did produce a number of portraits of Gala in his particulated Nuclear Mystical style, and two portraits of other women in a similar vein, although only one of these has been tentatively identified, and was of an Italian subject. Perhaps in response to his critic’s disapproval of the previous decade of his crammed canvases, exemplified in the horror vacui of his Portrait of Mrs. Harrison Williams, Dalí’s portraits of the 1950s become noticeably sparser. They also became more formulaic, and both new developments likely had to do with speeding up production on this regular source of income.
In the 1950s subjects were increasingly posed against backdrops based more or less on Dalí’s now “trademark” Port Lligat vista, and usually included a horse, often with a naked rider, the odd angel, and his habitual tiny figures in the background to enhance the perspectival illusion the sense of vast space. Subjects largely appear in bust or three-quarter length poses which, it should be noted, was often determined by cost. Dalí charged a few thousand extra to include hands, which are difficult and time-consuming to paint, and this arrangement sometimes resulted in odd placement of the figure on the canvas, presumably to eliminate the subject’s hands when working from photographs. Despite the streamlining, Dalí did continue to personalize his work in regards to his sitter’s personalities or preferences, largely through the use of botanical symbolism and other coded imagery.
Dalí’s announcement in the 1945 Dalí News of the unrealized portrait show in the fall of 1946 was the last time he wrote in any significant way about his portraits. It seems that by the 1950s he preferred to keep this commercial venture quiet and distinct from his more visible artistic practice. Society portraits continued to crop up in his shows and publications, but more often they were simply quietly handed over to clients, who immediately hung them in their homes, and where many still hang today having been passed on to relatives. This avoidance of the public eye may also have had to do with the increasing roster of clients who were dissatisfied with the works, and the 1950s also saw a number of Dalí’s patrons state privately that they were not fond their portraits, and several commissions that were rejected outright. The most notable example of this was a widely-publicized controversy over a portrait of showgirl-turned-society-matron and would-be killer Ann Woodward. She was so appalled by Dalí’s 1953 depiction of her that the press reported “It’s something she would not have in her home . . . She would throw it in the river.”[2]
The Medusa, 1950 (Formerly Portrait of Marie-Thérèse Nichols).
Gouache, conté crayon, pencil and ink on paper, 67.3 x 52 cm. (26.5” x 20.5”).
The High Museum of Art, Atlanta, Georgia.
Gift of Mrs. Isabelle Woolford Kennedy.
Gouache, conté crayon, pencil and ink on paper, 67.3 x 52 cm. (26.5” x 20.5”).
The High Museum of Art, Atlanta, Georgia.
Gift of Mrs. Isabelle Woolford Kennedy.
At this point we see Dalí was capable of pushing caricature to scalding satire. Intended to humiliate or even frighten a client, this signalled Dali's swelling confidence in his position as an artist of means in America, and perhaps a growing disenchantment with continent’s beau monde, with whom he was becoming increasingly familiar. The 1950s in fact started off with what may have been Dalí’s most vicious portrait “attack.” This was in the form of a drawing which features disturbing and violent imagery that would surely be shocking to a client expecting a more conventional, or at least mildly flattering likeness. Executed in conté crayon and gouache, the work is known today as The Medusa, in reference to the subject’s decapitated state, and the wiry profusion of snakes that writhe in her hair.
Despite these allusions to the notorious Gorgon of classical mythology, the rather dainty and elegant sitter hardly seems capable of turning a man to stone with a mere glance. Sitting upright and shown from the waist up, with bare shoulders and her torso covered by a white cloth, the subject wears a ladylike five-strand pearl necklace. Above this fine jewellery, however, her throat has been slit, revealing the interior of her neck and a smattering of blood at the cutline. This wound is neatly integrated with the horizon, which is comprised of a tree-covered landscape, populated by classical-style buildings. A few graphic figures fill out the scene, including an angel, a person wielding a cross and, barely sketched in, a rider on a horse. The latter image is repeated in the interior of an egg which the woman holds in her graceful hand.
While these embellishments suggest that the work might simply be a Surrealist fantasy, that it is indeed a portrait was confirmed during research for Dalí: The Late Work, an exhibition held in Atlanta’s High Museum of Art in 2011. While perusing the New York archives of the work of photographer Philippe Halsman, curator Elliott King and, Director of Collections and Exhibitions at the High,
David Brenneman, the source photograph for The Medusa. The photograph features a woman in early middle age with upswept, wavy dark hair. She holds an egg, and wears a décolleté black evening dress and the same five-strand pearl necklace as Dalí’s subject. How she came to be depicted as a Gorgon is a story that illustrates a particularly sinister side of Dalí’s character.
Despite these allusions to the notorious Gorgon of classical mythology, the rather dainty and elegant sitter hardly seems capable of turning a man to stone with a mere glance. Sitting upright and shown from the waist up, with bare shoulders and her torso covered by a white cloth, the subject wears a ladylike five-strand pearl necklace. Above this fine jewellery, however, her throat has been slit, revealing the interior of her neck and a smattering of blood at the cutline. This wound is neatly integrated with the horizon, which is comprised of a tree-covered landscape, populated by classical-style buildings. A few graphic figures fill out the scene, including an angel, a person wielding a cross and, barely sketched in, a rider on a horse. The latter image is repeated in the interior of an egg which the woman holds in her graceful hand.
While these embellishments suggest that the work might simply be a Surrealist fantasy, that it is indeed a portrait was confirmed during research for Dalí: The Late Work, an exhibition held in Atlanta’s High Museum of Art in 2011. While perusing the New York archives of the work of photographer Philippe Halsman, curator Elliott King and, Director of Collections and Exhibitions at the High,
David Brenneman, the source photograph for The Medusa. The photograph features a woman in early middle age with upswept, wavy dark hair. She holds an egg, and wears a décolleté black evening dress and the same five-strand pearl necklace as Dalí’s subject. How she came to be depicted as a Gorgon is a story that illustrates a particularly sinister side of Dalí’s character.
News Pictures, Inc. press photo of Marie-Thérèse Pereire (left) and Baroness Yvonne Heeckeren (right) arriving
on the SS Marques de Comillas from Bilbao, Spain, dated June 10, 1941. Author’s collection.
on the SS Marques de Comillas from Bilbao, Spain, dated June 10, 1941. Author’s collection.
The woman in the portrait has since been identified by the authors as Marie-Thérèse Nichols, born Marie-Thérèse Brollova (d. 1986). Born in Czechoslovakia and in 1936 she married her first husband, Gérard Pereire and moved from Brno to Paris.[3] In 1941 she appears to have fled Paris, via Spain, to the United States. The following year she married Brooklyn-born Rhodes scholar William Ichabod Nichols, the son of one of America’s first female architects, Minerva Parker Nichols.[4] In the early 1940s William Nichols became the editor of This Week, a Sunday magazine that was one of the biggest syndicated periodicals of its day. He knew Dalí professionally and apparently it was he who elected to place Dalí’s 1945 painting Basket of Bread on the front cover of the February 1948 edition of This Week. A gesture, he claimed, that gave the artist his “first mass audience.”[5]
It was around this time the Nichols commissioned Dalí to execute a sketch of Marie-Thérèse which, it turned out, was to be based on the photograph by Philippe Halsman. Halsman, another European émigré and an accomplished professional photographer, likely knew Nichols, as his work appeared frequently in This Week. The photographer was also a great collaborator of Dalí’s for almost forty years, beginning in the 1940s, and took many extremely innovative and amusing photographs of the artist, some of which are very well known to this day.
Photograph of Marie-Thérèse Nichols by Philippe Halsman, 1945.
Photo by Philippe Halsman © Philippe Halsman Estate 2023.
Photo by Philippe Halsman © Philippe Halsman Estate 2023.
Sketch of an unidentified woman (Likely a sketch for Mrs. Nichols).
Medium, date, dimensions unknown.
© The Gala-Salvador Dalí Foundation. All rights reserved
COVA-DAAV permissions pending.
Medium, date, dimensions unknown.
© The Gala-Salvador Dalí Foundation. All rights reserved
COVA-DAAV permissions pending.
Apparently Marie-Thérèse posed for Dalí in a series of sporadic sittings in New York, although the work took about three years to complete. As such, it appears Dalí turned to Halsman's 1945 photograph at the last minute, perhaps to fulfill the lagging commission. Who staged the photograph, however, is not known. The quirky addition of the egg to the portrait may have been Halsman’s idea, as an example of what he termed an “added unusual feature”; an odd or capricious element that infused an image with cachet, whimsy or humour.[6] Just as likely, it may have been a Surrealist embellishment suggested by Dalí; the egg being a recurring symbol of birth and rebirth in his visual lexicon. Of note is what appears to be a large fly or bumblebee attached to the subject’s necklace. Possibly a part of the jewellery itself, or perhaps another added feature by the photographer or the artist, and one that, like the egg, also figures in the final drawing.
Dalí biographer Meryle Secrest, who interviewed the Nichols, recounts a chilling story about the original portrait and its reception; a tale that clearly demonstrates to what extent Dalí could refuse to flatter, and could sometimes outright ridicule or debase clients he disliked. The Nichols made no secret of the fact that they were wary of Dalí’s character, and reportedly viewed him as obsequious, opportunistic, and snobbish. Nevertheless, they did admire his work and according to the Nichols, since they could not afford a painting, they opted for a sketch, which was considerably cheaper than what Dalí was charging for oils. The couple recalled that Gala took care of the negotiations, and that “she had a way of jabbing her finger at you. She said, ‘We will give you a special price,’ but she wanted cash on the line.”[7]
Several decidedly terse letters from William Nichols to Dalí at the Del Monte Lodge are preserved, dated 1950. These reveal that the price for the drawing was $750, and that an advance of $250 was paid, but most significantly, that the clients were fed up with waiting for Dalí to complete the picture.[8] William’s tone is in fact so curt, that one can imagine it did not sit well with the notoriously proud and petulant artist. Accordingly, it is hardly surprising that when the drawing was finally complete, the clients were appalled, claiming, quite simply, that “it was awful.” Mr. Nichols said of the image of his wife that, “I had never seen her look so hideous. He made her elderly and ugly, which was unfair because she was, and is, a beautiful woman. Nobody recognized her.”[9]
Dalí biographer Meryle Secrest, who interviewed the Nichols, recounts a chilling story about the original portrait and its reception; a tale that clearly demonstrates to what extent Dalí could refuse to flatter, and could sometimes outright ridicule or debase clients he disliked. The Nichols made no secret of the fact that they were wary of Dalí’s character, and reportedly viewed him as obsequious, opportunistic, and snobbish. Nevertheless, they did admire his work and according to the Nichols, since they could not afford a painting, they opted for a sketch, which was considerably cheaper than what Dalí was charging for oils. The couple recalled that Gala took care of the negotiations, and that “she had a way of jabbing her finger at you. She said, ‘We will give you a special price,’ but she wanted cash on the line.”[7]
Several decidedly terse letters from William Nichols to Dalí at the Del Monte Lodge are preserved, dated 1950. These reveal that the price for the drawing was $750, and that an advance of $250 was paid, but most significantly, that the clients were fed up with waiting for Dalí to complete the picture.[8] William’s tone is in fact so curt, that one can imagine it did not sit well with the notoriously proud and petulant artist. Accordingly, it is hardly surprising that when the drawing was finally complete, the clients were appalled, claiming, quite simply, that “it was awful.” Mr. Nichols said of the image of his wife that, “I had never seen her look so hideous. He made her elderly and ugly, which was unfair because she was, and is, a beautiful woman. Nobody recognized her.”[9]
Preparatory tracing for Portrait of Marie-Thérèse Nichols, n.d.
Incisions and ink on plastic sheet, 62 x 48 cm., 24” x 19”.
© Fundació Gala - Salvador Dalí. All rights reserved.
COVA-DAAV permissions pending.
Incisions and ink on plastic sheet, 62 x 48 cm., 24” x 19”.
© Fundació Gala - Salvador Dalí. All rights reserved.
COVA-DAAV permissions pending.
Judging from a preliminary drawing in the holdings of the Gala-Salvador Dalí Foundation, in which the sitter appears matronly and her mouth quite misshapen, Mr. Nichols was by no means exaggerating. This, however, may have had something to do with Dalí’s technique at the time, which is revealed through this primary sketch taken directly from the photograph. Dalí appears to have traced the photograph onto a plastic sheet, possibly using a projector or mirrored apparatus to enlarge the image (Halsman, in fact, photographed Dali using such a set-up in a photograph from 1941). He then presumably transferred it to the canvas through incisions in the plastic, an antiquated technique called “pouncing.” This cumbersome transfer method helps explain the awkward rendering, and perhaps why the final image appears in reverse to the photograph in The Medusa. Whether or not this was an experiment for Dalí at the time, or a frequent practice is not known. Perhaps he was attempting to emulate his beloved Vermeer, having written in his Confessions that “I am convinced that Vermeer of Delft used an optical mirror in which the subjects of his paintings were reflected so he could trace them.”[10]
Dalí evidently presented the work to the clients without the “Medusa” touch – that is, sans slashed throat and snake-like hair. Despite the client’s objection to the quality of the work, he was paid for the offending oeuvre, although the couple not surprisingly preferred to store it in a closet rather than to display it. Eventually, they came to the conclusion that the best thing was to fob it off to a charity shop in Manhattan, where the staff placed it in a window for sale. As luck would have it, the Dalís, who were staying nearby at the St. Regis, saw the work in the window and were outraged that the Nichols had disposed of it in a way they felt was beneath the master’s dignity. Secrest recounts the following exchange when Dalí confronted the Nichols about the donation:
One day Mrs. Nichols was lunching at the Caravelle on 55th Street, when she suddenly heard a voice hissing “Cocu!” It was Dalí. “Someone so stupid as to give away a Dalí has to be a cuckold!" Everyone in the restaurant stood up to look. She was so astounded that she could not say a word. That was not the end of it, either. The Nichols had the misfortune to meet the Dalís shortly afterwards at a Park Avenue dinner party. Dalí told them, “I just want you to know that I bought the portrait. I keep it and I am sticking pins into it. Because, you see, I have magic and do you know where I am going to stick pins? Into your eyes.”
