At first glance, the picture may seem pleasing and true to nature, but through
combinations of details, odd ideas are adumbrated. The result may turn out to be degrading.
Dorothy Adlow, "Portait by Dalí Makes News",
The Christian Science Monitor, August 26, 1954
Equestrian Fantasy: Portrait of Lady Dunn, 1954.
Oil on canvas, 119.7 x 134.6 cm (47.24” x 53.15”).
Beaverbrook Art Gallery, Beaverbrook Canadian Foundation, Fredericton, N.B., Canada.
In 1954, Dalí was once again in contact with the Dunns, this time regarding a grand equestrian “fantasy” portrait of Lady Dunn. A thin, dark-haired, dark-eyed woman with exacting and extravagant tastes, Lady Dunn was perhaps best known for marrying two much-older millionaires. Later in life she also became a well-respected art collector, racehorse owner and a prodigious philanthropist.
Lady Dunn was called Christofor by her friends, although her full maiden name was Marcia Anastasia Christoforides (1909 – 1994). Born in Sutton, Surrey, England, she came from an upper middle class family. Her mother was Mildred Nightingale-Boyes, and her father, John Christoforides, a Cypriot tobacco merchant. She was educated at Roedean, an élite girls’ school at Brighton rumored to rear young ladies who were “fierce as Boadicea, reared on hockey sticks, cold showers and long walks,” which may help explain Her Ladyship’s stalwart character and interest in sportsmanship.[1] Thanks to a meeting in the 1930s with press baron Max Aiken, Lord Beaverbrook, regarding a letter she wrote to the Sunday Express about Britain’s Empire Crusade, she was referred to his good friend James Dunn, who happened to be looking for a secretary. Although she possessed none of the requisite qualifications, and did not appear to need the work, she took up the position. After a rough initiation, in which Dunn almost fired her, in her words, she “carried on until he died.”[2]
As Dunn’s secretary, Christofor also took on something of the role of protégée, learning much about the financial world, and eventually became so adept at it as to give financial and business advice to Lord Dunn.[3] She also grew wealthy on her own account, through personal investment, but despite having become a woman of means, she remained Dunn’s faithful secretary. So faithful, in fact that when Dunn suffered a heart-attack in 1941, Christofor never left his side. Love blossomed as a result, and Dunn quickly divorced his second wife to marry his secretary, thirty-six years his junior, the next year.
Although little known today, thanks to their fortune, the Dunns became distinguished and widely recognized celebrities who were apparently “respected for their intelligence, celebrated for their business sense,”[4] — not to mention their lavish lifestyle and pronounced eccentricities. The couple owned opulent homes in England, France, and St. Andrews, New Brunswick in Canada, as well as holding suites in top-drawer hotels such as the Waldorf Astoria in New York. In 1945, at the top of the Helen Mine Mountain, near his Algoma mine, Dunn also had a small home built which was dubbed the Eagle’s Nest – an odd choice considering Hitler’s Bavarian mountaintop retreat of the same name.[5] Eccentric and exacting, Sir Dunn was said to insist on having his shoelaces ironed, and was known to fly his barber five hundred miles to have his hair cut.[6]
While the Dunns were not avid entertainers, when they did, it was a lavish affair, and often included first-run Hollywood movies that had been flown in from New York via Lord Dunn’s personal DC3 aircraft. At their home in St Andrews, Christofor even had a theatre seat rigged so that the film would play the moment Sir Dunn sat down. Lady Dunn also grew to expect impeccable treatment, and was said to disappear from social gatherings if her favourite drink, Bollinger Brut champagne, was not served, although she frequently brought her own. As time wore on, according to Iris Nowell, writer of the book Women who Give Away Millions, Christofor “demanded that people jump through her hoops and she became as difficult to please as her husband.” Decidedly not well liked by those who served them, she allegedly “humiliated servants in public and tyrannized waiters.”[7]
When Lord Dunn died in 1956, he left half of an estate worth 68 million to Christofor. Despite this considerable reparation, Lady Dunn was so devastated by the loss of her mate, that she apparently considered entering a convent. To the rescue (some say opportunistically) came Dunn’s good friend, and notorious womanizer in his younger years, Max Aiken, Lord Beaverbrook (1879 - 1964). This gentleman acted as the new widow’s advisor on the handling of her affairs, penned an aggrandizing biography of her late husband, and then married her.[8]
Like Lord Dunn, Beaverbrook was born in New Brunswick, and had an equally intriguing and successful career, including working as a financier, politician, author, and newspaper magnate. Like Dunn, whom he met as a young man, he dabbled in a number of professions before getting into finance. “Max,” as he was known, had a feel for both money and opportunity in Canada, and soon became a millionaire. Moving to England, he continued in business, and then entered politics. In 1911 he was knighted, then made a peer in 1917, adopting the title Beaverbrook after a stream near his home in Canada. During WWI he represented the Canadian government at the front, and was made Minister of Information in 1918.[9]
Postwar Beaverbrook wrote a number of books, and bought the Daily Express and the Evening Standard, in addition to initiating the Sunday Express. In 1929 he spearheaded the Empire Free Trade movement, which is how he met his second wife who, as mentioned above, was a supporter of the cause. During Churchill's WWII government Beaverbrook became Minister of Aircraft Production, followed by other wartime appointments. Post-war he concentrated again on his newspapers and writing, and retired from politics.[10] Among his many other accomplishments, Beaverbrook also funded the Beaverbrook Art Foundation, in Fredericton, New Brunswick, which opened an art gallery in 1959. This became the home of a number of important Dalí works, including La Turbie, Equestrian Fantasy, and Sunrise: Portrait of Lord Dunn.
Like Dunn, Beaverbook was also bewitched by the formidable Christofor, and although thirty-one years her senior, asked her to be his wife in 1963. He died a year later and the poor Lady found herself a widow once more, and once again the recipient of a good portion of her multi-millionaire husband’s estate. Now Lady Beaverbrook, Christofor spent the last thirty-one years of her life living between the estates of her two former husbands: Beaverbrook’s Cherkley Estate in Surrey, England, and Dunn’s Dayspring estate in St. Andrews, New Brunswick. Foreshadowed, so it seems, by Dalí’s equestrian portrait, she also became a show- and racehorse enthusiast. She owned many thoroughbreds, bred racehorses, and enthusiastically participated in all manner of equestrian pursuits.[11] Lady Beaverbrook also became a great philanthropist, distributing today’s equivalent of $300 million to numerous education, culture, and animal welfare causes in Canada’s Maritimes and the United Kingdom.”[12]
Lady Dunn was called Christofor by her friends, although her full maiden name was Marcia Anastasia Christoforides (1909 – 1994). Born in Sutton, Surrey, England, she came from an upper middle class family. Her mother was Mildred Nightingale-Boyes, and her father, John Christoforides, a Cypriot tobacco merchant. She was educated at Roedean, an élite girls’ school at Brighton rumored to rear young ladies who were “fierce as Boadicea, reared on hockey sticks, cold showers and long walks,” which may help explain Her Ladyship’s stalwart character and interest in sportsmanship.[1] Thanks to a meeting in the 1930s with press baron Max Aiken, Lord Beaverbrook, regarding a letter she wrote to the Sunday Express about Britain’s Empire Crusade, she was referred to his good friend James Dunn, who happened to be looking for a secretary. Although she possessed none of the requisite qualifications, and did not appear to need the work, she took up the position. After a rough initiation, in which Dunn almost fired her, in her words, she “carried on until he died.”[2]
As Dunn’s secretary, Christofor also took on something of the role of protégée, learning much about the financial world, and eventually became so adept at it as to give financial and business advice to Lord Dunn.[3] She also grew wealthy on her own account, through personal investment, but despite having become a woman of means, she remained Dunn’s faithful secretary. So faithful, in fact that when Dunn suffered a heart-attack in 1941, Christofor never left his side. Love blossomed as a result, and Dunn quickly divorced his second wife to marry his secretary, thirty-six years his junior, the next year.
Although little known today, thanks to their fortune, the Dunns became distinguished and widely recognized celebrities who were apparently “respected for their intelligence, celebrated for their business sense,”[4] — not to mention their lavish lifestyle and pronounced eccentricities. The couple owned opulent homes in England, France, and St. Andrews, New Brunswick in Canada, as well as holding suites in top-drawer hotels such as the Waldorf Astoria in New York. In 1945, at the top of the Helen Mine Mountain, near his Algoma mine, Dunn also had a small home built which was dubbed the Eagle’s Nest – an odd choice considering Hitler’s Bavarian mountaintop retreat of the same name.[5] Eccentric and exacting, Sir Dunn was said to insist on having his shoelaces ironed, and was known to fly his barber five hundred miles to have his hair cut.[6]
While the Dunns were not avid entertainers, when they did, it was a lavish affair, and often included first-run Hollywood movies that had been flown in from New York via Lord Dunn’s personal DC3 aircraft. At their home in St Andrews, Christofor even had a theatre seat rigged so that the film would play the moment Sir Dunn sat down. Lady Dunn also grew to expect impeccable treatment, and was said to disappear from social gatherings if her favourite drink, Bollinger Brut champagne, was not served, although she frequently brought her own. As time wore on, according to Iris Nowell, writer of the book Women who Give Away Millions, Christofor “demanded that people jump through her hoops and she became as difficult to please as her husband.” Decidedly not well liked by those who served them, she allegedly “humiliated servants in public and tyrannized waiters.”[7]
When Lord Dunn died in 1956, he left half of an estate worth 68 million to Christofor. Despite this considerable reparation, Lady Dunn was so devastated by the loss of her mate, that she apparently considered entering a convent. To the rescue (some say opportunistically) came Dunn’s good friend, and notorious womanizer in his younger years, Max Aiken, Lord Beaverbrook (1879 - 1964). This gentleman acted as the new widow’s advisor on the handling of her affairs, penned an aggrandizing biography of her late husband, and then married her.[8]
Like Lord Dunn, Beaverbrook was born in New Brunswick, and had an equally intriguing and successful career, including working as a financier, politician, author, and newspaper magnate. Like Dunn, whom he met as a young man, he dabbled in a number of professions before getting into finance. “Max,” as he was known, had a feel for both money and opportunity in Canada, and soon became a millionaire. Moving to England, he continued in business, and then entered politics. In 1911 he was knighted, then made a peer in 1917, adopting the title Beaverbrook after a stream near his home in Canada. During WWI he represented the Canadian government at the front, and was made Minister of Information in 1918.[9]
Postwar Beaverbrook wrote a number of books, and bought the Daily Express and the Evening Standard, in addition to initiating the Sunday Express. In 1929 he spearheaded the Empire Free Trade movement, which is how he met his second wife who, as mentioned above, was a supporter of the cause. During Churchill's WWII government Beaverbrook became Minister of Aircraft Production, followed by other wartime appointments. Post-war he concentrated again on his newspapers and writing, and retired from politics.[10] Among his many other accomplishments, Beaverbrook also funded the Beaverbrook Art Foundation, in Fredericton, New Brunswick, which opened an art gallery in 1959. This became the home of a number of important Dalí works, including La Turbie, Equestrian Fantasy, and Sunrise: Portrait of Lord Dunn.
Like Dunn, Beaverbook was also bewitched by the formidable Christofor, and although thirty-one years her senior, asked her to be his wife in 1963. He died a year later and the poor Lady found herself a widow once more, and once again the recipient of a good portion of her multi-millionaire husband’s estate. Now Lady Beaverbrook, Christofor spent the last thirty-one years of her life living between the estates of her two former husbands: Beaverbrook’s Cherkley Estate in Surrey, England, and Dunn’s Dayspring estate in St. Andrews, New Brunswick. Foreshadowed, so it seems, by Dalí’s equestrian portrait, she also became a show- and racehorse enthusiast. She owned many thoroughbreds, bred racehorses, and enthusiastically participated in all manner of equestrian pursuits.[11] Lady Beaverbrook also became a great philanthropist, distributing today’s equivalent of $300 million to numerous education, culture, and animal welfare causes in Canada’s Maritimes and the United Kingdom.”[12]
Lady Dunn and Salvador Dalí in the early 1950s.
