«Salvador Dali Dreams»

In 1969 the Spanish candy maker Chupa Chups asked Salvador Dali to design its logo, and he drew the daisy that is still printed on the lollipops today. I love that story. The man who painted melting clocks also drew something that ended up on candy. Dali knew that fame and art could share one surface, which is why salvador dali pop art feels less like a stretch than it sounds.

That daisy is the starting point of this painting.

A young woman stands against a black, heavily textured background with her hands on her hips. Her arms and torso are tattooed with Dali's world: his upturned moustache on one sleeve, a spiral shell and a rocky shore on the other, a red rose on her chest between two elephants on spindly legs, and floating spheres across her stomach. She wears a white crop top, a diamond necklace and gold rings. Her face is cut into strips that slide out of line, and small blocks of yellow, blue, red, white and black hang in the dark around her.

The elephants come from Dali's The Temptation of St Anthony (1946) and his other elephant paintings of the 1940s, and the spheres remind me of Galatea of the Spheres, 1952. The blocks nod to Mondrian's Composition with Red, Blue and Yellow, 1930. Warhol painted soup cans in 1962 and Lichtenstein painted Whaam! in 1963, proving that a flat, loud image can carry real ideas.

I like that she looks down at her own body, as if reading the pictures on her skin. A tattoo is a gallery you wear. The sliced face is my way of saying that an icon gets a little broken once everyone has copied it. I painted this contemporary pop art by hand, and as an original pop art painting I think it works as statement wall art in a room that can handle some noise.

Most of my original paintings are already in private collections, but I paint originals to order in any size. To ask about this one, message me on Instagram or by email. There is also a hand-finished lithograph of Salvador Dali Dreams.