Mrs. Nichols explained that she tried to shrug the incident off, but felt Dalí had something “supernaturally evil about him” and could not forget the threat. “I was afraid, you know, that I would go blind,” she confided to Secrest.[11]
Instead of sticking pins into the subject’s eyes as a magical form of reprisal, it seems the artist, having purchased the portrait, decided to embellish it in an equally malicious manner. Looking closely at The Medusa, the white gouache accents on the dress, face and background appear to have been dabbed over the original drawing, allowing Dalí to add the sordid detail of the cut throat on top, while the snakes could easily be included with a few extra strokes of the conté crayon. This approach would not only satisfy the artist’s thirst for revenge, it also allowed him to obscure the sitter’s face, and to “rebrand” the work as one from Greek mythology for re-use or resale.
As The Medusa, the work appeared in a show at the Gallery of Modern Art in 1965-66, the catalogue for which stating it was the property of Carlos Alemany, the jeweler who collaborated with and produced so many precious jewels and luxury sculptural works with Dalí.[12] As Dalí often paid collaborators or those to whom he owed money, in kind, it would have been convenient for him to dispose of this less saleable piece — an odd work that looked suspiciously like a portrait — as compensation for work rendered. Later the portrait came into the possession of Atlanta patron Isabelle Woolford Kennedy, who donated it to the High Museum in Atlanta, where it continues to be known as The Medusa.
Dalí evidently presented the work to the clients without the “Medusa” touch – that is, sans slashed throat and snake-like hair. Despite the client’s objection to the quality of the work, he was paid for the offending oeuvre, although the couple not surprisingly preferred to store it in a closet rather than to display it. Eventually, they came to the conclusion that the best thing was to fob it off to a charity shop in Manhattan, where the staff placed it in a window for sale. As luck would have it, the Dalís, who were staying nearby at the St. Regis, saw the work in the window and were outraged that the Nichols had disposed of it in a way they felt was beneath the master’s dignity. Secrest recounts the following exchange when Dalí confronted the Nichols about the donation:
One day Mrs. Nichols was lunching at the Caravelle on 55th Street, when she suddenly heard a voice hissing “Cocu!” It was Dalí. “Someone so stupid as to give away a Dalí has to be a cuckold!" Everyone in the restaurant stood up to look. She was so astounded that she could not say a word. That was not the end of it, either. The Nichols had the misfortune to meet the Dalís shortly afterwards at a Park Avenue dinner party. Dalí told them, “I just want you to know that I bought the portrait. I keep it and I am sticking pins into it. Because, you see, I have magic and do you know where I am going to stick pins? Into your eyes.”
Mrs. Nichols explained that she tried to shrug the incident off, but felt Dalí had something “supernaturally evil about him” and could not forget the threat. “I was afraid, you know, that I would go blind,” she confided to Secrest.[11]
Instead of sticking pins into the subject’s eyes as a magical form of reprisal, it seems the artist, having purchased the portrait, decided to embellish it in an equally malicious manner. Looking closely at The Medusa, the white gouache accents on the dress, face and background appear to have been dabbed over the original drawing, allowing Dalí to add the sordid detail of the cut throat on top, while the snakes could easily be included with a few extra strokes of the conté crayon. This approach would not only satisfy the artist’s thirst for revenge, it also allowed him to obscure the sitter’s face, and to “rebrand” the work as one from Greek mythology for re-use or resale.
As The Medusa, the work appeared in a show at the Gallery of Modern Art in 1965-66, the catalogue for which stating it was the property of Carlos Alemany, the jeweler who collaborated with and produced so many precious jewels and luxury sculptural works with Dalí.[12] As Dalí often paid collaborators or those to whom he owed money, in kind, it would have been convenient for him to dispose of this less saleable piece — an odd work that looked suspiciously like a portrait — as compensation for work rendered. Later the portrait came into the possession of Atlanta patron Isabelle Woolford Kennedy, who donated it to the High Museum in Atlanta, where it continues to be known as The Medusa.
Portrait of Josephine Hartford Bryce, 1950.
Oil on canvas, 28¼ x 22 1/8 in. (71.8 x 56.2 cm.).
Private collection.
Oil on canvas, 28¼ x 22 1/8 in. (71.8 x 56.2 cm.).
Private collection.
A second commission Dalí was to complete in 1950 was quite different from that of the ill-treated Marie-Thérèse Nichols and was of a daring heiress and millionaire variously associated with arts and culture. This was Josephine Hartford (1904 – 1992), granddaughter of George Huntington Hartford, head of the Great Atlantic and Pacific Tea Company (better known as A&P), which for most of the twentieth century was the largest grocery retailer in America.[13] Her father was Edward V. Hartford, an inventor and president of the Hartford Shock Absorber Company, but more significantly, one of the heirs to the massive A&P fortune. When he died in 1922, he left an estate estimated at 200 million dollars, much of which was squandered by Josephine’s notorious brother Huntington Hartford, an American businessman, filmmaker and art collector.[14] Josephine’s widowed mother, it should be noted, married Italian Prince Guido Pignatelli and thus become a princess.[15]
Josephine and Huntington grew up deeply nestled in the lap of luxury and privilege, first in a Park Avenue apartment, then in the tony Atlantic shore-side town of Deal, New Jersey, and next at a seaside estate in Newport, Rhode Island. Jo, as she was known, was educated both in Paris and New York. She developed a taste for culture and sport, and had ample resources to indulge her inclinations. She also appears to have possessed immense drive and energy: she studied under the distinguished French pianist and composer Isidor Edmond Philipp and became concert pianist herself; she trained to become a tournament tennis player as well as an airplane pilot; she raced her two-masted trans-Atlantic sailing yacht, the Vamarie; and she bred and raced horses in the US and Great Britain.[16] Described as a cosmopolitan figure, “who moved through the international art world as a friend to artists and an educated collector,” she was also notorious for her extravagance, described as having “squadrons of servants,” and being immensely fond of parties.[17] According to Marc Levinson, in his book The Great A&P and the Struggle for Small Business in America, it was Josephine and Huntington’s “constant need for cash” that helped speed the decline of the A&P empire.[18]
Josephine was married four times to men of varied professions and inclinations, the last of whom was Ivar Felix C. Bryce, whom she wed in 1950. Bryce was an intriguing character in his own right. Born in London to a family that had connections to the Mountbattens, he was a former agent of the Office for Strategic Services (OSS), which became the CIA post-war. During the war he worked under William Samuel Stephenson, the senior representative of British Intelligence for the Western hemisphere, who was also thought to be the inspiration for both William Stevenson’s (no relation) bestseller, A Man Called Intrepid, and Ian Fleming’s James Bond. Bryce was a close friend of Fleming, and it is believed the author based the character of Felix Leiter in the James Bond novels upon him.[19]
Josephine and Huntington grew up deeply nestled in the lap of luxury and privilege, first in a Park Avenue apartment, then in the tony Atlantic shore-side town of Deal, New Jersey, and next at a seaside estate in Newport, Rhode Island. Jo, as she was known, was educated both in Paris and New York. She developed a taste for culture and sport, and had ample resources to indulge her inclinations. She also appears to have possessed immense drive and energy: she studied under the distinguished French pianist and composer Isidor Edmond Philipp and became concert pianist herself; she trained to become a tournament tennis player as well as an airplane pilot; she raced her two-masted trans-Atlantic sailing yacht, the Vamarie; and she bred and raced horses in the US and Great Britain.[16] Described as a cosmopolitan figure, “who moved through the international art world as a friend to artists and an educated collector,” she was also notorious for her extravagance, described as having “squadrons of servants,” and being immensely fond of parties.[17] According to Marc Levinson, in his book The Great A&P and the Struggle for Small Business in America, it was Josephine and Huntington’s “constant need for cash” that helped speed the decline of the A&P empire.[18]
Josephine was married four times to men of varied professions and inclinations, the last of whom was Ivar Felix C. Bryce, whom she wed in 1950. Bryce was an intriguing character in his own right. Born in London to a family that had connections to the Mountbattens, he was a former agent of the Office for Strategic Services (OSS), which became the CIA post-war. During the war he worked under William Samuel Stephenson, the senior representative of British Intelligence for the Western hemisphere, who was also thought to be the inspiration for both William Stevenson’s (no relation) bestseller, A Man Called Intrepid, and Ian Fleming’s James Bond. Bryce was a close friend of Fleming, and it is believed the author based the character of Felix Leiter in the James Bond novels upon him.[19]
Fra Filippo Lippi, Portrait of a Woman, c. 1440,
tempera on wood, Gemäldegalerie, Berlin.
tempera on wood, Gemäldegalerie, Berlin.
For his portrait of Mrs. Hartford Bryce, Dalí continues to draw upon “classic” influences, this time on Renaissance profile portraits of noblewomen. More specifically, the painting is reminiscent of such works as Fra Filippo Lippi’s Portrait of a Woman (1440), or Da Vinci’s, Petrarch’s Laura, in which the sitter also holds a carnation. According to art historian Patricia Simons, portraits such as these were a sign of the subject’s “newly married (or perhaps sometimes betrothed) state.” They denoted “women as spectacle,” and therefore were a showcase of lavish jewelry and fine costumes, to convey the social and financial status of the bride and her betrothed.[20] This format was an apt choice on Dalí’s behalf, as the sitter had married her fourth and final husband the year the canvas was created. It also likely explains the carnation the sitter holds, another Renaissance mainstay that appears in a number of Dalí’s society portraits, and which was a conventional nuptial attribute, denoting pure love and fidelity.[21]
Notable indeed is the way in which Dalí’s portrait highlights the sitter’s sumptuous dress and jewelry. Bryce was, in fact, wearing her favorite embroidered green gown, and her grandmother’s precious emeralds, which at that time belonged to her brother. For insurance reasons, the emeralds could not be removed from City Bank in New York. As a result, Mrs. Bryce, who was determined to don them for her sittings, had to pose for Dalí in the vault in the bank.[22] There is no trace of these awkward circumstance in the final product, and instead, Dalí implemented his usual backdrop reminiscent of Port Lligat. In the background, to the subject’s left, he has placed the figures of three musicians, one of whom blows a trumpet, and one who strums a lute, an evident homage to Mrs. Bryce’s status as a musician. One wonders if the last tree in a long line of cypresses in the background, which floats into the air, is being carried away by the strains of their song, or if this may be a reference Mrs. Bryce’s standing as an airplane pilot.[23] To the subject’s right are the figures of Don Quixote and Sancho Panza, from Cervantes’ famous book, another allusion to her deep love of the arts.”[24]
Mrs. Bryce was reputedly very fond of Dalí’s portrait, and hung it in the dining room of her home for some forty years. That said, her daughter Nuala Pell, the wife of Rhode Island Senator Claiborne Pell, found the work somewhat disturbing, and felt it conveyed a sternness incongruous with her mother’s character.[25] The family kept ties with Dalí, and for the opening of his short-lived, 7.4 million dollar Gallery of Modern Art he had built at 2 Columbus Circle in Manhattan in 1964, Huntington Hartford commissioned Dalí’s spectacular large-scale work The Discovery of America by Christopher Columbus.
Notable indeed is the way in which Dalí’s portrait highlights the sitter’s sumptuous dress and jewelry. Bryce was, in fact, wearing her favorite embroidered green gown, and her grandmother’s precious emeralds, which at that time belonged to her brother. For insurance reasons, the emeralds could not be removed from City Bank in New York. As a result, Mrs. Bryce, who was determined to don them for her sittings, had to pose for Dalí in the vault in the bank.[22] There is no trace of these awkward circumstance in the final product, and instead, Dalí implemented his usual backdrop reminiscent of Port Lligat. In the background, to the subject’s left, he has placed the figures of three musicians, one of whom blows a trumpet, and one who strums a lute, an evident homage to Mrs. Bryce’s status as a musician. One wonders if the last tree in a long line of cypresses in the background, which floats into the air, is being carried away by the strains of their song, or if this may be a reference Mrs. Bryce’s standing as an airplane pilot.[23] To the subject’s right are the figures of Don Quixote and Sancho Panza, from Cervantes’ famous book, another allusion to her deep love of the arts.”[24]
Mrs. Bryce was reputedly very fond of Dalí’s portrait, and hung it in the dining room of her home for some forty years. That said, her daughter Nuala Pell, the wife of Rhode Island Senator Claiborne Pell, found the work somewhat disturbing, and felt it conveyed a sternness incongruous with her mother’s character.[25] The family kept ties with Dalí, and for the opening of his short-lived, 7.4 million dollar Gallery of Modern Art he had built at 2 Columbus Circle in Manhattan in 1964, Huntington Hartford commissioned Dalí’s spectacular large-scale work The Discovery of America by Christopher Columbus.
Portrait of René Fribourg.
Date, technique and dimensions unknown. Private collection.
Date, technique and dimensions unknown. Private collection.
When René Fribourg, owner of America’s most valuable private collection of French antiques and art objects, died in 1963 one of the obituaries mentioned a portrait of him by Salvador Dalí [26]. Members of the Fribourg family did not respond to our request, but one of our readers [27] sent us an image of the unknown work.
René Eugene Fribourg, born in 1880 in Arlon in Belgium, developed the family grain trading business founded in 1813 into a multinational conglomerate by opening an office in Chicago in 1921, followed by another branch in New York. The Continental Grain Company remains one of the largest private companies in the world.
In the wake of the German invasion of Belgium and France in 1940 René and his elder brother Jules decided to leave Europe via Lisbon and escape to the United States after a tropical sojourn. When Jules died in 1944 René took over as chairman of the board, also serving as acting president until Jules‘ son Michel returned from active military duty.