In keeping with Dalí’s “classic” directive, for his depiction of Lady Dunn he drew upon the historical tradition of the equestrian portrait, possibly to signify Christofor’s elevated status and commanding presence. Emerging in ancient Rome, and very popular during the Renaissance, according to portrait historian Shearer West, the equestrian format was “almost universally used for male figures of authority,” and “expressed the majesty of the leader, his control over nature, his military valor, and his towering stature above ordinary subjects.[13] Equestrian portraits of women were not unheard of, however, especially post-Renaissance, and Dalí may well have been thinking of some of his favourite artists’ equestrian portraits of women, such as Velazquez’s Queen Margarita on Horseback (1634-35), at the Prado, or in keeping with his interest with Goya, the Portrait of María Teresa de Vallabriga on Horseback (1783), at the Uffizi. As with these important women, Dalí’s choice of the equestrian format evokes the traditional associations, suggesting that the subject possesses majesty, valour and is a natural leader. That said, Dali had written in his personal newsletter, the 1945 edition of Dalí News, of a similar scene he had intended for a never-realized portrait of none other than actor Cary Grant, “with a fowling piece in his hand, against a background of an English autumnal forest.” Knowing how the artist occasionally recycled unfinished or refused portraits, or possibly painted backdrops before a client was found, this may well have been the intended canvas for the lead man in To Catch a Thief. Perhaps an X-Ray of the piece might offer some clues.[14]
For the portrait, Lady Dunn wears a handsome historicizing two-piece dark burgundy velvet riding habit with gold detailing, and a coordinating cap. She sits side-saddle: no mean feat considering she rides bareback, with the exception of a rich blue and gold blanket which separates her from her mount. She also dons brown suede gauntlets, necessary to protect her from the peregrine falcon perched upon her right hand. The bird, too, is dressed for sport, wearing a falconry hood, a tiny leather and cloth cap with feathers atop, used to cover the bird’s eyes and keep it calm while in the presence of humans. An intriguing addition to the canvas, this bird of prey suggests much about how Dalí viewed his subject. He was a keen, if often uncharitable judge of character, and here he has captured the essence of Lady Dunn’s financial prowess and sharp intelligence, as observed by biographer Iris Nowell, “Like a heron poised at the brook’s edge eyeing trout, she had instinct and timing.”[15]
The horse upon which Lady Dunn sits is a svelte palomino – so svelte, in fact, that it is remarkably thin, with a disproportionately small head. In the background below the horse’s legs, is a large manor house or castle, a metaphor for the Dunn’s Camelot-like lifestyle, and an index of the fantasy described in the work’s title. Middle ground is a forest setting, with clusters of trees inhabited by deer and a number of small creatures, including a squirrel, a rabbit, a frog, and a salamander. Sadly, these are precisely the kinds of creatures the falcon will shortly be preying upon.
While the subject and her mount are decidedly stately, the overall portrait composition is rather awkward. Unusual for equestrian portraits, in which the artist takes pride in a fine depiction of the animal, Dalí has “cut off” one of the hooves of the beast by painting it outside the canvas. Nevertheless, the portrait is impressive, and conveys grandeur not only through the haughty carriage and expression of both the lady and her raptor, but also her point of view. Lady Dunn’s gaze is cast well above the viewer, and draws with it all the social status and personality traits this implies. Together, the rather stilted presentation, the conventional format, the heavy-handed imagery and subject’s bearing are all decidedly “over-the-top,” and can be read as a gentle parody of the equestrian format, as much as jibe at Her Ladyship’s character. As a former curator of the Beaverbrook Art Gallery, which houses the work, states, “The portrait is a bit tongue-in-cheek. If you look closely at it, all three – the horse and the falcon and Christofor – all seem to have that same kind of quizzical expression in their eye.”[16]
While Dalí’s subtle cheek is clear to conscientious viewers, Lady Dunn apparently did not catch even a whiff of fun in her portrait, and quite likely, neither did Sir Dunn. In his biography of his great friend, Lord Beaverbrook notes that Equestrian Fantasy was Sir James’s favourite portrait.[17] Most revealing are remarks in a 1954 letter on the subject of Dalí’s portraiture from Lady Dunn to Mrs. Ince, secretary to Lord Beaverbrook in Fleet Street, London. In it, she begins by mentioning the scandal about the Woodward portrait, which was currently in the newspapers. Next, she fervently champions Dalí’s technique, writing of his “mastery of glowing luminosity which radiates from his light tones and gives a velvet texture to his somber tones – there is no trace of a brush or a daub anywhere to be discovered!” Enclosing a photograph of the recently completed commission, she claims that it has “fascinated everyone who has seen it. The reason I call it a painting is because the portraiture is incidental – I wanted a work of art – Dalí produced it in magnificent style – the heavenly luminosity is everywhere and yet obscure – just a magical ‘glow.’”[18]
In the letter, Christofor also reveals telling details about sitting for Dalí. “I must say that I was co-operative during the eight sittings,” she says with pride, “keeping quiet and remaining in the chosen position.” Dalí apparently complimented her with a good deal of relief, saying that “never do his female sitters keep calm for an instant – he is menaced by continual cigarette smoking, fidgeting with their faces and position combined with a constant flow of conversations over the telephone!” Finally, she explains that “All these rather irritating things had to be endured by him and in consequence the results were sometimes disturbing!”[19]
Clearly the Dunns were happy with the work and, caricature or not, it is impressively painted, and with all its fine details, delightful to contemplate. Consequently, Equestrian Fantasy: Portrait of Lady Dunn remains a worthy testament to an extraordinary woman who, although at times difficult and demanding, was also a great philanthropist, intensely loyal to her two husbands, and a good friend and patron of the Dalís.
For the portrait, Lady Dunn wears a handsome historicizing two-piece dark burgundy velvet riding habit with gold detailing, and a coordinating cap. She sits side-saddle: no mean feat considering she rides bareback, with the exception of a rich blue and gold blanket which separates her from her mount. She also dons brown suede gauntlets, necessary to protect her from the peregrine falcon perched upon her right hand. The bird, too, is dressed for sport, wearing a falconry hood, a tiny leather and cloth cap with feathers atop, used to cover the bird’s eyes and keep it calm while in the presence of humans. An intriguing addition to the canvas, this bird of prey suggests much about how Dalí viewed his subject. He was a keen, if often uncharitable judge of character, and here he has captured the essence of Lady Dunn’s financial prowess and sharp intelligence, as observed by biographer Iris Nowell, “Like a heron poised at the brook’s edge eyeing trout, she had instinct and timing.”[15]
The horse upon which Lady Dunn sits is a svelte palomino – so svelte, in fact, that it is remarkably thin, with a disproportionately small head. In the background below the horse’s legs, is a large manor house or castle, a metaphor for the Dunn’s Camelot-like lifestyle, and an index of the fantasy described in the work’s title. Middle ground is a forest setting, with clusters of trees inhabited by deer and a number of small creatures, including a squirrel, a rabbit, a frog, and a salamander. Sadly, these are precisely the kinds of creatures the falcon will shortly be preying upon.
While the subject and her mount are decidedly stately, the overall portrait composition is rather awkward. Unusual for equestrian portraits, in which the artist takes pride in a fine depiction of the animal, Dalí has “cut off” one of the hooves of the beast by painting it outside the canvas. Nevertheless, the portrait is impressive, and conveys grandeur not only through the haughty carriage and expression of both the lady and her raptor, but also her point of view. Lady Dunn’s gaze is cast well above the viewer, and draws with it all the social status and personality traits this implies. Together, the rather stilted presentation, the conventional format, the heavy-handed imagery and subject’s bearing are all decidedly “over-the-top,” and can be read as a gentle parody of the equestrian format, as much as jibe at Her Ladyship’s character. As a former curator of the Beaverbrook Art Gallery, which houses the work, states, “The portrait is a bit tongue-in-cheek. If you look closely at it, all three – the horse and the falcon and Christofor – all seem to have that same kind of quizzical expression in their eye.”[16]
While Dalí’s subtle cheek is clear to conscientious viewers, Lady Dunn apparently did not catch even a whiff of fun in her portrait, and quite likely, neither did Sir Dunn. In his biography of his great friend, Lord Beaverbrook notes that Equestrian Fantasy was Sir James’s favourite portrait.[17] Most revealing are remarks in a 1954 letter on the subject of Dalí’s portraiture from Lady Dunn to Mrs. Ince, secretary to Lord Beaverbrook in Fleet Street, London. In it, she begins by mentioning the scandal about the Woodward portrait, which was currently in the newspapers. Next, she fervently champions Dalí’s technique, writing of his “mastery of glowing luminosity which radiates from his light tones and gives a velvet texture to his somber tones – there is no trace of a brush or a daub anywhere to be discovered!” Enclosing a photograph of the recently completed commission, she claims that it has “fascinated everyone who has seen it. The reason I call it a painting is because the portraiture is incidental – I wanted a work of art – Dalí produced it in magnificent style – the heavenly luminosity is everywhere and yet obscure – just a magical ‘glow.’”[18]
In the letter, Christofor also reveals telling details about sitting for Dalí. “I must say that I was co-operative during the eight sittings,” she says with pride, “keeping quiet and remaining in the chosen position.” Dalí apparently complimented her with a good deal of relief, saying that “never do his female sitters keep calm for an instant – he is menaced by continual cigarette smoking, fidgeting with their faces and position combined with a constant flow of conversations over the telephone!” Finally, she explains that “All these rather irritating things had to be endured by him and in consequence the results were sometimes disturbing!”[19]
Clearly the Dunns were happy with the work and, caricature or not, it is impressively painted, and with all its fine details, delightful to contemplate. Consequently, Equestrian Fantasy: Portrait of Lady Dunn remains a worthy testament to an extraordinary woman who, although at times difficult and demanding, was also a great philanthropist, intensely loyal to her two husbands, and a good friend and patron of the Dalís.
Portrait of Prince Artchil Gourielli-Tchkonia, 1954.
Oil on canvas, 99.1 x 71.1 cm (38.97” x 27.95”).
Private collection, Courtesy Städel Museum, Frankfurt.
Oil on canvas, 99.1 x 71.1 cm (38.97” x 27.95”).
Private collection, Courtesy Städel Museum, Frankfurt.