In 1946 René Fribourg married Leah Kuba, the daughter of Russian immigrants, in Connecticut and filed for American citizenship. He devoted part of his wealth to his outstanding collection of European and Chinese porcelain and faience, paintings, drawings, boxes, objects d’art and furniture, which were sold by Sotheby & Co in eight sessions after his death in 1963.
René Eugene Fribourg, born in 1880 in Arlon in Belgium, developed the family grain trading business founded in 1813 into a multinational conglomerate by opening an office in Chicago in 1921, followed by another branch in New York. The Continental Grain Company remains one of the largest private companies in the world.
In the wake of the German invasion of Belgium and France in 1940 René and his elder brother Jules decided to leave Europe via Lisbon and escape to the United States after a tropical sojourn. When Jules died in 1944 René took over as chairman of the board, also serving as acting president until Jules‘ son Michel returned from active military duty.
In 1946 René Fribourg married Leah Kuba, the daughter of Russian immigrants, in Connecticut and filed for American citizenship. He devoted part of his wealth to his outstanding collection of European and Chinese porcelain and faience, paintings, drawings, boxes, objects d’art and furniture, which were sold by Sotheby & Co in eight sessions after his death in 1963.
In 1946, Fribourg purchased a huge whitestone mansion at 11 East 84th Street in Manhattan (today owned by the Bulgarian Government as its Permanent Mission to the United Nations), which became the scene of many Lucullan feasts with assorted Rockefellers, bankers, art experts, brokers, socialites and collectors as guests.
It is not clear how and when René Fribourg and Salvador Dalí first met, but it may have been in Paris in the 1930s. After World War II, both men commuted between New York and Europe and moved in the same social circles.
René Fribourg, a stout man of some 200 pounds, knew how to live, but when he developed gout in his later years had to give up Havana cigars, wine and some of the richest foods his guests continued to enjoy.
It is not clear how and when René Fribourg and Salvador Dalí first met, but it may have been in Paris in the 1930s. After World War II, both men commuted between New York and Europe and moved in the same social circles.
René Fribourg, a stout man of some 200 pounds, knew how to live, but when he developed gout in his later years had to give up Havana cigars, wine and some of the richest foods his guests continued to enjoy.
Salvador Dalí and Mrs. René Fribourg in April 1952 at the Waldorf Astoria.
The portrait may have been commissioned in 1950, when René Fribourg celebrated his 70th birthay, or in 1951, when Continental Grain celebrated it’s 30th anniversary in the United States. The classic painting shows the three-quarter-length portrait of Mr. Fribourg, wearing a long velvet smoking jacket in burgundy with black collar, covering his body and left hand, over a formal dark suit, a white shirt and tie. In his right hand he holds one of his 70 gold snuffboxes, what immediately brings to mind Dalí‘s Portrait of Ludmilla Arnhold. Unusually for Dalí the background is completely dark, with a halo visible behind his standing client, who looks down haughtily at us with raised eyebrows. The painter later chose a similar setting for his Portrait of Berthe David-Weill.
It is clear that the painting was not created to depict “the last tycoon“, as many of his friends called René Fribourg, but that it was intended to show the old connoisseur, bald and with a trimmed mustache, who spent more time on collecting than business.
Portrait of René Fribourg dominated the upstairs sitting room of the 84th Street mansion and was never publicly dispayed. It still belongs to the Fribourg family.
It is clear that the painting was not created to depict “the last tycoon“, as many of his friends called René Fribourg, but that it was intended to show the old connoisseur, bald and with a trimmed mustache, who spent more time on collecting than business.
Portrait of René Fribourg dominated the upstairs sitting room of the 84th Street mansion and was never publicly dispayed. It still belongs to the Fribourg family.
Portrait of Katharine Cornell, 1951.
Oil on cardboard, 101 x 76.2 cm.
The University of Buffalo Art Gallery.
Oil on cardboard, 101 x 76.2 cm.
The University of Buffalo Art Gallery.
The year after completing Portrait of Josephine Hartford Bryce, Dalí painted another woman in the arts, also in profile. This was American thespian Katharine Cornell (1893-1974), one of the most loved and revered Broadway actress of her epoch. Beautiful and extremely talented, her appearances are said to have affected audiences like few other performers of her day. This is perhaps best summed up by New York Times drama critic Brooks Atkinson, in a review of the 1931 Cornell vehicle, The Barretts of Wimpole Street, in which he writes, “By the crescendo of her playing, by the wild sensitivity that lurks behind her ardent gestures and her piercing stares across the footlights she charges the drama with a meaning beyond the facts it records. Her acting is quite as remarkable for the carefulness of its design as for the fire of her presence.”[28]
Cornell was born to American parents in Berlin, Germany, and grew up in Buffalo, New York, a city which honours her to this day. She was particularly revered by another notable Buffalonian, railroad industrialist Anson Conger Goodyear, who was born into a wealthy and socially prominent family. Deeply involved with the arts, he held a directorship at the nascent Albright-Knox Art Gallery in Buffalo, and was the first president of The Museum of Modern Art in New York.[29] Goodyear was a friend and admirer of Cornell’s, and decided to demonstrate his regard by commissioning Dalí to paint her portrait. While this has a whiff of romance about it, if Goodyear had designs upon the actress they were unlikely to be reciprocated, as it was widely understood that Cornell was attracted to women. Her biographers generally believe that her forty year union with husband Guthrie McClintic, the man who encouraged and managed her career, was what was known as a “lavender” marriage; that is, between two gay people for the sake of appearances.[30]
Cornell was born to American parents in Berlin, Germany, and grew up in Buffalo, New York, a city which honours her to this day. She was particularly revered by another notable Buffalonian, railroad industrialist Anson Conger Goodyear, who was born into a wealthy and socially prominent family. Deeply involved with the arts, he held a directorship at the nascent Albright-Knox Art Gallery in Buffalo, and was the first president of The Museum of Modern Art in New York.[29] Goodyear was a friend and admirer of Cornell’s, and decided to demonstrate his regard by commissioning Dalí to paint her portrait. While this has a whiff of romance about it, if Goodyear had designs upon the actress they were unlikely to be reciprocated, as it was widely understood that Cornell was attracted to women. Her biographers generally believe that her forty year union with husband Guthrie McClintic, the man who encouraged and managed her career, was what was known as a “lavender” marriage; that is, between two gay people for the sake of appearances.[30]
Photograph of Katherine Cornell, 1938. Photograph by Trude Fleischmann.
COVA-DAAV permission pending.
COVA-DAAV permission pending.
For the portrait, Dalí appears to have worked closely from a 1938 photograph of the actress, taken by Austrian-American photographer Trude Fleischmann. Using this work to form the profile, he chose to portray the actress in trompe l'oeil, with her profile discerned by the folds of the stage curtain, and the crown of her head outlined by a large boulder. As Cornell was fifty-eight when Dalí painted her, this abstract approach bypassed references to her age and lent a timeless quality to the work. Fluttering centre stage is a blue and black butterfly, a symbol of ephemeral beauty, while in the background the artist placed six cypress trees, similar to those in Portrait of Josephine Hartford Bryce. Dalí has infused other allusions to Cornell’s profession, in particular his use of green for the curtains, which may refer to one of Cornell’s most famous roles, in the 1925 play The Green Hat. Likewise the sensuous figure of a woman in red, who holds a crutch which resembles a sceptre or devil’s trident. Visual shorthand for a “wicked woman,” here Dalí likely references the subject’s seamier femme fatale roles in such melodramas such as The Letter (1927) and Dishonored Lady (1930).[31]
Records show that the work was delivered to Cornell’s Rockefeller Centre office on March 23, 1951, and a letter from Goodyear sent to a lawyer responsible for Dalí’s accounts in Monterey on May 4, 1951, states the price was $1,000. In it, the patron underscores his understanding that Dalí would contribute his fee to the American National Theatre and Academy (ANTA). Whether this was paid or not is unknown, as an irate letter sent to Dalí from the ANTA Fund Campaign seven months later queries why they still had not received the contribution.[32] Little else is known about Portrait of Katharine Cornell, although the actress reputedly did sit once for the artist, at the St. Regis Hotel in New York, and was apparently quite amused by the portrait.[33] It remains in Buffalo to this day, as part of the University of Buffalo Art Gallery holdings.
Records show that the work was delivered to Cornell’s Rockefeller Centre office on March 23, 1951, and a letter from Goodyear sent to a lawyer responsible for Dalí’s accounts in Monterey on May 4, 1951, states the price was $1,000. In it, the patron underscores his understanding that Dalí would contribute his fee to the American National Theatre and Academy (ANTA). Whether this was paid or not is unknown, as an irate letter sent to Dalí from the ANTA Fund Campaign seven months later queries why they still had not received the contribution.[32] Little else is known about Portrait of Katharine Cornell, although the actress reputedly did sit once for the artist, at the St. Regis Hotel in New York, and was apparently quite amused by the portrait.[33] It remains in Buffalo to this day, as part of the University of Buffalo Art Gallery holdings.
Portrait of Colonel Jack Warner, 1951.
Oil on canvas. 106.2 x 126.2 cm (41 13/16 x 49 11/16 in.).
Syracuse University Art Collection, Syracuse (New York).
Oil on canvas. 106.2 x 126.2 cm (41 13/16 x 49 11/16 in.).
Syracuse University Art Collection, Syracuse (New York).
A second portrait Dalí finished in 1951 was of film and TV mogul and producer Jack L. Warner (1892 - 1978), the husband of Ann Warner, whom the artist painted in 1944. As mentioned previously, the Dalís and the Warners became very friendly, and Gala and Dalí were frequent house guests at the Warner’s Beverly Hills mansion.
Jack Warner in the 1950s.
Like many of the artist’s American subjects, Jack’s life exemplifies the American Dream, having risen from humble beginnings to great wealth and influence in the entertainment industry. Born John Eichelbaum, to a Polish-Jewish immigrant family who later changed their name to Warner, they lived predominantly in the U.S. Jack was born during a brief stint in London, Ontario, in Canada. He grew up in Youngstown, Ohio with his numerous sisters and brothers, three of whom became interested in the emerging entertainment technology around moving pictures. After working on various projects, with brothers Harry, Albert, and Sam, Jack founded Warner Bros. Studios in 1918, and Warner Bros. Pictures in 1923, in Hollywood. Eventually Jack became the president and driving force behind Warner Bros. Studios. The company (a version of which is still in business today), has been one of the major players in film, television and recorded music throughout the 20th and so far into the 21st century. Most notably, in 1927 Warner Bros. released The Jazz Singer, the first motion picture with synchronized sound. They later produced numerous film classics such as Casablanca (1942) and A Streetcar Named Desire (1951). Today the company is perhaps most closely associated with the beloved Looney Toons cartoons, which brought to life characters such as Bugs Bunny and Porky Pig.[34]
Jack claimed that the “L” in Jack L. Warner stood for Leonard, although this was reputedly an affectation. His designation of colonel was authentic, although predominantly honorary as, like many other studio heads of the time, he was commissioned to the US Army Signal Corps during WWII.[35] Jack was known as a hard-headed and somewhat ruthless businessman, who frequently fought with his brothers and the stars on his roster. An irascible character in the eyes of many of his employees, he was also notorious for his bad jokes and awkward sense of humor.[36] This is perhaps hinted at in Dalí’s portrait, which is notable for Jack’s strained and artificial “Hollywood” smile.
Jack claimed that the “L” in Jack L. Warner stood for Leonard, although this was reputedly an affectation. His designation of colonel was authentic, although predominantly honorary as, like many other studio heads of the time, he was commissioned to the US Army Signal Corps during WWII.[35] Jack was known as a hard-headed and somewhat ruthless businessman, who frequently fought with his brothers and the stars on his roster. An irascible character in the eyes of many of his employees, he was also notorious for his bad jokes and awkward sense of humor.[36] This is perhaps hinted at in Dalí’s portrait, which is notable for Jack’s strained and artificial “Hollywood” smile.
The Warner Angelo Drive estate in Hollywood California, before it was bought by Amazon billionaire Jeff Bezos in 2020.
The background of Dalí's portrait of Jack Warner references this vista.
The background of Dalí's portrait of Jack Warner references this vista.
Also notable is the background of the painting, which strays noticeably from Dalí’s habitual Cadaqués-inspired seascapes. Instead, the artist has taken for inspiration the classically-inspired entranceway to Warner’s opulent Angelo Drive mansion in Beverly Hills. This nine-acre estate, which Warner had built between 1926 and 1937, featured a neoclassical mansion designed by architect Roland E. Coate, with richly opulent interiors by William Haines, and expertly-planned grounds designed by Florence Yoch. Among other extravagances, the estate featured a nine-hole golf course, a tennis court, a nursery, three hothouses, and an automobile court complete with its own body shop and gas pumps. Inside were grand halls, a massive dining room, an in-house movie theatre, and of course a substantial swimming pool.[37] In the background of the portrait, the artist has attempted to capture the essence of this lavish dwelling, interpreting, with a Renaissance twist, the tall white pillars on the front of the mansion, as well as the elegant round fountain at the entranceway. In keeping with Dalí's “classic” style of the period, instead of depicting the mogul at his desk — an authoritative station at which Warner was invariably photographed for publicity purposes — Dalí placed him, film script in hand, in front of an ancient stone sarcophagus. In the immediate foreground is Warner's beloved black schnauzer Dragon, who looks attentively to the right.
Portrait of Colonel Jack Warner apparently took five years to complete. The commission was begun in 1946, two years after Portrait of Mrs. Jack Warner was completed. At this time Dalí had also commenced work at Walt Disney Animation Studios in Burbank, California on a cartoon entitled Destino, although the project was not brought to fruition at that time. During this period, Dalí and Gala were frequent guests at the Warners’ home, as Jack had acted as an intermediary on the Disney contract.[38] According to Warner, while the Dalís were visiting, the artist “would do several brilliant pen-and-ink sketches of my eyebrows, my moustache, and my little finger, then off he would go to his beloved Spain. This went on for all those years.”[39] Not until three years had passed, and after Dalí took hundreds of sketches, was work on the canvas begun in earnest.
Letters from Warner to the artist show that in addition to sketches, Dalí also worked from photographs. In April of 1949, for example, Warner wrote of a photo in which he was “enclosing the picture of Dragon in the very pose you wanted – and with his ears up!”[40] A month later he wrote “Enclosed please find the best hand movement I could do but please do not look at the face because it is not good. Am also sending you another picture where I have a smile . . .”[41] By 1951 Warner had apparently seen the work and was unhappy with the treatment of the hands, writing “I know you will correct anything you have in mind such as making one hand more flesh coloured. On close examination, my left hand which holds the scenario seems to be a little too large. I think the whole hand in itself is too large but, of course, you are the best judge.”[42]
Portrait of Colonel Jack Warner apparently took five years to complete. The commission was begun in 1946, two years after Portrait of Mrs. Jack Warner was completed. At this time Dalí had also commenced work at Walt Disney Animation Studios in Burbank, California on a cartoon entitled Destino, although the project was not brought to fruition at that time. During this period, Dalí and Gala were frequent guests at the Warners’ home, as Jack had acted as an intermediary on the Disney contract.[38] According to Warner, while the Dalís were visiting, the artist “would do several brilliant pen-and-ink sketches of my eyebrows, my moustache, and my little finger, then off he would go to his beloved Spain. This went on for all those years.”[39] Not until three years had passed, and after Dalí took hundreds of sketches, was work on the canvas begun in earnest.
Letters from Warner to the artist show that in addition to sketches, Dalí also worked from photographs. In April of 1949, for example, Warner wrote of a photo in which he was “enclosing the picture of Dragon in the very pose you wanted – and with his ears up!”[40] A month later he wrote “Enclosed please find the best hand movement I could do but please do not look at the face because it is not good. Am also sending you another picture where I have a smile . . .”[41] By 1951 Warner had apparently seen the work and was unhappy with the treatment of the hands, writing “I know you will correct anything you have in mind such as making one hand more flesh coloured. On close examination, my left hand which holds the scenario seems to be a little too large. I think the whole hand in itself is too large but, of course, you are the best judge.”[42]
Colonel Jack L. Warner, without his usual moustache, at his business desk.
In the last recorded letter regarding the work, dated April 9, 1952, Warner had finally seen the finished project, and wrote the following: “When I came home last night there was my portrait. As you say ‘very sensational.’ I say the same.”[43] Despite this positive note, however, Warner apparently did not like the painting, and his biography, written in part by his brother’s granddaughter Cass Warner Sperling, revealed that “neither did anyone else, as it didn’t look like a Dalí work.”[44] Perhaps the ultimate condemnation was the fact that Warner decided it was not worthy of being hung in his mansion, relegating it to his kennels, presumably to be enjoyed by his beloved Dragon.[45]
Although at first glance the work appears compelling and cheerful — at least compared to the listless and melancholic portrait of Ann Warner — there are indeed some aspects of the work that are awkward, if not outright insulting to its sitter. As Dalí made no attempts at Surrealist rendering, and appears to have aimed for verisimilitude, his technical shortcomings cannot easily be overlooked. Beyond Warner's gleaming Cheshire Cat grin, it is clear that, as Warner pointed out himself, the hands are poorly rendered. His left hand, while farther away, is indeed noticeably larger than his right, which itself is unconvincingly foreshortened, flat and oddly-hued. Another problem is that in transforming Warner’s oak desk into a solid granite sarcophagus, the artist has left no room for where the subject’s legs would be. As a result, disembodied top half of Warner's body appears to hover over the stone slab, which itself incongruously disappears behind Dragon's head, no doubt to leave room for the view of the Warner mansion behind. This posture would be more convincing if Warner were standing, but it is clear that, evinced by his unflatteringly rendered jacket straining at its single button, he is seated.
What was possibly the most damning aspect of the work concerns the depiction of the red carnation, placed at a distance from Jack and ready to topple from the edge of the crypt/desk. As has been discussed, Dalí was a great enthusiast of flower and plant symbolism in his work. The red carnation appears frequently in his portraits, following a tradition that went back to early Renaissance portraiture.[46] As in Portrait of Mitzi Sigall (1948) or Portrait of Josephine Hartford Bryce (1950), he appears to draw on the traditional attribute of this flower as a reflection of pure love and the bonds of affection. Considering the Dalís spent long periods of time staying with Ann and Jack Warner, they could hardly avoid noticing that the California couple’s marriage had been strained beyond limits by the early 1950s, when the portrait of Jack was completed. As early as 1941 the Warners had separated, allegedly as a result of one of Ann’s affairs, but they never filed for divorce and remained married, if only to live separate lives under the same roof.[47] Jack was in fact a notorious womanizer, and in the 1950s and ‘60s he kept a series of mistresses. It is not known if he twigged to the meaning of Dalí’s crimson carnation in the context of his portrait, although it is hard to miss: the token of true conjugal love, placed desolately at the other end of the table from Warner, and just on the cusp of a fall.
Although at first glance the work appears compelling and cheerful — at least compared to the listless and melancholic portrait of Ann Warner — there are indeed some aspects of the work that are awkward, if not outright insulting to its sitter. As Dalí made no attempts at Surrealist rendering, and appears to have aimed for verisimilitude, his technical shortcomings cannot easily be overlooked. Beyond Warner's gleaming Cheshire Cat grin, it is clear that, as Warner pointed out himself, the hands are poorly rendered. His left hand, while farther away, is indeed noticeably larger than his right, which itself is unconvincingly foreshortened, flat and oddly-hued. Another problem is that in transforming Warner’s oak desk into a solid granite sarcophagus, the artist has left no room for where the subject’s legs would be. As a result, disembodied top half of Warner's body appears to hover over the stone slab, which itself incongruously disappears behind Dragon's head, no doubt to leave room for the view of the Warner mansion behind. This posture would be more convincing if Warner were standing, but it is clear that, evinced by his unflatteringly rendered jacket straining at its single button, he is seated.
What was possibly the most damning aspect of the work concerns the depiction of the red carnation, placed at a distance from Jack and ready to topple from the edge of the crypt/desk. As has been discussed, Dalí was a great enthusiast of flower and plant symbolism in his work. The red carnation appears frequently in his portraits, following a tradition that went back to early Renaissance portraiture.[46] As in Portrait of Mitzi Sigall (1948) or Portrait of Josephine Hartford Bryce (1950), he appears to draw on the traditional attribute of this flower as a reflection of pure love and the bonds of affection. Considering the Dalís spent long periods of time staying with Ann and Jack Warner, they could hardly avoid noticing that the California couple’s marriage had been strained beyond limits by the early 1950s, when the portrait of Jack was completed. As early as 1941 the Warners had separated, allegedly as a result of one of Ann’s affairs, but they never filed for divorce and remained married, if only to live separate lives under the same roof.[47] Jack was in fact a notorious womanizer, and in the 1950s and ‘60s he kept a series of mistresses. It is not known if he twigged to the meaning of Dalí’s crimson carnation in the context of his portrait, although it is hard to miss: the token of true conjugal love, placed desolately at the other end of the table from Warner, and just on the cusp of a fall.
Portrait of Frances Drexel Munn, 1952.
Oil on canvas, (53.3 x 66 cm.), 21” x 26”.
Family collection, with permission.
Oil on canvas, (53.3 x 66 cm.), 21” x 26”.
Family collection, with permission.
Dalí painted two very fine portraits in 1952, including one of his most elegant and traditional works, depicting American socialite Frances Drexel Munn (1917 – 2012). Frances was born in Radnor, Pennsylvania to a family as connected and distinguished as it was wealthy, and so top drawer as to be considered American “aristocracy.” Her father was Charles Alexander Munn of Chicago, and her mother, Mary Astor Paul of Pennsylvania, whose uncle was politician and newspaper publisher William Waldorf Astor, and whose grandfather was financier, banker and philanthropist Anthony J. Drexel. Otherwise known as “the man who made Wall Street,” Drexel was also the founder of Philadelphia’s Drexel University.[48] Frances’s sister Mary became distinguished as the Countess of Bessborough through her marriage to a viscount, and her great aunt Katharine Drexel founded the historically Black Roman Catholic Xavier University in Louisiana, and was canonized by the Catholic Church in 2000 as an American saint.[49]
Frances was raised in Philadelphia, in the grand Tudor Revival style Woodcrest mansion, designed by Horace Trumbauer and set on two acres of land which is now part of the Cabrini University campus. The family spent a good portion of their time in Paris, however, which was the setting for much of her childhood. They also kept a winter home in Palm Beach, Florida, in the elegant Spanish Colonial revival “millionaire’s cottage” Casa Amado, designed in 1920 by Addison Mizner, the famed Palm Beach “society” architect.[50]
In 1939 Frances married George F. Baker, Jr., whose grandfather and namesake had co-founded the First National Bank of the City of New York and was at one time one of the wealthiest men in the world. The couple had three children, but later divorced, and Frances subsequently married British film editor Peter Bezencenet. She spent much of her adult life in Paris and New York, and during the war she served as a Chief Nurses’ Aide at the New York Foundling Hospital.[51] Frances’s social circle in the United States consisted of a number of other members of the café society whom Dalí painted, including Mrs. Harrison Williams (aka Mona Bismark), C.Z. Guest, and Frances’s best friend, Rosemary Chisholm. Frances’s parents divorced, and in 1957 her father remarried to the “Sugar Heiress” Dorothy Spreckels, whom Dalí painted in 1942.
Frances was raised in Philadelphia, in the grand Tudor Revival style Woodcrest mansion, designed by Horace Trumbauer and set on two acres of land which is now part of the Cabrini University campus. The family spent a good portion of their time in Paris, however, which was the setting for much of her childhood. They also kept a winter home in Palm Beach, Florida, in the elegant Spanish Colonial revival “millionaire’s cottage” Casa Amado, designed in 1920 by Addison Mizner, the famed Palm Beach “society” architect.[50]
In 1939 Frances married George F. Baker, Jr., whose grandfather and namesake had co-founded the First National Bank of the City of New York and was at one time one of the wealthiest men in the world. The couple had three children, but later divorced, and Frances subsequently married British film editor Peter Bezencenet. She spent much of her adult life in Paris and New York, and during the war she served as a Chief Nurses’ Aide at the New York Foundling Hospital.[51] Frances’s social circle in the United States consisted of a number of other members of the café society whom Dalí painted, including Mrs. Harrison Williams (aka Mona Bismark), C.Z. Guest, and Frances’s best friend, Rosemary Chisholm. Frances’s parents divorced, and in 1957 her father remarried to the “Sugar Heiress” Dorothy Spreckels, whom Dalí painted in 1942.
Frances Drexel Munn (aka Mrs. George F. Baker, Jr) in her house on Centre Island, Oyster Bay, New York.
Vogue, October 15, 1948, page 114
Vogue, October 15, 1948, page 114
In an interview in 2015, Frances’s daughter Pauline Baker Pitt explained that considering her privileged upbringing, her mother had been duly spoilt, and was known to be somewhat “difficult.” She described her as very traditional, a lady who always had beautifully manicured hands and wore white gloves. Dalí’s portrait of a thirty-five year old Frances lends credence to this impression, and corresponds well with the formal portrait format he selected. In keeping with Dalí’s “classic” directives, the stiff, sideways half-length profile makes reference to Italian Renaissance portraits by artists such as Filippo Lippi and Domenico Ghirlandaio, as it did more literally with his Portrait of Josephine Hartford Bryce of 1950. A propos this Renaissance tradition, Dalí meticulously documents the sitter’s trappings of wealth, including her beautiful jewelry and fine clothing.
Dalí was a great admirer of the Dutch Baroque artist Gerrit Dou, and makes reference here to Dou’s trompe l’oeil effect of the painting as niche or window. Notably, while Dalí retains Dou’s architectural structure, in lieu of optical play, he opts instead to create a barrier between Frances and the viewer. This gives the impression of a distant and unapproachable character, further reinforced by her rigid posture, comically echoed in the poker-straight white carnation before her. Pauline explained that her mother had extremely good posture, and was forever instructing her daughter not to slouch. She also recalled that her mother was self-conscious about her nose, and that her husband teased her with the nickname “Biscis,” referring to proboscis, the Latin name for trunk or snout. Considering this, the choice of a profile view was a surprising one, especially as Dalí has noticeably highlighted the subject’s nose and mouth with a halo-like glow.[52]
In an interview in 2015, Frances’s daughter Pauline Baker Pitt explained that considering her privileged upbringing, her mother had been duly spoilt, and was known to be somewhat “difficult.” She described her as very traditional, a lady who always had beautifully manicured hands and wore white gloves. Dalí’s portrait of a thirty-five year old Frances lends credence to this impression, and corresponds well with the formal portrait format he selected. In keeping with Dalí’s “classic” directives, the stiff, sideways half-length profile makes reference to Italian Renaissance portraits by artists such as Filippo Lippi and Domenico Ghirlandaio, as it did more literally with his Portrait of Josephine Hartford Bryce of 1950. A propos this Renaissance tradition, Dalí meticulously documents the sitter’s trappings of wealth, including her beautiful jewelry and fine clothing.
Dalí was a great admirer of the Dutch Baroque artist Gerrit Dou, and makes reference here to Dou’s trompe l’oeil effect of the painting as niche or window. Notably, while Dalí retains Dou’s architectural structure, in lieu of optical play, he opts instead to create a barrier between Frances and the viewer. This gives the impression of a distant and unapproachable character, further reinforced by her rigid posture, comically echoed in the poker-straight white carnation before her. Pauline explained that her mother had extremely good posture, and was forever instructing her daughter not to slouch. She also recalled that her mother was self-conscious about her nose, and that her husband teased her with the nickname “Biscis,” referring to proboscis, the Latin name for trunk or snout. Considering this, the choice of a profile view was a surprising one, especially as Dalí has noticeably highlighted the subject’s nose and mouth with a halo-like glow.[52]
Gerrit Dou, The Dutch Housewife, 1650.