In keeping with painting aristocrats like the Dunns and Beaverbrooks, in 1954 Dalí also painted a royal personage living in America. This was the second husband of cosmetics industry mogul Helena Rubinstein, who later became Princess Gourielli, and was a good friend, frequent host, and avid patron of Dalí. Having commissioned a portrait of herself from the artist in 1943, a letter sent from Gala to Rubinstein on January 23, 1952 reveals plans were afoot for another likeness. Gala clarifies that the going price is $8,000, but that she and Dalí would “make special price of $6,000” for Madame. “A larger portrait, that is, the entire figure,” she adds, “the price is $14,000.” Rubinstein evidently went for the second option, with the result being a portrait of her spouse Artchil, which Dalí completed in 1954.[20]
Rubinstein’s second husband, Prince Artchil Gourielli-Tchkonia (1890 – 1955) was from Georgia, now a country in the Caucasus, but a republic in the Soviet Union at the time the portrait was painted. Gourielli’s matrilineal claim to Georgian nobility originated from his being born into the untitled noble Tchkonia family of Guria, and having adopted the legitimate title from his grandmother, Princess Gourielli. While Gourielli’s regal designation was often cited as suspect among Rubinstein’s social circles, it should be noted that Georgia is a country described as “rich” in princes.[21]
Forced to flee his home after the Red Army invaded Georgia in 1921, the Prince relocated in Paris, where he nestled among the well-to-do of that city.[22] He met Helena Rubinstein at the home of Comtesse de Polignac, better known as Marguerite, the celebrated daughter of Parisian couturière Jeanne Lanvin. Here Artchil and Helena played several games of Bridge over the next few weeks, and soon after her return to New York, her Bridge partner followed. Despite the Prince’s being twenty-three years Madame’s junior, the couple wed in 1938, and by all accounts, it was a happy match. If theirs was not a passionate arrangement, they clearly enjoyed each other’s company. There was much speculation, however, about Helena’s securing a noble marriage of convenience for publicity’s sake, and in particular, in order to “get one over” on her arch rival, cosmetics doyenne Elizabeth Arden. This approach only proved temporarily successful, however, as Arden soon found her own Prince Charming: one Russian Prince Michael Evednoff, whom she married in 1942 — and divorced in 1944. [23]
Rubinstein’s second husband, Prince Artchil Gourielli-Tchkonia (1890 – 1955) was from Georgia, now a country in the Caucasus, but a republic in the Soviet Union at the time the portrait was painted. Gourielli’s matrilineal claim to Georgian nobility originated from his being born into the untitled noble Tchkonia family of Guria, and having adopted the legitimate title from his grandmother, Princess Gourielli. While Gourielli’s regal designation was often cited as suspect among Rubinstein’s social circles, it should be noted that Georgia is a country described as “rich” in princes.[21]
Forced to flee his home after the Red Army invaded Georgia in 1921, the Prince relocated in Paris, where he nestled among the well-to-do of that city.[22] He met Helena Rubinstein at the home of Comtesse de Polignac, better known as Marguerite, the celebrated daughter of Parisian couturière Jeanne Lanvin. Here Artchil and Helena played several games of Bridge over the next few weeks, and soon after her return to New York, her Bridge partner followed. Despite the Prince’s being twenty-three years Madame’s junior, the couple wed in 1938, and by all accounts, it was a happy match. If theirs was not a passionate arrangement, they clearly enjoyed each other’s company. There was much speculation, however, about Helena’s securing a noble marriage of convenience for publicity’s sake, and in particular, in order to “get one over” on her arch rival, cosmetics doyenne Elizabeth Arden. This approach only proved temporarily successful, however, as Arden soon found her own Prince Charming: one Russian Prince Michael Evednoff, whom she married in 1942 — and divorced in 1944. [23]
Artchil Gourielli and Helena Rubinstein in Sydney, Australia, October 1938.
Artchil and Helena lived together in Rubinstein’s newly acquired, sumptuously-decorated twenty-six-room Park Avenue triplex, where the Prince was given a private suite. Virtually a “kept man,” Artchil rarely rose before noon, and apparently “gave his afternoons to planning intimate parties and gourmet meals,” not to mention drinking and gambling. Allegedly to remedy this indolence, in the early 1950s, Rubinstein launched a line of exclusive beauty products, primarily for men, under the name House of Gourielli, with packaging featuring the Prince’s coat of arms. Appropriately, his signature scent was called “Five O’Clock,” and came in a bottle shaped like a cocktail shaker. She also opened an exclusive Gourielli men’s grooming salon and retail outlet very close to the St. Regis Hotel, where Dalí lived and worked while in New York, and almost certainly where the portrait was painted.[24] The venture was not a success, however, and petered out after the Prince died in 1955. The Gouriellis were married for almost twenty years, and according to Patrick O’Higgins in his notorious memoir documenting his time as Rubinstein’s assistant, “she had loved him, in her own way, with a possessive passion. Theirs had been a happy relationship after the first stormy months when she watched over him like one of her profit-and-loss statements.”[25]
Despite his perceived flaws, the Prince was a handsome man with curly hair, and was known for his great sense of humour. He was much liked by Rubinstein’s staff. O’Higgins describes him as “a simple man with the appetites, the manners, the rough humour of a peasant smiled upon by good fortune” who had “managed his role as Prince Consort to a Beauty Queen with good nature.”[26] Dalí, who dined frequently at the Gourielli’s, was not impressed by the Prince however, and wrote scathingly of him in his Unspeakable Confessions of Salvador Dalí. He recalled the Prince “never opened his mouth except to blow smoke rings, and gleefully reports how his wife was deeply hurt at a dinner party when she overheard one of her guests remark that “In Georgia you’re a prince if you just own some sheep.” Perhaps most damningly, he summed up the Gourielli’s relationship by stating that “While the Prince’s title might have been suspect, the Princess’ bank account was coat-of-arms enough.”[27]
Despite his perceived flaws, the Prince was a handsome man with curly hair, and was known for his great sense of humour. He was much liked by Rubinstein’s staff. O’Higgins describes him as “a simple man with the appetites, the manners, the rough humour of a peasant smiled upon by good fortune” who had “managed his role as Prince Consort to a Beauty Queen with good nature.”[26] Dalí, who dined frequently at the Gourielli’s, was not impressed by the Prince however, and wrote scathingly of him in his Unspeakable Confessions of Salvador Dalí. He recalled the Prince “never opened his mouth except to blow smoke rings, and gleefully reports how his wife was deeply hurt at a dinner party when she overheard one of her guests remark that “In Georgia you’re a prince if you just own some sheep.” Perhaps most damningly, he summed up the Gourielli’s relationship by stating that “While the Prince’s title might have been suspect, the Princess’ bank account was coat-of-arms enough.”[27]
Prince and Princess Artchil Gourielli in the living room of their New York apartment circa 1950.
Dalí always held disdain for those he felt were putting on airs, and his contempt for the Prince may explain why he produced such an unflattering portrait of him. Judging by the choice of the full length format and the wealth of Georgian nationalist imagery, the Gouriellis evidently had a grand, official portrait in mind that would celebrate the Prince’s Caucasian heritage. The portrait is nevertheless one of Dalí’s least successful. In addition to Artchil’s pained, effete expression, is the mismatched scale of the lower to the upper body, and the disparity of the arms, rendered through poor foreshortening. The overall effect is of miscalculated proportion, which results in the Prince appearing squashed by the borders of the canvas. This reverses the intended effect of agrandisement, by squeezing the subject into an ill-fitted box. The outcome is decidedly bathetic –- in the sense of missing the mark to a ludicrous effect. While this may have been a case of stretching Dalí’s portraiture skills, it was just as likely intentional, to bring the Prince “down a notch” – to the tune of $14,000 (about $122,000 in today’s currency). As a final rebuke, in keeping with the artist’s consistent use of floral imagery to comment on the subject’s character, the plant at Artchil’s feet appears to be a common weed.
While the composition is questionable, the artist evidently worked with the Prince regarding the symbolism of the piece, in order to convey the Georgian’s national pride and aristocratic stature. The Prince wears national dress, a chokha specific to the Guria, Adjara and Samegrelo regions of Georgia.[28] Variations of this costume have been worn since the ninth century, and later became as much a symbol of resistance to the Russian occupation, as it is today of cultural affinity. The Prince’s particular uniform consists of the high-collared undercoat covered by the chokha, which is distinguished by the masrebi, a bandolier which holds bullet-like decorations that are a vestige of the costume’s military origins. Insignia are pinned to the chemise, including a medal with the Bolnisi cross, a Georgia national symbol. Around the Prince’s waist is a woven shawl used as a cummerbund, and below his brown breeches, he wears the customary pointed footwear topped by black wool gaiters.
The scenery behind the Prince is a Dalinian interpretation of Mount Kasbek, the holy mountain in the Caucasus, capped with snow and adorned with its characteristic mist. The church nested in the cliffs is typical of Georgian regional architecture, and almost certainly the Gergeti Trinity Church, situated on the right bank of the river Chkheri, which is perhaps referenced in the body of water behind. As with the portrait of Helena Rubinstein, also in the background is a figure who appears to be chained to the rocks. While in the Rubinstein portrait, this person is most frequently cited as Andromeda from classical mythology, to Georgian eyes, the figure in the rocks evokes a different narrative. This concerns Amirani, hero of a Georgian epic, son of the aptly-named Dali, a Caucasian goddess of the hunt. Like Prometheus of classical legend, who was punished for giving fire to mortals, Amirani was also chained to the rocks, in his case as a punishment for teaching metallurgy to humankind. The figure of Amirani is often used as an emblem of Georgia’s steadfastness in the face of ordeals and its struggle for survival.[29]
There is much merit in the national imagery of Portrait of Prince Artchil Gourielli-Tchkonia, but the fact that it has never been publicly displayed and almost never published, speaks volumes about its appeal to the Gouriellis. Helena, who was a good friend of Dalí’s, was uncharacteristically diplomatic in her assessment of the work when interviewed by Fleur Cowles in the late 1950s, although she damns the artist somewhat, with praise. “In 1954 Dalí painted a portrait of my late husband,” she explains. “I did not like it quite as much as his earlier work (although I don’t think it’s his fault). I think Dalí is a brilliant showman, and, when not hurried, is a marvelous craftsman.”[30] On the other hand, Rubinstein’s great niece, Diane Corbin, was more forthright regarding the reception of the work. In a discussion concerning the dozens of paintings retained after Madame’s death at Helena Rubinstein Foundation headquarters in New York, she reveals why her husband’s picture is nowhere to be seen. “We sold it,” she explains . . . it was . . . an awful picture.”[31]
While the composition is questionable, the artist evidently worked with the Prince regarding the symbolism of the piece, in order to convey the Georgian’s national pride and aristocratic stature. The Prince wears national dress, a chokha specific to the Guria, Adjara and Samegrelo regions of Georgia.[28] Variations of this costume have been worn since the ninth century, and later became as much a symbol of resistance to the Russian occupation, as it is today of cultural affinity. The Prince’s particular uniform consists of the high-collared undercoat covered by the chokha, which is distinguished by the masrebi, a bandolier which holds bullet-like decorations that are a vestige of the costume’s military origins. Insignia are pinned to the chemise, including a medal with the Bolnisi cross, a Georgia national symbol. Around the Prince’s waist is a woven shawl used as a cummerbund, and below his brown breeches, he wears the customary pointed footwear topped by black wool gaiters.
The scenery behind the Prince is a Dalinian interpretation of Mount Kasbek, the holy mountain in the Caucasus, capped with snow and adorned with its characteristic mist. The church nested in the cliffs is typical of Georgian regional architecture, and almost certainly the Gergeti Trinity Church, situated on the right bank of the river Chkheri, which is perhaps referenced in the body of water behind. As with the portrait of Helena Rubinstein, also in the background is a figure who appears to be chained to the rocks. While in the Rubinstein portrait, this person is most frequently cited as Andromeda from classical mythology, to Georgian eyes, the figure in the rocks evokes a different narrative. This concerns Amirani, hero of a Georgian epic, son of the aptly-named Dali, a Caucasian goddess of the hunt. Like Prometheus of classical legend, who was punished for giving fire to mortals, Amirani was also chained to the rocks, in his case as a punishment for teaching metallurgy to humankind. The figure of Amirani is often used as an emblem of Georgia’s steadfastness in the face of ordeals and its struggle for survival.[29]
There is much merit in the national imagery of Portrait of Prince Artchil Gourielli-Tchkonia, but the fact that it has never been publicly displayed and almost never published, speaks volumes about its appeal to the Gouriellis. Helena, who was a good friend of Dalí’s, was uncharacteristically diplomatic in her assessment of the work when interviewed by Fleur Cowles in the late 1950s, although she damns the artist somewhat, with praise. “In 1954 Dalí painted a portrait of my late husband,” she explains. “I did not like it quite as much as his earlier work (although I don’t think it’s his fault). I think Dalí is a brilliant showman, and, when not hurried, is a marvelous craftsman.”[30] On the other hand, Rubinstein’s great niece, Diane Corbin, was more forthright regarding the reception of the work. In a discussion concerning the dozens of paintings retained after Madame’s death at Helena Rubinstein Foundation headquarters in New York, she reveals why her husband’s picture is nowhere to be seen. “We sold it,” she explains . . . it was . . . an awful picture.”[31]
Portrait of Mrs. Reeves, 1954.
Oil on canvas, 57 7/8 x 36¼ in. (147 x 92 cm.).
Private collection.
Oil on canvas, 57 7/8 x 36¼ in. (147 x 92 cm.).
Private collection.