Oil on panel. Louvre, Paris.
Oil on panel. Louvre, Paris.
As in his portrait of Mrs. Bryce, Dalí returns here to the symbolism of the carnation. This was an apt choice, as Frances loved flowers, and kept a beautiful garden filled with carnations in a property they held at Centre Island, in Oyster Bay.[53] The detail of the second carnation, outside the window frame, is also highly suggestive in light of Dalí’s anthropomorphic tendencies, and the flower’s conventional association with love and marriage. While the carnation in front of Frances clearly mirrors the sitter, the second, prostrate and placed as if “peeking in” to the barrier-like window, might well suggest a lover or spouse. Considering the overall portrayal of Frances as detached and upright, one might say she was literally giving this “banished” blossom the cold shoulder. Frances’s marriage was in fact beginning to unravel at the time the portrait was painted, and the couple officially separated a few years later. Of note is Dalí’s choice of white for the flower, the cool colour of purity and virginity, rather than the traditional red he used to signify betrothal and passion.
Pauline revealed that she and her brother had always assumed the cracks in the wall to Frances’s left referred to their parents’ “crumbling” marriage. She also notes that – using Dalí’s own Paranoid Critical Method, wherein stains, clouds and amorphous matter suggest images in the mind’s eye – the crack on the bottom resembled their father’s profile, looking up, while in the one above, they saw the outline of their pet dog.[54] An equally curious detail is the way the artist has used light in this work. While Frances’s body has a luminous glow similar to that used for his goddess-like portrayal of Mona Bismarck, shadows indicate that the light source originates mid-distance to the left. While it leaves a long shaft of light along the bottom of the window sill, it creates a distinctly odd effect behind the sitter, as if the surface has been painted a creamy white two thirds of the way up.
In the portrait Frances wears a moss-green Mainbocher shoulder-strap evening dress with gold embroidery, a garment that shows her slender figure to advantage. Around her neck is a four-strand pearl necklace with a large teardrop pearl at the clasp. Her wing-shaped earrings are by her favorite jewelry designer, the chic Parisian Madame Belperron, and feature diamonds set in gold with a sapphire in the centre. While Dalí has chosen a minimal approach compared to other portraits of the period, the work is finely executed, with the artist taking extra care handling the clouds and the details on Frances’s dress. That is not to say that the client was particularly impressed by the painting however, and her daughter revealed that her mother was never partial to the work. Neither was her son, apparently, who found himself in possession of the portrait for some years, and hung it – to his mother’s annoyance – in a bedroom, behind the bathroom door.[55]
Pauline revealed that she and her brother had always assumed the cracks in the wall to Frances’s left referred to their parents’ “crumbling” marriage. She also notes that – using Dalí’s own Paranoid Critical Method, wherein stains, clouds and amorphous matter suggest images in the mind’s eye – the crack on the bottom resembled their father’s profile, looking up, while in the one above, they saw the outline of their pet dog.[54] An equally curious detail is the way the artist has used light in this work. While Frances’s body has a luminous glow similar to that used for his goddess-like portrayal of Mona Bismarck, shadows indicate that the light source originates mid-distance to the left. While it leaves a long shaft of light along the bottom of the window sill, it creates a distinctly odd effect behind the sitter, as if the surface has been painted a creamy white two thirds of the way up.
In the portrait Frances wears a moss-green Mainbocher shoulder-strap evening dress with gold embroidery, a garment that shows her slender figure to advantage. Around her neck is a four-strand pearl necklace with a large teardrop pearl at the clasp. Her wing-shaped earrings are by her favorite jewelry designer, the chic Parisian Madame Belperron, and feature diamonds set in gold with a sapphire in the centre. While Dalí has chosen a minimal approach compared to other portraits of the period, the work is finely executed, with the artist taking extra care handling the clouds and the details on Frances’s dress. That is not to say that the client was particularly impressed by the painting however, and her daughter revealed that her mother was never partial to the work. Neither was her son, apparently, who found himself in possession of the portrait for some years, and hung it – to his mother’s annoyance – in a bedroom, behind the bathroom door.[55]
Portrait of Berthe David-Weill, 1952.
Oil on canvas, 101.6 x 61 cm (40.15” x 24.01”).
The Metropolitan Museum of Art, Bequest of Berthe David-Weill, 1986.
Oil on canvas, 101.6 x 61 cm (40.15” x 24.01”).
The Metropolitan Museum of Art, Bequest of Berthe David-Weill, 1986.
Portrait of Berthe David-Weill, which Dalí executed in 1952, is something of a departure for the artist. It is his most conventional society portrait to date, with a straight forward-likeness, and except for a few eccentrically-placed roses, and a halo-like glow around the subject’s head, there is no further attempt to create a narrative, or to fill the canvas with attributes and objects of interest. For the most part, Dalí has simply painted his subject attired in an elegant frock and tasteful jewels, holding a finely-bound book in her carefully manicured hands.
This woman is Berthe David-Weill (1897-1985), born Berthe Haardt in Saint-Gilles-les-Bruxelles in Belgium. Her father, George-Marie Haardt, an explorer and art connoisseur, was also vice-president of Citroën Motor Works.[56] Berthe was married twice, and her first husband was Baron Marie Charles Napoleon Emile Gaillard, who came from an important French military family. They had one child, a boy named Jean. In 1932 Berthe wed investment banker Pierre David-Weill, with whom she had two children, Elaine and Michel. Pierre was born in Paris, and was the son of David David-Weill, a prolific and respected art collector, and Chairman of Lazard Frères, a powerful investment firm with branches in France and the US, which would become one of the world’s richest private financial empires. Pierre also worked for Lazard Frères, where he was a senior partner.[57]
Being a Jewish family, the impending war meant that living in Europe in the late 1930s was particularly dangerous, and the David-Weills had to leave Paris when the Germans occupied France. Like the Dalís, after a challenging time securing travel documents in Portugal, Pierre went to the Americas, where he took over the running of the New York City office of Lazard Frères. Berthe and the children remained in France while immigration papers where arranged, and during the last year of Nazi occupation, she and her two children by Pierre had to hide in the French south-western village of Béduer. Berthe’s son from her first marriage, Jean Gaillard, was a member of the France Libre resistance. He was captured by the Nazis towards the end of the war and forced to dig tunnels in the Mittelbau-Dora concentration camp in central Germany. Very ill, he was then transferred north to Ravensbrück, where he died shortly after arrival. Berthe and her other children eventually made it to New York to live with Pierre, who remained primarily in the US until 1958.[58]
In France Pierre had been a keen art patron, and unlike his father’s traditional tastes, he favoured Art Deco and patronized and collected moderns of his time, such as Picasso, Matisse, as well as Masson and other Surrealists.[59] As such, it is likely the David-Weills knew Dalí and Gala from Paris before the war. In the U.S., they remained connected to the world of art and culture. Berthe became a fixture of New York high society, often seen at élite social functions and having her elegant, art-filled home featured in magazines such as House & Garden. A lover of good taste and fine aesthetics, it was said she “epitomized the refined Frenchwoman.” As claimed an acquaintance, “She served only pink champagne because it was more beautiful,” adding that “David-Weill had many attractions.”[60]
Those attractions did not escape the notice of Theodore Rousseau Jr, Vice Director and Curator of European Art at New York’s Metropolitan Museum of Art. A handsome, dashing individual born in the U.S. of French lineage, his international education included Eton, the Sorbonne and Harvard, where he focused primarily on the arts. During the war Rousseau joined the Navy, serving in intelligence as the assistant attaché to the American Ambassador to Portugal and Spain. He was later transferred to the Art Looting Investigation Unit of the Office of Strategic Services (OSS), where he interviewed those responsible for the Nazi’s theft of art for Germany.[61] He also worked with the French Resistance, which is how he met Berthe. It was his rueful task to inform her that her son had died at Ravensbrück, a tragedy from which she would never fully recover. Although Berthe was fifteen years Rousseau’s senior, they formed a deep bond and became lovers.[62] Rousseau had briefly been married, but after his divorce he remained a bachelor, and a rather notorious womanizer. Berthe, however, was his closest companion and although married to Pierre, they were well known as a couple among New York’s beau monde. Indeed, after falling into a coma brought on by inoperable stomach cancer, it was in Berthe’s bed that Rousseau died.[63]
The close bond between Rousseau and Berthe may explain some of the style and content of Dalí’s portrait. While the circumstances of the commission are not known, it is clear that instead of his recent Renaissance and classical references, this canvas evokes the style of fellow Spaniard Goya’s society portraits including works such as Wife of Juan Agustín Ceán Bermúdez, circa 1785, or La Condesa de Chinchón, circa 1800. Dalí’s use of the richly-dressed subject’s sideways pose, her direct address to the viewer, and specifically, the stark near-black background, all evoke Goya.
Rousseau was in fact particularly interested in Goya around the time the portrait was painted. This culminated in 1955, when he was involved with the Met’s taking on a major travelling exhibition of two hundred and eighty-three of Goya’s works from the Prado and Lazaro Galdiano museums, a show which was held at the Met in May of 1955. Entitled Goya: Prints and Drawings, the Met also added a number of works, including twenty-eight paintings from their own holdings and other American collections. As the curator of European art, it would have been Rousseau’s task to procure these for the Goya showcase.[64] In the press release for the exhibition, Rousseau focuses specifically Goya’s portraiture, and claims, Goya’s biting critical estimates of the people he portrayed did not lessen the demand for portraits, and he was official painter to three kings of Spain. He was an excellent graphic reporter, commentator and satirist. Even today, more than a century after his death, Goya speaks directly and compellingly to the present generation, because he understood humanity and was intensely democratic.[65]
This woman is Berthe David-Weill (1897-1985), born Berthe Haardt in Saint-Gilles-les-Bruxelles in Belgium. Her father, George-Marie Haardt, an explorer and art connoisseur, was also vice-president of Citroën Motor Works.[56] Berthe was married twice, and her first husband was Baron Marie Charles Napoleon Emile Gaillard, who came from an important French military family. They had one child, a boy named Jean. In 1932 Berthe wed investment banker Pierre David-Weill, with whom she had two children, Elaine and Michel. Pierre was born in Paris, and was the son of David David-Weill, a prolific and respected art collector, and Chairman of Lazard Frères, a powerful investment firm with branches in France and the US, which would become one of the world’s richest private financial empires. Pierre also worked for Lazard Frères, where he was a senior partner.[57]
Being a Jewish family, the impending war meant that living in Europe in the late 1930s was particularly dangerous, and the David-Weills had to leave Paris when the Germans occupied France. Like the Dalís, after a challenging time securing travel documents in Portugal, Pierre went to the Americas, where he took over the running of the New York City office of Lazard Frères. Berthe and the children remained in France while immigration papers where arranged, and during the last year of Nazi occupation, she and her two children by Pierre had to hide in the French south-western village of Béduer. Berthe’s son from her first marriage, Jean Gaillard, was a member of the France Libre resistance. He was captured by the Nazis towards the end of the war and forced to dig tunnels in the Mittelbau-Dora concentration camp in central Germany. Very ill, he was then transferred north to Ravensbrück, where he died shortly after arrival. Berthe and her other children eventually made it to New York to live with Pierre, who remained primarily in the US until 1958.[58]
In France Pierre had been a keen art patron, and unlike his father’s traditional tastes, he favoured Art Deco and patronized and collected moderns of his time, such as Picasso, Matisse, as well as Masson and other Surrealists.[59] As such, it is likely the David-Weills knew Dalí and Gala from Paris before the war. In the U.S., they remained connected to the world of art and culture. Berthe became a fixture of New York high society, often seen at élite social functions and having her elegant, art-filled home featured in magazines such as House & Garden. A lover of good taste and fine aesthetics, it was said she “epitomized the refined Frenchwoman.” As claimed an acquaintance, “She served only pink champagne because it was more beautiful,” adding that “David-Weill had many attractions.”[60]
Those attractions did not escape the notice of Theodore Rousseau Jr, Vice Director and Curator of European Art at New York’s Metropolitan Museum of Art. A handsome, dashing individual born in the U.S. of French lineage, his international education included Eton, the Sorbonne and Harvard, where he focused primarily on the arts. During the war Rousseau joined the Navy, serving in intelligence as the assistant attaché to the American Ambassador to Portugal and Spain. He was later transferred to the Art Looting Investigation Unit of the Office of Strategic Services (OSS), where he interviewed those responsible for the Nazi’s theft of art for Germany.[61] He also worked with the French Resistance, which is how he met Berthe. It was his rueful task to inform her that her son had died at Ravensbrück, a tragedy from which she would never fully recover. Although Berthe was fifteen years Rousseau’s senior, they formed a deep bond and became lovers.[62] Rousseau had briefly been married, but after his divorce he remained a bachelor, and a rather notorious womanizer. Berthe, however, was his closest companion and although married to Pierre, they were well known as a couple among New York’s beau monde. Indeed, after falling into a coma brought on by inoperable stomach cancer, it was in Berthe’s bed that Rousseau died.[63]
The close bond between Rousseau and Berthe may explain some of the style and content of Dalí’s portrait. While the circumstances of the commission are not known, it is clear that instead of his recent Renaissance and classical references, this canvas evokes the style of fellow Spaniard Goya’s society portraits including works such as Wife of Juan Agustín Ceán Bermúdez, circa 1785, or La Condesa de Chinchón, circa 1800. Dalí’s use of the richly-dressed subject’s sideways pose, her direct address to the viewer, and specifically, the stark near-black background, all evoke Goya.