In keeping with his working with millionaires who made their fortunes in the beauty industry, the next portrait Dalí was to paint was of cosmetics innovator Lydia Reeves, better known by her maiden name, Lydia O’Leary (1903 – 1985). Much like Helena Rubinstein, Lydia was a self-made woman, and somewhat like Rubinstein, her career largely exemplified the much-loved “rags-to-riches” American mythos. Born in New England just after the turn of the century, Lydia’s father was an Irish immigrant who drove a horse-drawn cab to support his large family. Lydia was bullied as a child because of a disfiguring nevus flammeus birthmark, commonly known as a “port-wine stain,” which covered a large area of her face. Despite these setbacks, Lydia graduated from college in 1921, after which she began searching for work in New York City as a department store sales clerk. Her birthmark, however, made employers reluctant to place her where she would be in contact with the public, and she had to settle for a position hand-painting cards in a work area in the back room.[32]
Commercial photograph of Lydia O’Leary with and without Covermark, 1936.
One day in the late 1920s, while painting a flower on a Bridge scorecard, Lydia made one purplish petal too dark, and had to lighten it using a paler shade. This led to the idea of doing the same thing with her birthmark. Experimenting with oil paint on her own skin, she devised the then-novel idea of a corrective concealer for birthmarks and blemishes. Working in consultation with a chemist, within a few months Lydia had developed a workable formula using readily available ingredients such as zinc and glycerine. She then applied for a patent, which was denied, as the courts were not convinced her product differed significantly from certain cosmetics available on the market. Appealing the decision, Lydia staged a dramatic courtroom “transformation,” where she first removed her concealer from her own birthmark, and then proceeded to re-camouflage it in just a few minutes, to the amazement of the panel of federal appellate judges.[33]
In 1932 O‘Leary received her patent, and with the encouragement of dermatologists who increasingly referred patients to her, she developed a line of products called Covermark, versions of which are still in production today.[34] The product was, and continues to be a boon for people with birthmarks, burns, scars, and other imperfections, helping them build self-confidence, and shielding them from the kind of discrimination the inventor had endured. In the service of the afflicted, O’Leary was very active with the medical applications of her product. She conducted tours and workshops to help introduce it across the U.S., and during the war she visited base hospitals to work with plastic surgeons in rehabilitating the wounded and disfigured.[35] After the war, O‘Leary was honoured by the Japanese Government for the assistance she gave to burn patients who were victims of the atomic bombs dropped on Nagasaki and Hiroshima.[36]
In 1932 O‘Leary received her patent, and with the encouragement of dermatologists who increasingly referred patients to her, she developed a line of products called Covermark, versions of which are still in production today.[34] The product was, and continues to be a boon for people with birthmarks, burns, scars, and other imperfections, helping them build self-confidence, and shielding them from the kind of discrimination the inventor had endured. In the service of the afflicted, O’Leary was very active with the medical applications of her product. She conducted tours and workshops to help introduce it across the U.S., and during the war she visited base hospitals to work with plastic surgeons in rehabilitating the wounded and disfigured.[35] After the war, O‘Leary was honoured by the Japanese Government for the assistance she gave to burn patients who were victims of the atomic bombs dropped on Nagasaki and Hiroshima.[36]
Advertisement for Lydia O’Leary’s Covermark, 1958.
When WWII ended O’Leary married for the first time, at the age of forty-two. Her husband was James Reeves, a wealthy widower who had just merged a chain of grocery stores he had started with his brother, with Safeway, which was one of America’s most prosperous food chains. Like O’Leary’s father, James was also an Irish immigrant from humble circumstances. Working with his brother Daniel as a fruit peddler, he later grew to be a millionaire. While Lydia and James never had children together, among Reeves’ progeny from his previous marriage was Daniel Farrell Reeves, the owner of the Cleveland, and later Los Angeles, Rams. James died in 1957, after which Lydia sold Covermark, travelled extensively, and shared her time between three homes: one in Palm Beach; a twenty-nine room Victorian summer house in Southampton, historically known as “Wahnfried”; and a third in New York.[37]
As a measure of Lydia’s immense wealth, in New York she lived at the famously luxurious 740 Park Avenue, in a twelve-room, fourteenth-floor apartment.[38] Considered “the most luxurious and powerful residential building in New York City,” this building today is home to the highest concentration of billionaires in the country.[39] In addition to being the former residence of the Ambassador of France to the United Nations and the childhood home of Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis, it has had many famous residents, among them businessman John D. Rockefeller, Jr., writer Jerzy Kosiński, and clothing designer Vera Wang. [40]
In the early 1970s O’Leary began seeing Leonard Sills, a property owner who had recently become a widower. The couple became engaged, but never wed, as Lydia had a stroke and spent the last decade of her life debilitated. After her death in 1985, all her assets went to Sills, and the New York apartment was sold to Spyros Niarchos, whose father, the Greek shipping magnate Stavros Niarchos, pf whom Dalí apparently painted a portrait.[41] Another resident of the building was the first wife of William Hale Harkness, whose daughter Edith Harkness (by his second wife), Dalí also painted that same year.
As a measure of Lydia’s immense wealth, in New York she lived at the famously luxurious 740 Park Avenue, in a twelve-room, fourteenth-floor apartment.[38] Considered “the most luxurious and powerful residential building in New York City,” this building today is home to the highest concentration of billionaires in the country.[39] In addition to being the former residence of the Ambassador of France to the United Nations and the childhood home of Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis, it has had many famous residents, among them businessman John D. Rockefeller, Jr., writer Jerzy Kosiński, and clothing designer Vera Wang. [40]
In the early 1970s O’Leary began seeing Leonard Sills, a property owner who had recently become a widower. The couple became engaged, but never wed, as Lydia had a stroke and spent the last decade of her life debilitated. After her death in 1985, all her assets went to Sills, and the New York apartment was sold to Spyros Niarchos, whose father, the Greek shipping magnate Stavros Niarchos, pf whom Dalí apparently painted a portrait.[41] Another resident of the building was the first wife of William Hale Harkness, whose daughter Edith Harkness (by his second wife), Dalí also painted that same year.
Photograph of Lydia Reeves standing beside Dalí’s portrait. Probably taken at an exhibition
of Dalí’s work and jewels held at the Parrish Art Museum, Southampton, August, 1958.
Courtesy of Sister Rose Pacatte.
of Dalí’s work and jewels held at the Parrish Art Museum, Southampton, August, 1958.
Courtesy of Sister Rose Pacatte.
While no documentation has come to light regarding Dalí’s commission for the portrait, it was likely understood that, with Lydia being in the beauty industry, the result was to be flattering. Indeed, Dalí appears to have made a real effort to edify his subject, although her bemused expression and rigid posture give the work a somewhat awkward feel. In it, Lydia stands against a standard Dalínian backdrop of the mid-1950s, featuring a misty horizon populated by a figure on a white horse, a low mountain range, and a few archaic buildings. The most noticeable of these being a Renaissance-style archway with a cupola upon which stand three spindly figures. Along the horizon is a milky golden sky and an azure swathe behind the figure’s head, which is flanked by clouds, including the artist’s trademark ominous storm cloud from which rays of light emanate.
Lydia stands with her arms at her sides, and turns her face toward the viewer. She dons two thin strands of pearls, and a tightly-fitted copper-coloured décolleté gown which matches the colour of her hair and showcases her shapely figure. Draped implausibly upon her right arm, and seeming to defy gravity, is a blue shawl, which trails upon the ground. The overall effect of Dalí’s colour scheme and placement is one of visual harmony with the landscape, where complimentary blues, coppers and golden hues abound. The one element that disrupts this chromatic congruence is the red carnation in O’Leary’s hand. As in a number of Dalí’s other portraits, such as those of Mitzi Sigall and Josephine Hartford Bryce, the blossom likely carries the traditional connotation of marital fidelity and conjugal love.
Records show that on March 31, 1954, Portrait of Mrs. Reeves was sold to Mrs. Reeves by M. Knoedler & Co. for US $15,000, or about $165,500 today. [Consignment book: S2501-S6608 in GRI Special Collections, S2639]. Portrait of Mrs. Reeves was only publicly exhibited once, at the Parrish Art Museum, Southampton, in August of 1958. Sister Rose Pacatte, the subject’s grand-niece and goddaughter, kept a photograph of Lydia which was almost certainly taken at this exhibition. In it Lydia is dressed in an elegant lace cocktail dress, and stands by her portrait. In one hand she holds her purse, while with the other, she has discreetly extended her middle finger below the canvas. Noting that it would not have been out of character for her great-aunt, Sister Rose suggests this “up yours” gesture may have to do with the fact that the portrait process had not been easy for Lydia, as Dalí had reportedly thrown "temper tantrums" during the process. Whatever she may have felt about the artist or the work, relatives recall that Lydia kept it hanging in the foyer of her Park Avenue apartment.[42] Indeed, while the birth of the work may not have been an easy one, Portrait of Mrs. Reeves is certainly one of Dalí’s most flattering commissions.
Lydia stands with her arms at her sides, and turns her face toward the viewer. She dons two thin strands of pearls, and a tightly-fitted copper-coloured décolleté gown which matches the colour of her hair and showcases her shapely figure. Draped implausibly upon her right arm, and seeming to defy gravity, is a blue shawl, which trails upon the ground. The overall effect of Dalí’s colour scheme and placement is one of visual harmony with the landscape, where complimentary blues, coppers and golden hues abound. The one element that disrupts this chromatic congruence is the red carnation in O’Leary’s hand. As in a number of Dalí’s other portraits, such as those of Mitzi Sigall and Josephine Hartford Bryce, the blossom likely carries the traditional connotation of marital fidelity and conjugal love.
Records show that on March 31, 1954, Portrait of Mrs. Reeves was sold to Mrs. Reeves by M. Knoedler & Co. for US $15,000, or about $165,500 today. [Consignment book: S2501-S6608 in GRI Special Collections, S2639]. Portrait of Mrs. Reeves was only publicly exhibited once, at the Parrish Art Museum, Southampton, in August of 1958. Sister Rose Pacatte, the subject’s grand-niece and goddaughter, kept a photograph of Lydia which was almost certainly taken at this exhibition. In it Lydia is dressed in an elegant lace cocktail dress, and stands by her portrait. In one hand she holds her purse, while with the other, she has discreetly extended her middle finger below the canvas. Noting that it would not have been out of character for her great-aunt, Sister Rose suggests this “up yours” gesture may have to do with the fact that the portrait process had not been easy for Lydia, as Dalí had reportedly thrown "temper tantrums" during the process. Whatever she may have felt about the artist or the work, relatives recall that Lydia kept it hanging in the foyer of her Park Avenue apartment.[42] Indeed, while the birth of the work may not have been an easy one, Portrait of Mrs. Reeves is certainly one of Dalí’s most flattering commissions.
Portrait of Elsa Maxwell, 1954.
Produced for her book I Married the World, published by William Heinemann, Ltd, 1955.
Original probably sanguine and ink on paper. Whereabouts of original unknown.
Produced for her book I Married the World, published by William Heinemann, Ltd, 1955.
Original probably sanguine and ink on paper. Whereabouts of original unknown.