Rousseau was in fact particularly interested in Goya around the time the portrait was painted. This culminated in 1955, when he was involved with the Met’s taking on a major travelling exhibition of two hundred and eighty-three of Goya’s works from the Prado and Lazaro Galdiano museums, a show which was held at the Met in May of 1955. Entitled Goya: Prints and Drawings, the Met also added a number of works, including twenty-eight paintings from their own holdings and other American collections. As the curator of European art, it would have been Rousseau’s task to procure these for the Goya showcase.[64] In the press release for the exhibition, Rousseau focuses specifically Goya’s portraiture, and claims, Goya’s biting critical estimates of the people he portrayed did not lessen the demand for portraits, and he was official painter to three kings of Spain. He was an excellent graphic reporter, commentator and satirist. Even today, more than a century after his death, Goya speaks directly and compellingly to the present generation, because he understood humanity and was intensely democratic.[65]
Francisco Goya, Wife of Juan Agustín Ceán Bermúdez, c.1785.
Oil on canvas, Szépművészeti Múzeum, Budapest, Hungary.
Oil on canvas, Szépművészeti Múzeum, Budapest, Hungary.
Like Goya, Dalí was also capable of producing biting critical estimates of his patrons, and as we know, he was also an excellent commentator and satirist. Whether or not Rousseau shared this view of Dalí’s work remains speculation, however. That said, it is possible that the couple suggested a Goyaesque approach, or that Dalí chose to reference the Spanish artist in homage to Berthe’s lover’s interest in the artist. What is certain is, that compared to most of Dalí’s other commissions, Portrait of Berthe David-Weill is decidedly flattering. Forever the opportunist, it was not in his best interest to do anything to offend Rousseau, who was one of the most influential men in the American art world. Indeed, in contrast to some of his more cutting and caricatural portraits, Dalí seems to have taken great pains to make the subject as appealing as possible. Most notably, he includes the sensuous detail of a dress strap slipped off one milky shoulder – a convention in portraits of mistresses. He also crowns Berthe with a golden halo, and beside her face places a levitating rose, no doubt to indicate that this fifty-five year old woman was still very much in bloom. Dalí further reinforces this language of flowers with two roses springing from the carpet as if paying homage at her feet: one reflecting the hue of her pale blue dress, the other, the ivory of her skin.
In addition to possibly influencing Dalí’s Goya-esque approach to the portrait, it is also likely Rousseau had a hand in Berthe’s bequeathing her portrait to the Met, where it has become part of the institution’s permanent collection. Michael Gross, author of Rogues’ Gallery: The Secret Story of the Lust, Lies, Greed, and Betrayals That Made the Metropolitan Museum of Art, describes Rousseau as notoriously good-looking and suave, and claims he was “the curator in charge of charming women donors to the museum.”[66] This was a task he performed admirably, and his active courting of wealthy society matrons resulted in many important gifts and bequests to the Met, including such prize acquisitions as Georges de la Tour's Fortune Teller in 1960, and Rembrandt's Aristotle Contemplating the Bust of Homer in 1961.[67]
In addition to her portrait, Berthe made another donation to the Met in 1975, now held in the Costume Institute. This is a version of the elegant dress she wears in the portrait, which was from Christian Dior’s 1948–49 Fall/Winter collection. Called Tourterelle (French for “turtledove”), the original was made of changeant pale blue and mauve taffeta, meaning that it appeared to subtly change colour while moving in the light, a two-tone effect that Dalí catches admirably in his painting. According to Richard Martin and Harold Koda, the curators of a show on Dior held at the Met in 1996-97, the dress Berthe bequeathed is a later version, as the labels inside reads “Dior, Spring/Summer, 1957.”[68] It seems she liked the blue one so much that she had another made up later in pink silk taffeta.
In addition to possibly influencing Dalí’s Goya-esque approach to the portrait, it is also likely Rousseau had a hand in Berthe’s bequeathing her portrait to the Met, where it has become part of the institution’s permanent collection. Michael Gross, author of Rogues’ Gallery: The Secret Story of the Lust, Lies, Greed, and Betrayals That Made the Metropolitan Museum of Art, describes Rousseau as notoriously good-looking and suave, and claims he was “the curator in charge of charming women donors to the museum.”[66] This was a task he performed admirably, and his active courting of wealthy society matrons resulted in many important gifts and bequests to the Met, including such prize acquisitions as Georges de la Tour's Fortune Teller in 1960, and Rembrandt's Aristotle Contemplating the Bust of Homer in 1961.[67]
In addition to her portrait, Berthe made another donation to the Met in 1975, now held in the Costume Institute. This is a version of the elegant dress she wears in the portrait, which was from Christian Dior’s 1948–49 Fall/Winter collection. Called Tourterelle (French for “turtledove”), the original was made of changeant pale blue and mauve taffeta, meaning that it appeared to subtly change colour while moving in the light, a two-tone effect that Dalí catches admirably in his painting. According to Richard Martin and Harold Koda, the curators of a show on Dior held at the Met in 1996-97, the dress Berthe bequeathed is a later version, as the labels inside reads “Dior, Spring/Summer, 1957.”[68] It seems she liked the blue one so much that she had another made up later in pink silk taffeta.
Tourterelle, House of Dior by Christian Dior, Fall/Winter collection, 1948–49, fabricated 1957. Silk taffeta.
Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York.
Donated by Berthe David-Weill, 1975.
Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York.
Donated by Berthe David-Weill, 1975.
Portrait of Ann Woodward, 1953.
Oil on canvas, 85.7 x 61 cm (33.74” x 24.02”).
Morohashi Museum of Modern Art, Fukushima (Japan).
Oil on canvas, 85.7 x 61 cm (33.74” x 24.02”).
Morohashi Museum of Modern Art, Fukushima (Japan).
While few people -- other than Berthe’s husband perhaps -- could find fault with Dali’s lovely portrait of this Frenchwoman, one of his most scathing and notorious portraits was painted the following year. The work was to gain widespread media attention on two separate occasions, on account of the character and actions of its subject. This was of former showgirl and socialite, Ann Woodward (1915-1975), who was born in Pittsburgh, Kansas, and grew up in humble circumstances. Before marriage, Woodward went by her given name of Evangeline Crowell. Hoping to establish a career in the entertainment industry, as a young woman she moved to Kansas City, and changed her name to a more Hollywood-friendly Ann Eden. Next stop was New York City, where she began modelling at the John Robert Powers agency, as well as taking on small acting roles, and work in radio. In 1940 she even won the ironic title of “The Most Beautiful Girl in Radio”.[69] Ann also worked as a showgirl, and it was at one of New York’s most exclusive nightclubs, FeFe’s Monte Carlo, that she met the wealthy William Woodward, Sr. This gentleman was heir to the Hanover National Bank fortune, and owned the Belair Stud Farm in Maryland, famous for producing some of America’s greatest thoroughbred racehorses. Rumour had it that Ann was William’s mistress, until she was “passed on” to his son, “Billy” Woodward, Jr.[70]
A blue blood clan that occasionally hobnobbed with European royalty, Billy’s family was duly shocked when he married showgirl Ann in 1943. Although their union produced two sons, it was reputedly tumultuous, with infidelities on both sides. In 1947, Billy reportedly asked his wife for a divorce, but she declined, apparently due to her social aspirations and desire for respectability, not to mention enjoying a luxurious lifestyle.[71] Despite her modest beginnings, Ann did manage a certain social standing, which she evidently wished to reflect in the portrait she and her husband commissioned Dali to paint.
How the commission was secured is unknown, but it has been recorded that for about one year, Woodward posed sporadically for Dalí in a New York hotel, most likely the St. Regis. As was typical of Dalí’s working method, Mrs. Woodward claimed never to have been given the opportunity to see the work before it was delivered.[72] When she finally did, her reaction was so adverse that it was written up and syndicated in newspapers across the country. "Her husband William" one article went, "said she took one look at the finished product and walked away 'scared' ... like walking away from a monster.". [73] Woodward subsequently explained, in less alarming language, that she had wanted a portrait that was suitable for her young sons, and Dalí’s version was a far cry from what she had in mind.[74]
A blue blood clan that occasionally hobnobbed with European royalty, Billy’s family was duly shocked when he married showgirl Ann in 1943. Although their union produced two sons, it was reputedly tumultuous, with infidelities on both sides. In 1947, Billy reportedly asked his wife for a divorce, but she declined, apparently due to her social aspirations and desire for respectability, not to mention enjoying a luxurious lifestyle.[71] Despite her modest beginnings, Ann did manage a certain social standing, which she evidently wished to reflect in the portrait she and her husband commissioned Dali to paint.
How the commission was secured is unknown, but it has been recorded that for about one year, Woodward posed sporadically for Dalí in a New York hotel, most likely the St. Regis. As was typical of Dalí’s working method, Mrs. Woodward claimed never to have been given the opportunity to see the work before it was delivered.[72] When she finally did, her reaction was so adverse that it was written up and syndicated in newspapers across the country. "Her husband William" one article went, "said she took one look at the finished product and walked away 'scared' ... like walking away from a monster.". [73] Woodward subsequently explained, in less alarming language, that she had wanted a portrait that was suitable for her young sons, and Dalí’s version was a far cry from what she had in mind.[74]
“HER DALÍ NO DILLY?” Syndicated newspaper article discussing the lawsuit over Portrait of Ann Woodward,
The Brooklyn Eagle, Wednesday, August 25, 1954.
The Brooklyn Eagle, Wednesday, August 25, 1954.
Ann’s reaction was newsworthy because the Woodwards refused to pay for the work, which resulted in Dalí initiating a lawsuit in the Manhattan Supreme Court for the $7,000 fee owing. Dalí’s measures worked, and the media attention resulted in the Woodwards eventual capitulation.[75] In his published journal, Reynolds Morse wrote that “The papers were by this time really hot after a reproduction of the allegedly scandalous portrait, but Mrs. Woodward would not give it to them. Dalí refused their request on the gentlemanly grounds that she had bought and owned the picture, and that he did not have the right to give it out.” According to Morse, “This of course helped Dalí to establish the fact that the picture was legally Mrs. Woodward’s.”[76] Notably, when Morse later managed to catch a glimpse of the work, he thought that it “proved to be one of his best efforts” despite the fact that “the woman looked like what she more than likely was: a very pretty but perhaps somewhat common second wife who might have been a night club hostess she looked so much the type.”[77] If this was the case, what did Morse not see that caused Mrs. Woodward’s instant and visceral reaction to her likeness?
Examining the portrait closely, the first objection was surely Mrs. Woodward’s carriage. Instead of an elegant and graceful pose typical of society portraits the period, she leans seductively against the side of the large rock formation behind her. Directly facing the viewer, she has one eyebrow raised in a manner that can only be described as a “come hither” expression. Her hair is tousled enough to suggest that she has just enjoyed a tryst, corroborated by her white gown, which upon closer inspection appears to be made of a rumpled bed sheet that has been wantonly rolled and wrapped around her upper body. Further suggesting dishabille, the blue sash around her waist unravels and transforms into the shoreline in the background. All these elements denote wanton sexuality, and that a state of semi-dress was an integral and natural part of Mrs. Woodward’s character.
Walking along the beach is a fisherman with a net, possibly a reference to views of her as as having "caught" herself a rich man. Worst of all, however, is Dalí’s crude and cruel use of what might loosely be termed Freudian imagery. With the rock formation behind Ann outlining her silhouette, and the inverted triangular hole above her, beneath a precariously-placed rock, a theme emerges. This becomes more defined as the eye falls to the conspicuous, oddly-propped shell in the sand, placed so the orifice resembles a woman’s most private parts. Finally, and perhaps most damningly, this shape is repeated once again, in the pose of Mrs. Woodward’s right hand, which forms a similar opening between her thumb and middle finger. This was evidently to imply what awaited beneath the rumpled bed sheet of her dress. In no uncertain terms, Dalí was suggesting that Mrs. Woodward was “open for business.”
While Dalí typically kept jibes or caricatures of his subjects subtle enough to beg the question as to whether or not they were intentional, in this case, he pushed them to the point of provocation and insult. Regrettably, there appear to be no existing records documenting the artist’s comments on the subject, except for a quotation (including amusing alliterative spelling) which Morse documented in his journal. “Myself” Dalí apparently told him, “is theenk thees woman is theenk she is prettier than she is!”[78]
The portrait fiasco was not to be the end of scandal for Ann Woodward, it seems, and two years after the work was painted, her name once again appeared in the news; this time, for murder. It all began the night of October 30th, 1955, when Billy and Ann had returned home to their weekend retreat in the New York State town of Oyster Bay, after attending a dinner party held in honour of none other than Wallis Simpson, the Duchess of Windsor. As there had been reports in the news of break-ins in the area, Ann and Bill went to their separate bedrooms packing their respective firearms. As recounted, Ann was awakened by sounds she thought were made by an intruder, and subsequently fired two shots in the direction of a shadow in her doorway. Unfortunately, the “intruder” turned out to be her husband, who was killed instantly.