In addition to his portraits in oil and sketches intended for display in people’s homes, Dalí also produced the occasional likeness among his illustrations for books. For showman Billy Rose’s humorous 1946 memoir Wine, Women and Words, for example, Dalí produced sketches of Rose and his wife of the time, Olympic swimmer and water performer Eleanor Holmes. While there were rough sketches based on publicity photographs, and hardly worthy of the title “portrait,” the opposite can be said about Dalí’s charming 1954 frontispiece illustration of Elsa Maxwell, the “irrepressible nobody” who became one of the best-known celebrities of mid-20th century America.[43] A self-described “daughter of an unsuccessful insurance man from Keokuk, Iowa,” this short, overweight lesbian, lacking breeding, education, money and conventional beauty, rose to become one of the most influential society women of all through the sheer power of personality and pluck. A society columnist, author, songwriter, actress, and party planner extraordinaire, she hosted events, openings and soirées for movie stars, socialites, aristocrats, and royalty. [44]
Claiming to have been born in a theatre, in the middle of a performance of the opera Mignon, culture, society, and performing were in Elsa’s blood. She acted on stage and appeared as herself in a handful of Hollywood movies such as Elsa Maxwell’s Hotel for Women. She wrote hit songs, penned how-to books, met everyone from Einstein to Marilyn Monroe, hosted the most delightful and extravagant parties, and became a regular on television in the 1950s and ‘60s. She knew everyone who was anyone and, deciding from a young age not to marry, she claimed instead that she “married the world.”[45]
I Married the World was, in fact, the title of the immensely entertaining autobiography she published in 1955, for which she had Dalí limn the frontispiece. A lively drawing in sanguine and ink, Dalí presented Elsa’s silhouette as if it had been struck onto a medallion. This was a wise choice, as it helped the artist avoid depicting Elsa’s notorious corpulence, and instead of creating an accurate or idealized likeness, Dalí has instead decided to lend the hostess dignity and an air of social rank on a stately roundel. While a respectful and quite accurate likeness, Dalí also inserts one of his trademark ants, in back, which creates a trompe l’oeil effect.[46]
By the time Dalí executed this image of Maxwell, the two were fond acquaintances, enough that she notes her gratitude to the Dalís as a dedication in the book. “My grateful thanks to Salvador Dalí for his frontispiece drawing,” she writes, “and to his wife, Gala, who has always been his inspiration.”[47] But while things were evidently most congenial between the two at this point, this was not always the case, and Elsa, in fact, savaged Dalí’s earlier efforts in a review of his first portrait show at the Knoedler Gallery in 1943. This piece appeared in one of her syndicated columns, Elsa Maxwell's Particles, which bears the headline, “Dalí-ing with Democracy.”[48]
Maxwell begins her critique of the show by praising the artist’s technique, saying he has “almost achieved the surface perfection of a Mantegna or Francesca,” but then quickly adds that “the newest added horror to gazing at Dalí's paintings of their grotesque, decadent nudes and perverse symbolism is having to read the artist’ own interpretations of his work . . . ” Next she highlights Dalí’s admiration of Franco, and hints at more sinister fascist leanings — hence the title of the column, “Dalí-ing with Democracy.” What follows is her opinion that Dalí has painted the eleven portraits “faultlessly, as always. His ideal in portraiture is to establish a rapport of fatality between each of the different personalities and their backgrounds.” If this is the case, however, she points out that his subjects “should sue the artist for libel,” as Dalí has painted them with “no animation, personality or thought behind their blank faces.” Worst of all, she writes, “Dalí has good reason to laugh at us who pay so dearly to be ridiculed in oils.”[49]
Despite this scathing review of Dalí's first portrait exhibition, twelve years later, the artist seems to have forgotten the socialite’s condemnation as, indeed, had Maxwell herself, bravely setting herself up to be “ridiculed in oil” — or at least in sanguine on paper. From period photographs, it is evident that both celebrities, with their lust for life, love of society, and genius for showmanship, had eventually found common ground and forged a genuine friendship.
Claiming to have been born in a theatre, in the middle of a performance of the opera Mignon, culture, society, and performing were in Elsa’s blood. She acted on stage and appeared as herself in a handful of Hollywood movies such as Elsa Maxwell’s Hotel for Women. She wrote hit songs, penned how-to books, met everyone from Einstein to Marilyn Monroe, hosted the most delightful and extravagant parties, and became a regular on television in the 1950s and ‘60s. She knew everyone who was anyone and, deciding from a young age not to marry, she claimed instead that she “married the world.”[45]
I Married the World was, in fact, the title of the immensely entertaining autobiography she published in 1955, for which she had Dalí limn the frontispiece. A lively drawing in sanguine and ink, Dalí presented Elsa’s silhouette as if it had been struck onto a medallion. This was a wise choice, as it helped the artist avoid depicting Elsa’s notorious corpulence, and instead of creating an accurate or idealized likeness, Dalí has instead decided to lend the hostess dignity and an air of social rank on a stately roundel. While a respectful and quite accurate likeness, Dalí also inserts one of his trademark ants, in back, which creates a trompe l’oeil effect.[46]
By the time Dalí executed this image of Maxwell, the two were fond acquaintances, enough that she notes her gratitude to the Dalís as a dedication in the book. “My grateful thanks to Salvador Dalí for his frontispiece drawing,” she writes, “and to his wife, Gala, who has always been his inspiration.”[47] But while things were evidently most congenial between the two at this point, this was not always the case, and Elsa, in fact, savaged Dalí’s earlier efforts in a review of his first portrait show at the Knoedler Gallery in 1943. This piece appeared in one of her syndicated columns, Elsa Maxwell's Particles, which bears the headline, “Dalí-ing with Democracy.”[48]
Maxwell begins her critique of the show by praising the artist’s technique, saying he has “almost achieved the surface perfection of a Mantegna or Francesca,” but then quickly adds that “the newest added horror to gazing at Dalí's paintings of their grotesque, decadent nudes and perverse symbolism is having to read the artist’ own interpretations of his work . . . ” Next she highlights Dalí’s admiration of Franco, and hints at more sinister fascist leanings — hence the title of the column, “Dalí-ing with Democracy.” What follows is her opinion that Dalí has painted the eleven portraits “faultlessly, as always. His ideal in portraiture is to establish a rapport of fatality between each of the different personalities and their backgrounds.” If this is the case, however, she points out that his subjects “should sue the artist for libel,” as Dalí has painted them with “no animation, personality or thought behind their blank faces.” Worst of all, she writes, “Dalí has good reason to laugh at us who pay so dearly to be ridiculed in oils.”[49]
Despite this scathing review of Dalí's first portrait exhibition, twelve years later, the artist seems to have forgotten the socialite’s condemnation as, indeed, had Maxwell herself, bravely setting herself up to be “ridiculed in oil” — or at least in sanguine on paper. From period photographs, it is evident that both celebrities, with their lust for life, love of society, and genius for showmanship, had eventually found common ground and forged a genuine friendship.
Salvador Dalí sketching Elsa Maxwell, 1954.
Image rights of Salvador Dalí reserved. Fundació Gala-Salvador Dalí, Figueres, 2023.
Image rights of Salvador Dalí reserved. Fundació Gala-Salvador Dalí, Figueres, 2023.
Elsa Maxwell sitting for Salvador Dalí on the cover of a Swedish magazine, June 1955.
Author's collection.
Author's collection.
Click here to view portrait.
Portrait of Dolores Suero Falla, 1955.
Oil on canvas, 117.5 x 92.6 cm (46.45” x 36.61”).
Carlos and Rosa de la Cruz Collection, Miami Florida.
Oil on canvas, 117.5 x 92.6 cm (46.45” x 36.61”).
Carlos and Rosa de la Cruz Collection, Miami Florida.
One of Dalí’s next commissions was his Portrait of Dolores Suero Falla, a three-quarter length likeness he produced in 1955. Dolores Suero Falla, known by her family as “Lolo,” was born in Cuba in 1918 to the Falla Bonet family. One of the wealthiest families in Cuba, they owned land and sugar mills there, while other interests are still maintained elsewhere today by the family, which now lives in the U.S.[50] The family also has a long tradition of philanthropy, and in 1926, Lolo’s grandmother, Dolores Falla Bonet, founded La Liga Contra el Cancer (the League against Cancer) in Havana, an organization which provided the model for a similar group begun in Miami in 1975.[51]
The subject’s son, Carlos M. de la Cruz, Sr., is a businessman, community leader and, with his wife Rosa, an important collector of contemporary art in Miami Florida. He explains that Dalí painted the portrait in 1955 when Dolores was living in New York City, and that the artist visited her several times and made informal sketches while they chatted. The only time she formally sat was in fact not until the portrait had been completed, and Dalí wanted to verify it before delivery. That said, her son believes that Dalí still very much captured her expression and personality.[52] Considering the accuracy and detail of the portrait, it is likely the artist supplemented his sketches with photographs, as he frequently did. In fact, an existing letter sent to Dalí from Lolo’s mother Sra. Isabel Falla in Havana, in March, 1955 records a discussion about the exchange of a photograph with the artist. It also mentions the price of the commission, which was $9,000; that is, Dalí’s usual price at that time for a bust, and extra for the hands.[53]
In Portrait of Dolores Suero Falla, Lolo appears as a woman of thirty-seven with a creamy complexion, a pleasant oval face and short, glossy, dark brown hair with golden highlights. Her graceful arms are bare, and through her elegant pointing gesture, much emphasis is placed on her carefully manicured hands and nails embellished with burgundy polish. According to de la Cruz, “The background, dress and jewelry of this portrait were all a product of [Dalí’s] imagination. The artist imagined her wearing a gown of tulle and lace, and a three-strand pearl necklace, and a single pearl earring,” which, he suggests, brings to mind Vermeer’s famous Girl with a Pearl Earring.[54] Delores remained fit and youthful until she passed away at the age of seventy four, and her son notes that the portrait closely resembled her until the end of her life.
The background of Portrait of Dolores Suero Falla is characterized by Dalí’s typical Port Lligat-inspired landscape, and while the artist is surprisingly subtle here, the work is rich in Christian symbolism. Besides his standard light and dark cloud formations at the top of the canvas, he has added rays of sunshine beaming into a vaguely-halo-shaped cloud above the sitter’s head, implying Lolo is a divine being. Behind her is a fisherman with a net, recalling Matthew 4:19, wherein Jesus sees his future apostles Peter and Andrew fishing, and calls to them saying “Come, I will make you fishers of men.”[55] The dolphin, which Dalí has placed conspicuously on the classically-carved stone slab on which Lolo sits, is another potent Christian emblem, representing resurrection and salvation.[56]
Finally, with Lolo gently pointing to it, stands a nautilus cup. This object, made from the shell of the nautilus mollusk, is frequently found in post-Renaissance Dutch and Flemish painting as a sign of wealth (which it may well indicate here), and is also an emblem of beauty, perfection and cosmic order.[57] In the 1950s Dalí spoke and wrote frequently about the spiral, and was well aware of the “sacred geometry” of the Phi spiral, approximated by the nautilus shell.[58] Regarding one of his later assemblages, which features a similar shell, he is recorded as saying, “the gnomic growth of the nautilus . . . was considered by God as accomplished at the time when it fell in love with the angels.”[59]
“After staying for a short time at mother’s New York apartment,” de la Cruz chronicles the history of the portrait, stating “the painting was hung at my grandmother, Isabel Falla de Suero’s home in Havana, where we all lived.” It seems the canvas had been commissioned specifically to hang in this house, which was designed in the 1920s by Carrère and Hastings, a fashionable Beaux-Arts design firm located in New York. “When our family left Cuba as exiles in 1960, the portrait was installed in [Carlos and Rosa’s] New York apartment,” he recounts. “Later, mother took it to her home in Madrid, where it remained until the end of her life.”[60] Today the work takes pride of place in the Carlos and Rosa de la Cruz Collection, a private, Miami-based art museum run by Carlos and his wife Rosa.
The subject’s son, Carlos M. de la Cruz, Sr., is a businessman, community leader and, with his wife Rosa, an important collector of contemporary art in Miami Florida. He explains that Dalí painted the portrait in 1955 when Dolores was living in New York City, and that the artist visited her several times and made informal sketches while they chatted. The only time she formally sat was in fact not until the portrait had been completed, and Dalí wanted to verify it before delivery. That said, her son believes that Dalí still very much captured her expression and personality.[52] Considering the accuracy and detail of the portrait, it is likely the artist supplemented his sketches with photographs, as he frequently did. In fact, an existing letter sent to Dalí from Lolo’s mother Sra. Isabel Falla in Havana, in March, 1955 records a discussion about the exchange of a photograph with the artist. It also mentions the price of the commission, which was $9,000; that is, Dalí’s usual price at that time for a bust, and extra for the hands.[53]
In Portrait of Dolores Suero Falla, Lolo appears as a woman of thirty-seven with a creamy complexion, a pleasant oval face and short, glossy, dark brown hair with golden highlights. Her graceful arms are bare, and through her elegant pointing gesture, much emphasis is placed on her carefully manicured hands and nails embellished with burgundy polish. According to de la Cruz, “The background, dress and jewelry of this portrait were all a product of [Dalí’s] imagination. The artist imagined her wearing a gown of tulle and lace, and a three-strand pearl necklace, and a single pearl earring,” which, he suggests, brings to mind Vermeer’s famous Girl with a Pearl Earring.[54] Delores remained fit and youthful until she passed away at the age of seventy four, and her son notes that the portrait closely resembled her until the end of her life.
The background of Portrait of Dolores Suero Falla is characterized by Dalí’s typical Port Lligat-inspired landscape, and while the artist is surprisingly subtle here, the work is rich in Christian symbolism. Besides his standard light and dark cloud formations at the top of the canvas, he has added rays of sunshine beaming into a vaguely-halo-shaped cloud above the sitter’s head, implying Lolo is a divine being. Behind her is a fisherman with a net, recalling Matthew 4:19, wherein Jesus sees his future apostles Peter and Andrew fishing, and calls to them saying “Come, I will make you fishers of men.”[55] The dolphin, which Dalí has placed conspicuously on the classically-carved stone slab on which Lolo sits, is another potent Christian emblem, representing resurrection and salvation.[56]
Finally, with Lolo gently pointing to it, stands a nautilus cup. This object, made from the shell of the nautilus mollusk, is frequently found in post-Renaissance Dutch and Flemish painting as a sign of wealth (which it may well indicate here), and is also an emblem of beauty, perfection and cosmic order.[57] In the 1950s Dalí spoke and wrote frequently about the spiral, and was well aware of the “sacred geometry” of the Phi spiral, approximated by the nautilus shell.[58] Regarding one of his later assemblages, which features a similar shell, he is recorded as saying, “the gnomic growth of the nautilus . . . was considered by God as accomplished at the time when it fell in love with the angels.”[59]
“After staying for a short time at mother’s New York apartment,” de la Cruz chronicles the history of the portrait, stating “the painting was hung at my grandmother, Isabel Falla de Suero’s home in Havana, where we all lived.” It seems the canvas had been commissioned specifically to hang in this house, which was designed in the 1920s by Carrère and Hastings, a fashionable Beaux-Arts design firm located in New York. “When our family left Cuba as exiles in 1960, the portrait was installed in [Carlos and Rosa’s] New York apartment,” he recounts. “Later, mother took it to her home in Madrid, where it remained until the end of her life.”[60] Today the work takes pride of place in the Carlos and Rosa de la Cruz Collection, a private, Miami-based art museum run by Carlos and his wife Rosa.
Permission pending.
Portrait of Abbey Kissel Starr, circa 1955
Oil on canvas, approx. 22 x 28”.
Private Collection.
Oil on canvas, approx. 22 x 28”.
Private Collection.
On February 11, 1955, Dali signed a contract to paint the portrait of Abbey Kissel Starr (1917 – 2005), a descendent of the Vanderbilt family on the side of her father, William Thorn Kissel, the great-grandson of American business magnate Cornelius Vanderbilt.[61] The document specifies a bust-length portrait, the dimensions of the work, and a fee of $8,000. Signed by Abbey’s mother, Mrs. W. Thorn Kissel, it suggests the work was commissioned by her parents, or perhaps just her mother.[62]
One of three children, Abbey was born in New York, and was a lifelong resident of Far Hills in Somerset County, New Jersey. No ordinary address, this pastoral “bastion of old money,” was home to some of the wealthiest families in the country. Built up by industrialists and wealthy businessmen who wanted to emulate the English aristocracy, they built “colonies,” that were punctuated by grand country houses on sprawling estates – all within close proximity to New York City. This “landed gentry of the Somerset Hills,” as they were considered, included great families such as the Astors, the Drydens, the Pfizers, and the Forbes. Being among these ranks, in 1918 Abbey’s father purchased a Tudor-style mansion called October House, which originally included five hundred acres of land. The Kissels changed the name to Foxwood, in reference to the fox hunting that was a grand feature of the area. To this day fox hunting and equestrian sports, together with golf, mark the area as a playground for privilege.[63] Abbey’s father was an avid polo player, and introduced the sport to the area. He maintained a polo field on the grounds of his estate, and in 1930, founded the Burnt Mills Polo Club.[64]
In 1940 Abbey married into another affluent family, that of Louis Starr, whose father was one-time president of the First National Bank and Trust Company of Ridgefield, Connecticut. Among other accomplishments, Louis was associated with Laidlaw & Company in New York City, and had served as Lt. Colonel of the 8th Air Force in England during WWII. When Louis’ father’s died, his son inherited a considerable fortune, and needless to say, he and Abbey were very nicely set up.[65] Together they had one son and one daughter.[66]
Dali’s portrait of Abbey Kissel Starr is one of his most conventional. Devoid of Surrealist touches, one might never suspect it was painted by the self-styled “world’s most famous Surrealist.” The subject was in her late thirties when the work was executed, and with her composed demeanor and head held high, Abbey appears very much a lady. She was said to be very beautiful, with chiseled features, which are evident here set off by her rather shortly-cropped brown hair swept off her forehead.[67] That said, the sharp shadows on her face distort her features somewhat, especially around her nose, indicating a strong light source from above. As it is unlikely the artist would have chosen to position Abbey with such unflattering lighting, this suggests that Dali worked from a photograph. Notably, the shadows are not carried through in the rest of the painting or on the subject’s body.
Abbey is depicted in Dali’s customary décolleté, and it is not clear if she is wearing an actual dress, one from the artist’s imagination, or Dali’s favorite gold satin wrap, draped to look like a gown and held together with a brooch at the bustline. This jewel is complemented with pearls in Abbey’s ears, a ring, bracelet, and brooch – all understated, but enough to suggest a woman of means. Under the subject’s left arm is a swath of blue fabric which, together with the gold, blends with the blue sky and sand-hued background, harmonizing with the natural surroundings. Dali has employed his favoured backdrop of a deep blue sky, with a dark cloud on the left, and a body of white clouds to the right. Behind Abbey runs the requisite landscape with mountainous outcroppings on either side. The background is exceptionally sparse, not even featuring one or two of the artist’s habitual figures walking about, and only a horse and rider are given in the middle ground, providing a sense of scale. While not an unusual addition for a Dali portrait, in this case the equestrian feature has added meaning, considering Abbey’s connection with the “horsey set” of the Somerset region.
Not an unflattering likeness by any means, the portrait does not reveal much about the sitter, or Dali’s view of her, as he invariably implied in other portraits using poignant iconography, or caricatural rendering. Indeed, the written records suggests that the Starrs kept very much to themselves, rarely appearing in the papers, attending large functions, or lending any cause for comment outside their social circle. This preference for a low profile is evident in correspondence written in 1984 between Reynolds Morse, co-founder of the Dali Museum in Florida, and Walter B. Terry, a New Jersey banker and family friend representing the Starrs. Morse, who was attempting to secure an image of the work for a compendium of Dalí’s portraits, writes in response to a request to keep the subject’s identity anonymous, “It would be solely for the Dalí Museum archives. If a catalogue of Dalí portraits would ever be made, it could be included without any name or title as requested.”[68] This does not necessarily mean the family did not like the work, however, as it hung for many years in a place of honour in the Starr’s dining room.[69]
One of three children, Abbey was born in New York, and was a lifelong resident of Far Hills in Somerset County, New Jersey. No ordinary address, this pastoral “bastion of old money,” was home to some of the wealthiest families in the country. Built up by industrialists and wealthy businessmen who wanted to emulate the English aristocracy, they built “colonies,” that were punctuated by grand country houses on sprawling estates – all within close proximity to New York City. This “landed gentry of the Somerset Hills,” as they were considered, included great families such as the Astors, the Drydens, the Pfizers, and the Forbes. Being among these ranks, in 1918 Abbey’s father purchased a Tudor-style mansion called October House, which originally included five hundred acres of land. The Kissels changed the name to Foxwood, in reference to the fox hunting that was a grand feature of the area. To this day fox hunting and equestrian sports, together with golf, mark the area as a playground for privilege.[63] Abbey’s father was an avid polo player, and introduced the sport to the area. He maintained a polo field on the grounds of his estate, and in 1930, founded the Burnt Mills Polo Club.[64]
In 1940 Abbey married into another affluent family, that of Louis Starr, whose father was one-time president of the First National Bank and Trust Company of Ridgefield, Connecticut. Among other accomplishments, Louis was associated with Laidlaw & Company in New York City, and had served as Lt. Colonel of the 8th Air Force in England during WWII. When Louis’ father’s died, his son inherited a considerable fortune, and needless to say, he and Abbey were very nicely set up.[65] Together they had one son and one daughter.[66]
Dali’s portrait of Abbey Kissel Starr is one of his most conventional. Devoid of Surrealist touches, one might never suspect it was painted by the self-styled “world’s most famous Surrealist.” The subject was in her late thirties when the work was executed, and with her composed demeanor and head held high, Abbey appears very much a lady. She was said to be very beautiful, with chiseled features, which are evident here set off by her rather shortly-cropped brown hair swept off her forehead.[67] That said, the sharp shadows on her face distort her features somewhat, especially around her nose, indicating a strong light source from above. As it is unlikely the artist would have chosen to position Abbey with such unflattering lighting, this suggests that Dali worked from a photograph. Notably, the shadows are not carried through in the rest of the painting or on the subject’s body.
Abbey is depicted in Dali’s customary décolleté, and it is not clear if she is wearing an actual dress, one from the artist’s imagination, or Dali’s favorite gold satin wrap, draped to look like a gown and held together with a brooch at the bustline. This jewel is complemented with pearls in Abbey’s ears, a ring, bracelet, and brooch – all understated, but enough to suggest a woman of means. Under the subject’s left arm is a swath of blue fabric which, together with the gold, blends with the blue sky and sand-hued background, harmonizing with the natural surroundings. Dali has employed his favoured backdrop of a deep blue sky, with a dark cloud on the left, and a body of white clouds to the right. Behind Abbey runs the requisite landscape with mountainous outcroppings on either side. The background is exceptionally sparse, not even featuring one or two of the artist’s habitual figures walking about, and only a horse and rider are given in the middle ground, providing a sense of scale. While not an unusual addition for a Dali portrait, in this case the equestrian feature has added meaning, considering Abbey’s connection with the “horsey set” of the Somerset region.
Not an unflattering likeness by any means, the portrait does not reveal much about the sitter, or Dali’s view of her, as he invariably implied in other portraits using poignant iconography, or caricatural rendering. Indeed, the written records suggests that the Starrs kept very much to themselves, rarely appearing in the papers, attending large functions, or lending any cause for comment outside their social circle. This preference for a low profile is evident in correspondence written in 1984 between Reynolds Morse, co-founder of the Dali Museum in Florida, and Walter B. Terry, a New Jersey banker and family friend representing the Starrs. Morse, who was attempting to secure an image of the work for a compendium of Dalí’s portraits, writes in response to a request to keep the subject’s identity anonymous, “It would be solely for the Dalí Museum archives. If a catalogue of Dalí portraits would ever be made, it could be included without any name or title as requested.”[68] This does not necessarily mean the family did not like the work, however, as it hung for many years in a place of honour in the Starr’s dining room.[69]
Portrait of Eleanor Lambert, 1956.
Watercolour, pencil, sanguine/paper, 68.5x58.8 cm. (27x23 1/6 in.).
Signed, dated (on rock, 1956).
Sold at Sotheby’s New York, November 03, 2005.
Watercolour, pencil, sanguine/paper, 68.5x58.8 cm. (27x23 1/6 in.).
Signed, dated (on rock, 1956).
Sold at Sotheby’s New York, November 03, 2005.