Woodward was tried for murder in Nassau County, but was acquitted when the jury deemed the shooting accidental. Already famous for the Dalí scandal, the murder – by a beautiful, wealthy socialite with a shady past — was naturally front-page news. So much so that Life magazine billed the incident as “The Shooting of the Century.”[79] Morse recalls that “Dalí was delighted with the typical way the headlines came through at the time of the murder – something like ‘Woman who had portrait painted by Dalí kills husband!’ The publicity from the portrait suit . . . and the murder, Dalí said resulted in phenomenal business for him.”[80]
Things did not turn out as well for Mrs. Woodward, who was instantly cut from the social circles she had laboured so diligently to impress, and whose life was further marked by tragedy. Both Ann’s sons committed suicide, as eventually, did she. Ann’s demise was apparently precipitated by a chapter written by Truman Capote for his upcoming novel Answered Prayers, which was published in Esquire in November 1975. In it, he wrote scathing descriptions of a number of high profile New York society matrons, who appeared thinly disguised as fictional characters. Ann Woodward, whom Capote names Ann Cutler in the book, is painted as a former call girl and gold-digger, while the killing of her husband was portrayed as decidedly pre-meditated. It is believed that Woodward read the relevant excerpt from the book a few days before it was published, and was so devastated at the prospect of yet more scandal, that she swallowed cyanide.[81]
Billy’s mother Elsie Woodward apparently never believed Ann should have been acquitted for the murder of her son, and after Ann’s death is recorded as having stated sardonically, “Well, that’s that. She shot my son, and Truman just murdered her, and so now I suppose we don’t have to worry about that anymore.”[82] That said, the story of Ann Woodward continued to fascinate the public, spurred on by a sensational 1992 non-fiction book This Crazy Thing Called Love by Susan Braudy and, in 1985 a novel by Dominick Dunne, which later became a TV series entitled The Two Mrs. Grenvilles, starring Ann-Margret as Ann Woodward.[83] Dalí’s portrait of the lovely but unlucky Ann Woodward was hidden away for years. In the year 2000 it was quietly sold off, and is now owned by the Morohashi Museum of Modern Art, in Fukushima Japan. It was not publicly exhibited until 2009.
Examining the portrait closely, the first objection was surely Mrs. Woodward’s carriage. Instead of an elegant and graceful pose typical of society portraits the period, she leans seductively against the side of the large rock formation behind her. Directly facing the viewer, she has one eyebrow raised in a manner that can only be described as a “come hither” expression. Her hair is tousled enough to suggest that she has just enjoyed a tryst, corroborated by her white gown, which upon closer inspection appears to be made of a rumpled bed sheet that has been wantonly rolled and wrapped around her upper body. Further suggesting dishabille, the blue sash around her waist unravels and transforms into the shoreline in the background. All these elements denote wanton sexuality, and that a state of semi-dress was an integral and natural part of Mrs. Woodward’s character.
Walking along the beach is a fisherman with a net, possibly a reference to views of her as as having "caught" herself a rich man. Worst of all, however, is Dalí’s crude and cruel use of what might loosely be termed Freudian imagery. With the rock formation behind Ann outlining her silhouette, and the inverted triangular hole above her, beneath a precariously-placed rock, a theme emerges. This becomes more defined as the eye falls to the conspicuous, oddly-propped shell in the sand, placed so the orifice resembles a woman’s most private parts. Finally, and perhaps most damningly, this shape is repeated once again, in the pose of Mrs. Woodward’s right hand, which forms a similar opening between her thumb and middle finger. This was evidently to imply what awaited beneath the rumpled bed sheet of her dress. In no uncertain terms, Dalí was suggesting that Mrs. Woodward was “open for business.”
While Dalí typically kept jibes or caricatures of his subjects subtle enough to beg the question as to whether or not they were intentional, in this case, he pushed them to the point of provocation and insult. Regrettably, there appear to be no existing records documenting the artist’s comments on the subject, except for a quotation (including amusing alliterative spelling) which Morse documented in his journal. “Myself” Dalí apparently told him, “is theenk thees woman is theenk she is prettier than she is!”[78]
The portrait fiasco was not to be the end of scandal for Ann Woodward, it seems, and two years after the work was painted, her name once again appeared in the news; this time, for murder. It all began the night of October 30th, 1955, when Billy and Ann had returned home to their weekend retreat in the New York State town of Oyster Bay, after attending a dinner party held in honour of none other than Wallis Simpson, the Duchess of Windsor. As there had been reports in the news of break-ins in the area, Ann and Bill went to their separate bedrooms packing their respective firearms. As recounted, Ann was awakened by sounds she thought were made by an intruder, and subsequently fired two shots in the direction of a shadow in her doorway. Unfortunately, the “intruder” turned out to be her husband, who was killed instantly.
Woodward was tried for murder in Nassau County, but was acquitted when the jury deemed the shooting accidental. Already famous for the Dalí scandal, the murder – by a beautiful, wealthy socialite with a shady past — was naturally front-page news. So much so that Life magazine billed the incident as “The Shooting of the Century.”[79] Morse recalls that “Dalí was delighted with the typical way the headlines came through at the time of the murder – something like ‘Woman who had portrait painted by Dalí kills husband!’ The publicity from the portrait suit . . . and the murder, Dalí said resulted in phenomenal business for him.”[80]
Things did not turn out as well for Mrs. Woodward, who was instantly cut from the social circles she had laboured so diligently to impress, and whose life was further marked by tragedy. Both Ann’s sons committed suicide, as eventually, did she. Ann’s demise was apparently precipitated by a chapter written by Truman Capote for his upcoming novel Answered Prayers, which was published in Esquire in November 1975. In it, he wrote scathing descriptions of a number of high profile New York society matrons, who appeared thinly disguised as fictional characters. Ann Woodward, whom Capote names Ann Cutler in the book, is painted as a former call girl and gold-digger, while the killing of her husband was portrayed as decidedly pre-meditated. It is believed that Woodward read the relevant excerpt from the book a few days before it was published, and was so devastated at the prospect of yet more scandal, that she swallowed cyanide.[81]
Billy’s mother Elsie Woodward apparently never believed Ann should have been acquitted for the murder of her son, and after Ann’s death is recorded as having stated sardonically, “Well, that’s that. She shot my son, and Truman just murdered her, and so now I suppose we don’t have to worry about that anymore.”[82] That said, the story of Ann Woodward continued to fascinate the public, spurred on by a sensational 1992 non-fiction book This Crazy Thing Called Love by Susan Braudy and, in 1985 a novel by Dominick Dunne, which later became a TV series entitled The Two Mrs. Grenvilles, starring Ann-Margret as Ann Woodward.[83] Dalí’s portrait of the lovely but unlucky Ann Woodward was hidden away for years. In the year 2000 it was quietly sold off, and is now owned by the Morohashi Museum of Modern Art, in Fukushima Japan. It was not publicly exhibited until 2009.
Portrait of Mrs. Eric Phillips, 1953.
Oil on canvas, 108 x 80.8 cm (42.51” x 31.89”).
Private collection. Courtesy of Heather James Fine Art.
Oil on canvas, 108 x 80.8 cm (42.51” x 31.89”).
Private collection. Courtesy of Heather James Fine Art.
While 1953 saw Dalí’s most scandalous portrait, of a woman who Dalí appears to have deemed of questionable morality, that year he also completed a portrait that suggested the subject was a sort of saint or Madonna. This was Canadian Doris Delano Phillips (1901-1980), née Smith, a woman considered a great beauty in her youth. Doris’s mother, Maude Delano Osborne, was a pioneer in women’s tennis, and in France in 1924 her sister Cecil was the first woman to represent Canada at a Winter Olympic games. Doris’ first marriage was to realty man Colonel John Adair Gibson, with whom she had two children, named Timothy Adair and Cecil. Sadly, Gibson committed suicide by jumping from a train.[84] In 1940, Doris married fellow Canadian Colonel William Eric Phillips, who served in the British army during WWI, and later became chairman of the Board of Governors at the University of Toronto. A successful financier and industrialist, he was one of the founders of the Argus Corporation, an investment company which grew to own multiple high-grossing Canadian enterprises.[85] William Eric Phillips died in 1964, leaving Doris’s brother in law, John A. (“Bud”) McDougald, also an Argus partner, in control of interests held by Doris and her sister. In 1978 the controversial and possibly unwitting sale of their voting shares to media mogul Conrad Black led to a much-publicized falling out between Black and Doris’s side of the family. Doris died two years later, while Black went on to make a small fortune from this transaction.[86]
Dalí’s Portrait of Mrs. Eric Phillips, a study in blue and gold, is one of his most traditional portraits to this point in his career. It depicts its fifty-two year old subject seated against a barren, wheat-coloured expanse, behind which is a landscape that features white mountains and pointed fir trees, possibly hinting at a Canadian setting. In the background is a single angel, and at the sitter’s feet, a lamb so diminutive it appears quite out of proportion to the subject. Mrs. Phillips glitters with diamonds in her ears and on her neck and wrist, and a half-moon brooch at the bustline. Her pale blue evening gown is strapless, and as in La Turbie: Sir James Dunn, and other works, the artist has swathed his subject in his favourite golden fabric, in order to give the work a timeless and regal feel. This gilt wrap with the fringed hem also appears in Dalí’s religious tour de force, Corpus Hypercubus of 1955, where Gala, as the mother of Christ, waits to envelop Jesus, who is hung above her on the cross. With its angel and Mrs. Phillip’s eyes cast piously down toward the lamb, a traditional symbol of Christ, Dalí more subtly portrays Mrs. Phillips as a Madonna-like figure. In particular, with its pyramidal composition, Portrait of Mrs. Eric Phillips recalls religious works such as da Vinci’s Virgin and Child with Saint Anne, or Virgin of the Rocks.
Unlike some of those who had commissioned portraits from Dalí earlier in the decade, Doris was apparently delighted with the work. In a letter in the Gala-Salvador Dalí Foundation archives from Mrs. Phillips to the Dalís, dated April 15, 1953, she calls it a masterpiece. “The painting is beautiful beyond words,” she states. “Eric and I feel that it has a divine quality rarely transferred to canvas, it has the radiance of the modern with the deep feeling of the old masters, blended into one.” She concludes by stating that she is “very proud and humble to be the subject,” and in a final P.S., she adds, “I love the little lamb.”[87]
Another letter of note in the archives, and one that possibly was to have consequences for Dalí’s portrait painting, is from Mrs. Phillips' son, the painter Timothy Phillips (1929-2004). Tim (as he went by) had studied under Augustus John (who also painted a portrait of his mother, in 1955), and the much celebrated Italian portraitist Pietro Annigoni. In it he mentions a dinner he and his mother recently attended with Dalí, and that he would be very pleased to take up an offer to be Dalí’s assistant.[88] The young man was invited to Cadaqués later that year, and ended up working for Dalí between 1953 and about 1962, engaged in what he modestly described as “doing mathematical calculations,” and “very minor parts of lesser pictures.”[89] As will be discussed later, it is likely this included working on Dalí’s society portraits.
In Cadaqués Tim Phillips lived in a mountaintop monastery purchased by his wealthy stepfather. Here he entered a rather disastrous marriage, drank copiously, took mescaline, and met artists such as Marcel Duchamp and Man Ray. Dalí writes about Tim in his August 13, 1953 entry for Diary of a Genius, saying, "Philips [sic] is a young Canadian painter, a fanatical Dalínian. An angel sent him to me. I have set up a studio for him in a shed. Already he draws with great probity whatever I need, which allows me to dwell at length on the details I like best, with less feeling of guilt. Since six o’clock this morning, Philips [sic] has been under the house, drawing Gala’s boat as I have asked him to do."[90]
While Dalí continued to employ Tim for many years, he later writes, “Philips paints my picture meticulously. To finish it I shall only need to undo everything he has done.”[91]
Dalí’s Portrait of Mrs. Eric Phillips, a study in blue and gold, is one of his most traditional portraits to this point in his career. It depicts its fifty-two year old subject seated against a barren, wheat-coloured expanse, behind which is a landscape that features white mountains and pointed fir trees, possibly hinting at a Canadian setting. In the background is a single angel, and at the sitter’s feet, a lamb so diminutive it appears quite out of proportion to the subject. Mrs. Phillips glitters with diamonds in her ears and on her neck and wrist, and a half-moon brooch at the bustline. Her pale blue evening gown is strapless, and as in La Turbie: Sir James Dunn, and other works, the artist has swathed his subject in his favourite golden fabric, in order to give the work a timeless and regal feel. This gilt wrap with the fringed hem also appears in Dalí’s religious tour de force, Corpus Hypercubus of 1955, where Gala, as the mother of Christ, waits to envelop Jesus, who is hung above her on the cross. With its angel and Mrs. Phillip’s eyes cast piously down toward the lamb, a traditional symbol of Christ, Dalí more subtly portrays Mrs. Phillips as a Madonna-like figure. In particular, with its pyramidal composition, Portrait of Mrs. Eric Phillips recalls religious works such as da Vinci’s Virgin and Child with Saint Anne, or Virgin of the Rocks.
Unlike some of those who had commissioned portraits from Dalí earlier in the decade, Doris was apparently delighted with the work. In a letter in the Gala-Salvador Dalí Foundation archives from Mrs. Phillips to the Dalís, dated April 15, 1953, she calls it a masterpiece. “The painting is beautiful beyond words,” she states. “Eric and I feel that it has a divine quality rarely transferred to canvas, it has the radiance of the modern with the deep feeling of the old masters, blended into one.” She concludes by stating that she is “very proud and humble to be the subject,” and in a final P.S., she adds, “I love the little lamb.”[87]
Another letter of note in the archives, and one that possibly was to have consequences for Dalí’s portrait painting, is from Mrs. Phillips' son, the painter Timothy Phillips (1929-2004). Tim (as he went by) had studied under Augustus John (who also painted a portrait of his mother, in 1955), and the much celebrated Italian portraitist Pietro Annigoni. In it he mentions a dinner he and his mother recently attended with Dalí, and that he would be very pleased to take up an offer to be Dalí’s assistant.[88] The young man was invited to Cadaqués later that year, and ended up working for Dalí between 1953 and about 1962, engaged in what he modestly described as “doing mathematical calculations,” and “very minor parts of lesser pictures.”[89] As will be discussed later, it is likely this included working on Dalí’s society portraits.