In 1956, Dalí produced another portrait drawing similar, although less detailed, to The Medusa of 1950. Featuring an attractive wavy-haired femme d’un certain âge in a sparse landscape, it is believed to depict Eleanor Lambert (1903 – 2003), a key figure in twentieth-century New York. Known unofficially as the “Empress of Fashion,” the Indiana-born Lambert became a great art, fashion, and public relations promoter and innovator during her long residence in New York City. According to her biographer and former protégé John Tiffany, “Eleanor Lambert lived to be one hundred years old and she spent more than seventy of those years tirelessly creating the institutions, the legends and the spectacular events that put American fashion on the map and changed the way the whole world views and experiences fashion.”[70]
Eleanor Lambert in the 1950s.
Lambert’s career began with her conducting publicity for books and authors, then shifted to art galleries and artists. Originally holding ambitions to be a sculptor, she became highly engaged with the art world, and among the artists she represented during her career were such notables as Jackson Pollock, Jacob Epstein, Isamu Noguchi, and Dalí.[71] Just a few of her many accomplishments in this milieu were working as the original public relations director for the new Whitney Museum of American Art, helping to found the Museum of Modern Art, and being instrumental in establishing the Art Dealers Association of America.[72]
Lambert was married twice, and her first husband was architect Willis Conner. After their divorce, in 1936 she married journalist and newspaper executive Seymour Berkson, who died in 1959. She had one son with Berkson, the poet and art critic Bill Berkson.[73] As her career progressed, she moved more deeply into the world of fashion, where she was a great mover, shaker and innovator. She is, for example, credited with elevating the status of American mode and couture internationally, and enthusiastically promoting American and other designers such as Halston, Oscar de la Renta, Anne Klein, Hattie Carnegie, Christian Lacroix and Donna Karan. Among her many other achievements, in 1940 she initiated the International Best-Dressed List, and some years later, Fashion Week, in NYC, Paris, and Rome, and was instrumental in the establishment of the London chapter. Lambert also helped instigate the prestigious Coty Fashion Critics’ Awards for design excellence, begun in 1943, and in 1962 she started the Council of Fashion Designers of America.[74]
From 1945 to 1960, when Lambert was helping produce the annual fashion show for the polio victim support charity the March of Dimes, Dalí was among those commissioned to create graphics and stage sets. According to Tiffany, Dalí was extremely keen about this role, and practically begged Lambert for the commission “as a friend and client.”[75] His choice of imagery for the charity included floating armchairs and butterflies, and in 1954, a Winged Victory to symbolize health, mobility, and the victory over polio.[76]
Lambert ardently courted the media to promote art, fashion, and its makers, and was often paid in kind by struggling or out-of-pocket artists. Consequently, she amassed an impressive collection of artwork, much of which was kept in her New York office.[77i] Tiffany reveals that Dalí was one of her clients who occasionally fell short on cash payments. Instead, he explains, the artist paid her with art, which may have included the portrait in question.[78] Lambert also owned another notable Dalí, a 1953 butterfly-themed collage with ink and watercolor. This was hung above the fireplace in her bedroom, and is owned today by her grandson.[79]
Portrait of a Woman in a Landscape is a simple sanguine drawing punctuated with light blue touches of watercolour over low mountains at the horizon line. Aiding the perspectival illusion is a tiny figure in the middle ground to the left, holding a fishing net, as in Portrait of Dolores Suero Falla of the previous year. To the right is a rock with a flat surface, upon which the artist inscribed his signature, and the year 1956. Lambert’s décolleté garment is merely implied, although her son Bill has noted that the neckline is similar to a dress of hers, believed to have been designed by Charles James.[80] Although the artist sketched the subject’s face with a certain amount of detail, he greatly simplified her features. Yet while these are merely implied, both Tiffany and Bill Berkson believe the portrait ably captures this extraordinary woman’s likeness and essence.[81]
Lambert was married twice, and her first husband was architect Willis Conner. After their divorce, in 1936 she married journalist and newspaper executive Seymour Berkson, who died in 1959. She had one son with Berkson, the poet and art critic Bill Berkson.[73] As her career progressed, she moved more deeply into the world of fashion, where she was a great mover, shaker and innovator. She is, for example, credited with elevating the status of American mode and couture internationally, and enthusiastically promoting American and other designers such as Halston, Oscar de la Renta, Anne Klein, Hattie Carnegie, Christian Lacroix and Donna Karan. Among her many other achievements, in 1940 she initiated the International Best-Dressed List, and some years later, Fashion Week, in NYC, Paris, and Rome, and was instrumental in the establishment of the London chapter. Lambert also helped instigate the prestigious Coty Fashion Critics’ Awards for design excellence, begun in 1943, and in 1962 she started the Council of Fashion Designers of America.[74]
From 1945 to 1960, when Lambert was helping produce the annual fashion show for the polio victim support charity the March of Dimes, Dalí was among those commissioned to create graphics and stage sets. According to Tiffany, Dalí was extremely keen about this role, and practically begged Lambert for the commission “as a friend and client.”[75] His choice of imagery for the charity included floating armchairs and butterflies, and in 1954, a Winged Victory to symbolize health, mobility, and the victory over polio.[76]
Lambert ardently courted the media to promote art, fashion, and its makers, and was often paid in kind by struggling or out-of-pocket artists. Consequently, she amassed an impressive collection of artwork, much of which was kept in her New York office.[77i] Tiffany reveals that Dalí was one of her clients who occasionally fell short on cash payments. Instead, he explains, the artist paid her with art, which may have included the portrait in question.[78] Lambert also owned another notable Dalí, a 1953 butterfly-themed collage with ink and watercolor. This was hung above the fireplace in her bedroom, and is owned today by her grandson.[79]
Portrait of a Woman in a Landscape is a simple sanguine drawing punctuated with light blue touches of watercolour over low mountains at the horizon line. Aiding the perspectival illusion is a tiny figure in the middle ground to the left, holding a fishing net, as in Portrait of Dolores Suero Falla of the previous year. To the right is a rock with a flat surface, upon which the artist inscribed his signature, and the year 1956. Lambert’s décolleté garment is merely implied, although her son Bill has noted that the neckline is similar to a dress of hers, believed to have been designed by Charles James.[80] Although the artist sketched the subject’s face with a certain amount of detail, he greatly simplified her features. Yet while these are merely implied, both Tiffany and Bill Berkson believe the portrait ably captures this extraordinary woman’s likeness and essence.[81]
Eleanor Lambert with her husband Seymour Berkson, 1950s.
Photo courtesy of Bill Berkson.
Photo courtesy of Bill Berkson.
A Portrait of Madame X, 1954, as it appeared in Australian Magazine, Feb. 8, 1955.
Medium, whereabouts unknown.
Medium, whereabouts unknown.
Alongside Dali's other styles and experiments in painting, in 1950 the artist had begun what is known as his "Nuclear Mysticism" phase. This was an epic style informed by molecular biology and physics, combined with the artist's growing interest in grandiose religious subjects. The Nuclear Mystical works were characterized by fragmented particles and vortices, which would often make up images in the manner of rounded pixels, evidently referring to atomic particles. Dali created a few faces in this mode, most notably of Gala, or based on Renaissance images of the Madonna.
Notable here is a work that is today known as Mystery of the Spheres, with an estimated date of 1952. Yet when a photo of the work appeared in an article on Dali in Australian Magazine, Feb. 8, 1955, it was described as A Portrait of Madame X. The text beneath says "A Portrait of Madame X was one of Dali's recent commissions. He is highly paid for his portraits, spends considerable time in the US painting them."[82]
Notable here is a work that is today known as Mystery of the Spheres, with an estimated date of 1952. Yet when a photo of the work appeared in an article on Dali in Australian Magazine, Feb. 8, 1955, it was described as A Portrait of Madame X. The text beneath says "A Portrait of Madame X was one of Dali's recent commissions. He is highly paid for his portraits, spends considerable time in the US painting them."[82]
If this was a commissioned portrait then, who might the subject be? And why was her identity withheld? A possible prospect is suggested by a March 1954 letter in the Gala-Salvador Dali Archives. This is addressed to Dali, and is from Igor Markevitch, the famed Russian composer, then living in London, England. It mentions Dali doing a portrait of Markevitch's wife, Topazia. Markevitch was originally married to Kyra Nijinsky, daughter of the famous ballet dancer Vaslav Nijinsky. Donna Topazia Caetani (1921 - 1990), who came from a noble Italian family, was the composer's second wife.
Topazia Caetani Markevitch
A Portrait of Madame X was first shown in Italy in 1954. As Topazia was Italian, and Markevitch had became an Italian citizen, it might explain the Italian connection. Also the couple later moved to Switzerland, and the composer had ties to Brussels, where the portrait, renamed, was eventually sold some years later. One of the owners of the painting, it should be noted, was Count Theo Rossi, an Italian of whom Dalí also painted a portrait. Unfortunately, Igor and Topazia's son relays that he never heard mention of such a portrait being done of his mother. However, both his parents were acquainted with Dali, and he does not rule out this being a portrait of his mother.[83] This does not, of course, make this an "American" portrait, but it is not certain Madame X is indeed Topazia, and until more evidence comes to light, the subject of A Portrait of Madame X/Mystery of the Spheres will remain a mystery. The fact that Dali's American portraits are mentioned in the caption below A Portrait of Madame X, does suggest an American connection, however, making it worth a mention here. What we do know is that the client did not appear to want to be identified, and perhaps the piece was resold either because they did not like it, could not afford it, or for some other reason. Changing the name, as Dali did with his Portrait of Marie-Thérèse Nichols, of 1950, to The Medusa, would certainly make a very specific portrait more attractive to a new buyer.
Australian Magazine, Feb. 8, 1955.
A Portrait of Madame X appears bottom, right.
A Portrait of Madame X appears bottom, right.
ENDNOTES
[1] Iris Nowell, Women Who Give Away Millions: Portraits of Canadian Philanthropists (Toronto: Dundurn Press, 1996), 4.
[2] Nowell, Women Who Give Away Millions, 5.
[3] Nowell, Women Who Give Away Millions, 5. Becoming a shrewd businesswoman, early on Chrostophor invested all her personal savings in De Beers stock, which grew tenfold. Then, based on a tip-off, she bet the entire amount on a horse race, resulting in an enormous win.
[4] Johanna Rowe, “Dunn Impact on Regions Far from Done — Many Monuments Remain,” Saultstar.com, February 26, 2012, accessed April 15, 2015, http://www.saultstar.com/2012/02/25/dunn-impact-on-region-far-from-done-many-monuments-remain.
[5] Nowell, Women Who Give Away Millions, 15; “Dayspring,” The Oppenheimer-Prager Museum at Dayspring, accessed April 15, 2015, http://www.museumatdayspring.org/dayspring/.
[6] Nowell, Women Who Give Away Millions, 15-16.
[7] Nowell, Women Who Give Away Millions, 17, 27.
[8] Nowell, Women Who Give Away Millions, 29, 33.
[9] “Max Aitken, Lord Beaverbrook,” The Canadian Encyclopedia, Historic Canada, accessed April 15, 2015, http://www.thecanadianencyclopedia.ca/en/article/max-aitken-lord-beaverbrook/.
[10] “Max Aitken, Lord Beaverbrook,” The Canadian Encyclopedia.
[11] “Max Aitken, Lord Beaverbrook,” The Canadian Encyclopedia.
[12] Rowe, “Dunn Impact on Regions Far from Done.”
[13]Salvador Dalí, Next Exposition of the Latest Portraits by Dalí,” Dalí News: Monarch of the Dailies (Dalí Mirror Incorporated), Tuesday November 20, 1945, p. 4.
[14] Shearer West, Portraiture (Oxford and New York: Oxford University Press, 2004), 77.
[15] Nowell, Women Who Give Away Millions, 5.
[16] Ian Lumsden, “Equestrian Fantasy: Lady Dunn, by Salvador Dali,” The New Brunswick Reader, March 28, 1998, 21.
[17] Lord Beaverbrook, Courage: The Story of Sir James Dunn (Fredericton: Brunswick Press, 1961), 246.