In Cadaqués Tim Phillips lived in a mountaintop monastery purchased by his wealthy stepfather. Here he entered a rather disastrous marriage, drank copiously, took mescaline, and met artists such as Marcel Duchamp and Man Ray. Dalí writes about Tim in his August 13, 1953 entry for Diary of a Genius, saying, "Philips [sic] is a young Canadian painter, a fanatical Dalínian. An angel sent him to me. I have set up a studio for him in a shed. Already he draws with great probity whatever I need, which allows me to dwell at length on the details I like best, with less feeling of guilt. Since six o’clock this morning, Philips [sic] has been under the house, drawing Gala’s boat as I have asked him to do."[90]
While Dalí continued to employ Tim for many years, he later writes, “Philips paints my picture meticulously. To finish it I shall only need to undo everything he has done.”[91]
ENDNOTES
[1] More about this subject will appear in a future project on Dali’s society portraits.
[2] Staff writer, “Dali Files Suit against Woodwards,” Lexington Herald, August 25, 1954, n.p.
[3] “Fiançailles,” Figaro (Paris), September 9, 1936, n.p.
[4] Edward T. James, Janet Wilson James and Paul S. Boyer, Notable American Women, 1607-1950: A Biographical Dictionary, Volume 1 (Cambridge, Harvard University Press, 1971) 630; “William Ichabod Nichols,” Prabook website, accessed November 18, 2015, http://prabook.org/web/person-view.html?profileId=612420
[5] Secrest, Salvador Dali, 186.
[6] See Philippe Halsman, Halsman on the Creation of Photographic Ideas, (New York: Ziff-Davis Pub. Co, 1961).
[7] Secrest, Salvador Dali, 186.
[8] Letter from William I. Nichols, dated May 5, 1950, the Gala-Salvador Dali archives, Figures, Spain.
[9] Secrest, Salvador Dali, 186.
[10] Dali, Confessions, 255
[11] Secrest, Salvador Dali, 187.
[12] Gallery of Modern Art, “Salvador Dali 1910 – 1964, exh. cat., (New York: The Foundation of Modern Art, 1965), entry 205, p. 158; Salvador Dali, Dali News: Monarch of the Dailies (Dali Mirror Incorporated), Tuesday, November 20, 1945, p. 4.
[13] Kenneth T. Jackson, The Encyclopedia of New York City, 1st Edition. Yale University Press, 502.
[14] Adam Bernstein, “Huntington Hartford II: A&P Heir Lost Millions On Cultural Investments,” obituary, Washington Post, Tuesday, May 20, 2008, accessed April 15, 2015, http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/05/19/AR2008051902520.html.
[15] Eric Pace, “Josephine Hartford Bryce, 88, Philanthropist and Sportswoman,” obituary, The New York Times, June 10, 1992; Marc Levinson, The Great A&P and the Struggle for Small Business in America (New York: Hill and Wang, 2012) 134.
[16] Levinson, The Great A&P, 134.
[17] Newport Art Museum, Newportraits, exh. cat. (Biddeford and Portland Maine: University Press of New England, 2000), 28.
[18] Levinson, The Great A&P, 134.
[19] Ian Fleming, Preface to H. Montgomery Hyde, Room 3603 (Guilford, CT: The Lyons Press, 2001), n.p.; Patrick J. Buchanan, Naked Forgery, The American Cause, July 11, 2003, accessed April 15, 2015, http://www.theamericancause.org/patnakedforgeryprint.htm; Richard Grigonis, Grigonis Research, A Tribute to Ivan T. Sanderson, accessed April 15, 2015,
http://www.richardgrigonis.com/Ch01%20Prologue%20and%20On%20the%20Trail%20of%20Ivan%20Sanderson.html; “Ivar Bryce, Biography,” IMDb, accessed April 15, 2015, http://www.imdb.com/name/nm2374542/bio; “Moyns Park House,” Birdbrook website, accessed February 10, 2015, http://birdbrook.net/25.html.
[20] Patricia Simons, “Women in Frames: The Gaze, the Eye, the Profile in Renaissance Portraiture,” from History Workshop: A Journal of Socialist and Feminist Historians, 25 (Spring, 1988), 4-30. Reprinted in Norma Broude and Mary D. Garrard, eds., The Expanding Discourse: Feminism and Art History, 38 - 57 (NewYork: Harper Collins, 1992) p. 40.
[21] George Ferguson, Signs and Symbols in Christian Art (New York: Oxford University Press, 1955, 35.
[22] Newport Art Museum, Newportraits, 28.
[23] Alternately, perhaps this flight of fancy makes reference to the Josephine’s being an accomplished airplane pilot.
[24] Newport Art Museum, Newportraits, 312.
[25] Newport Art Museum, Newportraits, 28.
[26] Frederick Winship, "Bon Vivant's Antique Collection To Be Sold", Tucson Daily Citizen, June 24, 1963, p. 25.
[27] Mario González Lares from Venezuela.
[28] Alden Whitman, “Katharine Cornell Is Dead at 81,” obituary, The New York Times, June 10, 1974, accessed April 15, 2015, http://www.nytimes.com/learning/general/onthisday/bday/0216.html.
[29] E-mail correspondence between Julia Pine and Michael Basinski, Curator, The Poetry Collection, University of Buffalo, January 12, 2011.
[30] Ann Whitcher-Gentzke, “Leading Lady: Surprising Package from a UB Graduate Spurs Reflections on the Life of Actress Katharine Cornell,” UB Today, University of Buffalo online, accessed April 15, 2015, http://www.buffalo.edu/UBT/UBTarchives/volume30number1/features/Cornell.php.
[31] As quoted in Whitman, “Katharine Cornell Is Dead at 81.”
[32] Correspondence between Charles Goodyear, the American National Theatre and Academy (ANTA), and Salvador Dali, 1951, the Gala-Salvador Dali archives, Figueres, Spain.
[33] Paul Chimera, “So You Think You Know Buffalo,” in Catharine Artman’s “Potpourri,” The Buffalo News, n.p., n.d.
[34] Biographical profile compiled from Cass Warner Sperling, Cork Millner, and Jack Warner Jr., Hollywood Be Thy Name: The Warner Brothers Story (Lexington, KY: University Press of Kentucky 1998); Bob Thomas, Clown Prince of Hollywood: The Antic Life and Times of Jack L. Warner (New York: McGraw-Hill Publishing Company, 1990).
[35] Warner Sperling, Millner, and Warner Jr., Hollywood Be Thy Name; Bob Thomas, Clown Prince of Hollywood.
[36] Warner Sperling, Millner, and Warner Jr., Hollywood Be Thy Name; Bob Thomas, Clown Prince of Hollywood.
[37] Jeffrey Hayden, “jack L. Warner: The Beverly Hills Estate of the Archetypal Hollywood Mogul,” photographic essay, Architecture Digest, accessed April 15, 2015, http://www.architecturaldigest.com/celebrity-homes/2005/slideshow-jack-l-warner-20051101#slide=1.
[38] Etherington-Smith, The Persistence of Memory, 304.
[39] Cowles, The Case of Salvador Dali, 229.
[40] Letter from Jack Warner to Dali dated April 15, 1948, the Gala-Salvador Dali Foundation archives, Figueres, Spain.
[41] Letter from Jack Warner to Dali dated, May 11, 1949, the Gala-Salvador Dali Foundation archives, Figueres, Spain.
[42] Letter from Jack Warner to Dali dated, March 9, 1951, the Gala-Salvador Dali Foundation archives, Figueres, Spain.
[43] Letter from Jack Warner to Dali dated, April 9, 1952, the Gala-Salvador Dali Foundation archives, Figueres, Spain.
[44] Warner Sperling, Millner, and Warner Jr, Hollywood Be Thy Name, 269.
[45] Cowles, The Case of Salvador Dali, 229.
[46] Ferguson, Signs and Symbols in Christian Art, 34.
[47] Myrna Oliver, “Ann Warner; Widow of Hollywood Movie Mogul,” obituary, Los Angeles Times, March 10, 1990, accessed February 10, 2016, http://articles.latimes.com/1990-03-10/news/mn-1712_1_ann-warner.
[48] Bluewire Media, The Drexel Video: Mary, Countess of Bessborough, 2010.
[49] Staff writer, “Countess of Bessborough, 98, dies,” Palm Beach Daily News, April 18, 2013, accessed December 3, 2015, http://www.palmbeachdailynews.com/news/news/national/countess-of-bessborough-98-dies/nXPXb/#sthash.DSeltEB5.dpuf; Augustus C. Mayhew, “House of Munn: The Palm Beach Story,” The New York Social Diary, accessed December 3, 2015, http://www.newyorksocialdiary.com/legacy/socialdiary/2006/11_24_06/socialdiary11_24_06.ph.
[50] Francis Baker, Obituary, The New York Times, Thursday, May 3, 2012, accessed December 3, 2015, http://www.legacy.com/obituaries/nytimes/obituary.aspx?pid=157433161; Augustus C. Mayhew, “House of Munn.”
[51] Francis Baker, Obituary.
[52] Interview by Julia Pine with Pauline Baker Pitt, December 1, 2015.
[53] Interview with Pauline Baker Pitt.
[54] Interview with Pauline Baker Pitt.
[55] Interview with Pauline Baker Pitt.
[56] Du Plessix Gray, Them, 32.
[57] See William D. Cohen, The Last Tycoons: The Secret History of Lazard Freres and Co. (New York: Knopf Doubleday Publishing Group, 2007); Robert Lenzner, “Assault On The House Of Lazard,” Forbes Magazine, April 9, 2000, accessed February 2, 2016, http://www.forbes.com/global/2000/0904/0317044a.html.
[58] Cohen, Chapter 3, “Original Sin,” The Last Tycoons, 41-61; Staff writer, “Pierre David-Weill,” obituary, Daytona Beach Morning Journal, 16 January, 1975, n.p.
[59] Hector Feliciano, Lost Museum: The Nazi Conspiracy to Steal the World’s Greatest Works of Art, New York: Basic Books, 1998, 93; Michael Gross, Rogues' Gallery: The Secret Story of the Lust, Lies, Greed, and Betrayals That Made the Metropolitan Museum of Art (New York: Broadway Books, 2010), 315.
[60] Gross, Rogues’ Gallery, 316.
[61] “Rousseau, Theodore, Jr.,” Dictionary of Art Historians: A Biographical Dictionary of Historic Scholars, Museum Professionals and Academic Historians of Art, accessed April 15, 2015, https://dictionaryofarthistorians.org/rousseaut.htm.
[62] Gross, Rogues’ Gallery, 252.
[63] Gross, Rogues’ Gallery, 317, 365.
[64] Staff writer, “Exhibition of 283 Works by Francisco Goya Opens May 4 at the Metropolitan Museum,” press release, Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York City, May 4-30, 1955, accessed April 15, 2015, http://libmma.contentdm.oclc.org/cdm/ref/collection/p16028coll12/id/638
[65] Staff writer, Exhibition of 283 Works by Francisco Goya, 1.
[66] Gross, Rogues’ Gallery 315.
[67] “Rousseau, Theodore, Jr,” Dictionary of Art Historians.
[68] Richard Martin and Harold Koda, Christian Dior, exh. cat., The Metropolitan Museum of Art (New York: Harry N. Abrams Inc, 1996) 201.
[69] “Ann Woodward, 1915 - 1975,” Bio, A&E Television Networks website, accessed April 15, 2015, http://www.biography.com/people/ann-woodward-235823.
[70] Staff writer, “Woman of Tragedy, The Glow Girl,” The Miami News. November 6, 1955, 2E.
[71] “Ann Woodward, 1915 - 1975,” Bio.
[72] Cowles, The Case of Salvador Dali, 225.
[73] Staff writer, “Her Dali No Dilly?, The Brooklyn Eagle, Wed. August 25, 1954.
[74] Secrest, Salvador Dali, 185.
[75] Cowles, The Case of Salvador Dali, 225.
[76] Reynolds Morse, Reynolds Morse Journal, vol. 1, 208-09.
[77] Morse Journal, 211.
[78] Morse Journal, 212.
[79] Jim Yardley, “Heir to a Fortune, and to Tragedy; Suicide Ends the Life of a Wealthy, and Haunted, Man,” The New York Times, May 8, 1999, accessed April 15, 2015, http://www.nytimes.com/1999/05/08/nyregion/heir-fortune-tragedy-suicide-ends-life-wealthy-haunted-man.html.
[80] Morse Journal, 216.
[81] Sam Kashner, “Capote’s Swan Dive,” Vanity Fair, December 2012, accessed April 15, 2015,
http://www.vanityfair.com/culture/2012/12/truman-capote-answered-prayers#; Yardley, “Heir to a Fortune.”
[82] Susan Braudy, This Crazy Thing Called Love (New York: St. Martin's Press, 1993), 414; Yardley, “Heir to a Fortune.
[83] “Ann Woodward, 1915 - 1975,” Bio.
[84] Peter C. Newman, The Establishment Man: A Portrait of Power (Toronto: McClelland & Stewart; 1982), 120.
[85] “William Eric Phillips” Historic Canada, The Canadian Encyclopedia Online, accessed April 15, 2015, http://www.thecanadianencyclopedia.ca/en/article/william-eric-phillips/.
[86] Newman, The Establishment Man, 118 fn; “Argus Corporation Ltd,” The Canadian Encyclopedia, accessed November 20, 2015, http://www.thecanadianencyclopedia.ca/en/article/argus-corporation-ltd/
[87] Letter from Mrs. Phillips to the Dalís, dated April 15, 1953. The Gala-Salvador Dalí Foundation Archives, Figueres, Spain.
[88] Letter from Timothy Phillips to Dali, dated Jan. 17, 1953. The Dalí Gala-Salvador Dalí Foundation Archives, Figueres, Spain.
[89] Thomas Girst, “’Two Minds on a Single Wavelength:’ Timothy Phillips on Salvador Dali and Marcel Duchamp,” Toutfait: The Marcel Duchamp Studies Online Journal, Dec., 1999, accessed April 15, 2015, http://www.toutfait.com/online_journal_details.php?postid=795.
[90] Salvador Dalí, Diary of a Genius, entry for August 13th, 1953 (London: Picador, 1976), 99.
[91] Dalí, Diary of a Genius, entry for August 16th, 1953, 100.