[18] Letter from Lady Dunn to Mrs. Ince, Secretary to the Rt. Hn. Lord Beaverbrook, c/o The Daily Express, Fleet Street, London, September 7, 1954, Beaverbrook Art Gallery archives.
[19] Letter from Lady Dunn to Mrs. Ince, September 7, 1954
[20] Letter written from Gala to Mme. Rubinstein/Princess Gourielli, dated January 23, 1952, written on St. Regis Hotel letterhead. Gala-Salvador Dali Foundation archive, Figueres, Spain.
[21] Helena Rubinstein, in Mrs. Astor and the Gilded Age blog, May 17, 2010, accessed Feb. 7, 2015, http://mrsastor.com/content/; Arthur Leist, Das georgische Volk, Dresden: E. Pierson’s Verlag 1903), n.p., accessed via the Internet Archive, Feb. 7, 2015,
http://www.archive.org/stream/dasgeorgischevo00leisgoog/dasgeorgischevo00leisgoog_djvu.txt.
[22] Maxine Fabe, Beauty Millionaire: The Life of Helena Rubinstein, Women of America series (New York: Thomas Y. Crowell Company, 1972), 116.
[23] Fabe, Beauty Millionaire, 125. This approach only proved temporarily successful, however, as Arden soon found her own Prince Charming, one Russian Prince Michael Evednoff whom she married in 1942 — and divorced in 1944.
[24] Fabe, Beauty Millionaire, 126-127, 136.
[25] Patrick O’Higgins, Madame: An Intimate Biography of Helena Rubinstein (New York: The Viking Press, 1971), 214.
[26] O’Higgins, Madame, 214
[27] Dali, Unspeakable Confessions, 206, 208-209.
[28] Jahanzeb Nazir, “Traditional dress of Georgia: The Fantastic Chokha,” in The Lovely Planet: Food, Culture, Art and Traditions from around this Lovely Planet, accessed Feb. 7, 2015, http://www.thelovelyplanet.net/traditional-dress-of-georgia-the-fantastic-chokha/.
[29] Alexander Mikaberidze, “Amirani,” in “Georgian Mythology Key Characters and Concepts,” Georgia: Past, Present and Future, retrieved Feb. 7, 2015, available at http://rustaveli.tripod.com/mythology.html.
[30] Cowles, The Case of Salvador Dali, 225.
[31] Lindy Woodhead, War Paint: Madame Helena Rubinstein and Miss Elizabeth Arden: Their Lives, Their Times, Their Rivalry (Wiley: 2004).
[32] Sister Rose Pacatte, Review of Park Avenue: Money, Power and the American Dream, “Sister Rose at the Movies” blog, via Patheos: Hosting the Conversation on Faith, retrieved January 21, 2015, available at: http://www.patheos.com/blogs/sisterrosemovies/2012/11/park-avenue-money-power-and-the-american-dream-november-12-pbs-check-local-listings/.
[33] “The Lydia Legacy,” “The Covermark Story,” CM Beauty, Covermark website, retrieved January 21, 2015, available at: http://www.cm-beauty.com/covermark_story.htm.
[34] “The Lydia Legacy,” CM Beauty, Covermark website.
[35] Staff writer, “Cover Mark Genius Visiting in Resort,” The Palm Beach Post, Feb. 15 1943, n.p.
[36] Sister Rose Pacatte, Review of Park Avenue: Money, Power and the American Dream.
[37] Michael Gross, 740 Park: The Story of the World's Richest Apartment Building (New York: Broadway Books, 2006), 354-5; e-mail correspondence between Julia Pine and Sister Rose Pacatte, January 16, 2015.
[38] Lydia O’Leary’s address was at the 71 East Seventy-First Street entrance.
[39] Julie Zeveloff, “740 Park Avenue: Inside the Most Powerful Apartment Building in New York,” Business Insider, Dec. 29, 2011, accessed April 15, 2015, http://m.yibei.com/book/4efcd1be7e021e3340099b80.
[40] Park Avenue: Money, Power & the American Dream, Dir. Alex Gibney, Independent Lens 2012.
[41] Michael Gross, 740 Park: The Story of the World's Richest Apartment Building (New York: Broadway Books, 2006), 354-5; e-mail correspondence between Julia Pine and Sister Rose Pacatte, January 16, 2015.
[42] E-mail correspondence between Julia Pine and Sister Rose Pacatte, January 16, 2015.
[43] See Sam Staggs, Inventing Elsa Maxwell: How an Irrepressible Nobody Conquered High Society, Hollywood, the Press, and the World (New York: St. Martin’s Griffin, 2013).
[44] Elsa Maxwell, I Married the World (Melbourne, London and Toronto: William Heinemann, Ltd, 1955), 5.
[45] Maxwell, I Married the World, 5.
[46] A working version of the drawing, entitled Study for the Portrait of Madame X, was at one time part of the Perrot-Moore Collection, Cadaqués, Spain.
[47] Maxwell, I Married the World, v.
[48] Elsa Maxwell, “Dali-ing with Democracy”, New York Post, April 23, 1943, p. 12.
[49] Maxwell, “Dali-ing with Democracy”
[50] Ciro Bianchi Ross, “El secuestro de Falla Bonet (I),” Juventude Rebelde website, accessed Feb. 11, 2015, http://www.juventudrebelde.cu/columnas/lectura/2012-02-11/el-secuestro-de-falla-bonet-i-/; e-mail correspondence between Julia Pine and Carlos M. de la Cruz, October 6, 2015.
[51] Staff writer, “Cruz Control: New Chairman of the University of Miami Board of Trustees is Helping Shape the Future of his Alma Mater,” Miami Magazine Online, accessed Feb. 15, 2015, http://www6.miami.edu/miami-magazine/fall99/cruz.html; Liga Contra el Cancer website, La Liga History, accessed May 25, 2015, http://ligacontraelcancer.org/la-liga-history/.
[52] Carlos M. de la Cruz, De La Cruz Collection pamphlet, 2010, 3, accessed Feb. 11, http://www.delacruzcollection.org/pamphlets/2010/1st%20floor%20Panphlet%2002-17-10.pdf.
[53] Letter in the Gala-Salvador Dali archives, Havana, March, 1955, from “Succession of Laureano Falla Guteirre,” explaining the price of the portrait, followed by Sra. Isabel Falla, “Me dice la Sra. De Suero que le recuerde la fotografia del cuadr que Ud. Quedó en enviarle, la cual aún no ha recibido.”
[54] De la Cruz, De La Cruz Collection pamphlet, 8.
[55] Matthew 4:19.
[56] George Ferguson, Signs and Symbols in Christian Art (New York: Oxford University Press, 1955), 12.
[57] “Nature Morte Vivante (Still Life – Fast Moving),” Permanent Collection, Exhibitions and Collections, The Dali Museum website, accessed February 11, 2015, http://thedali.org/exhibit/nature-morte-vivante-still-life-fast-moving/#sthash.DGNX9aut.dpuf.
[58] The Nautilus Shell, Ancient Symbols website, accessed Feb. 15, 2015, http://www.ancient-symbols.com/symbols-directory/nautilus-shell.html.
[59] Robert Descharnes, The World of Salvador Dalí (New York: Viking Press, 1968), 117.
[60] De la Cruz, De La Cruz Collection pamphlet, 3.
[61] William A. Schleicher and Susan J. Winter, In the Somerset Hills: The Landed Gentry (New Jersey: Arcadia Publishing, 1997), p. 71.
[62] Contract for Portrait of Mrs. Louis Starr, dated Feb. 11, 1955, and addressed to Mrs. W. Thorn Kissel, 834 Fifth Ave, New York. The Gala-Salvador Dali archives, Figueres, Spain.
[63] Anna Rohleder, “Far Hills, New Jersey,” Forbes, December 14, 2000, accessed December 12, 2016, http://www.forbes.com/2000/12/12/ppfarhills.html.
[64] The Bedminster Township Planning Board, Master Plan, Bedminster Township, Somerset County, N.J., January 2003, p. 297. Accessed Dec. 4, 2016,
http://www.bedminster.us/vertical/sites/%7B950B43CC-2516-4767-87EE-CF91D0F5ECF1%7D/uploads/%7B4DBBF688-8EEB-41F2-8386-F6FCCEC3F944%7D.PDF
[65] Staff writer, “Estate of $1,973,781 Left by Louis Starr,” The New York Times, March 26, 1937, accessed November 11, 2015, http://spiderbites.nytimes.com/pay_1937/articles_1937_03_00001.html.
[66] Abbey Kissel Starr, Obituary, The New York Times, September 28, 2005, accessed November 11, 2015, http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=9F05E0DA1230F93BA1575AC0A9639C8B63; Louis Starr, Obituary, The New York Times, November 10, 1998, accessed November 11, 2015, http://www.nytimes.com/1998/11/10/classified/paid-notice-deaths-starr-louis.html; Staff Writer, “Troth Announced of Abbey T. Kissel,” The New York Times, Apr 18, 1940, accessed November 15, 2015, http://spiderbites.nytimes.com/pay_1940/articles_1940_04_00002.html/
[67] Telephone interview with family friend Grace Terry by Julia Pine, November 5, 2015.
[68] Letter from William Morse to Walter B. Terry, New Jersey, dated October. 29, 1984, Gala-Salvador Dali Museum archives.
[69] Telephone interview with Grace Terry.
[70] John Tiffany, “History” (Eleanor Lambert), Council of Fashion Designers of America (CFDA) website, accessed May 28, 2015, http://cfda.com/about/history.
[71] John Tiffany, Eleanor Lambert: Still Here (Pointed Leaf Press, 2011), 20.
[72] Tiffany, “History” (Eleanor Lambert); Enid Nemy, “Eleanor Lambert, Empress of Fashion, Dies at 100,” obituary, The New York Times, Oct. 8, 2000, accessed April 15, 2015, http://www.nytimes.com/2003/10/08/nyregion/eleanor-lambert-empress-of-fashion-dies-at-100.html
[73] Nemy, “Eleanor Lambert, Empress of Fashion, Dies at 100.”
[74] Tiffany, “History” (Eleanor Lambert); Nemy, “Eleanor Lambert, Empress of Fashion, Dies at 100.”
[75] E-mail correspondence between John Tiffany and Julia Pine, June 1, 2015.
[76] David W. Rose, March of Dimes (Mount Pleasant, SC: Arcadia Publishing, 2003), 58. An interesting example of this work, billed as “Salvador Dali’s Largest Artwork” appeared for sale in a Las Vegas art gallery in 2014, erroneously entitled March of Time Committee: Papillion, and likely misdated as circa 1940. A banner or backdrop for a March of Dimes event, this oil and tempera work on unstretched canvas measures 17 × 63 feet (5.18 x 19.20 meters). See http://martinlawrence.com/exhibitions14/0714artlasvegas.html.
[77] Katja Schmolka, “John A. Tiffany — about the legacy of Eleanor Lambert,” ZIP Magazine, February 27, 2013, accessed April 15, 2015, http://www.zip-magazine.com/interviews/john-a-tiffany-eleanor-lambert-still-here.
[78] Michele Langevine Leiby, “John Tiffany Reflects on Eleanor Lambert, the Subject of his New Book,” The Washington Post, September 23, 2011, accessed April 15, 2015,
http://www.washingtonpost.com/lifestyle/style/john-tiffany-reflects-on-eleanor-lambert-the-subject-of-his-new-book/2011/09/19/gIQA9tMuqK_story.html; Tiffany, Eleanor Lambert: Still Here.
[79] E-mail correspondence between Bill Berkson and Julia Pine, June 1, 2015.
[80] E-mail correspondence between John Tiffany and Julia Pine, June 1, 2015.
[81] Many thanks to Bill and Moses Berkson and John Tiffany for a lively and informative e-mail correspondence regarding the subject of Portrait of a Woman in a Landscape in December, 2014 and June 2015.
[82] Michael Ramsden, "The Atomic Age, as seen by Dali." Australian Magazine, Feb. 8, 1955, p. 7.
[83] E-mail correspondence between Karl Heinz Klumpner and Oleg Caetani's wife Susanna, January 9, 2023.
