One Second Before Awakening from a Dream Caused by the Flight of a Bee Around a Pomegranate, 1944 – (Salvador Dali) Previous Next


Artist:

Style: Surrealism

Topic: Dreams Fly Fruits Dreams Fly

Technique: Oil

The painting depicts a woman (Dalí's wife, Gala) sleeping while sunbathing naked during a calm day on rocks floating over the sea, possibly at Port Lligat. An elephant with incredibly long, extremely thin legs walks across the sea's horizon, carrying an obelisk. Near the woman float two drops of water and a small pomegranate. From a larger pomegranate comes a fish that spews a tiger from which comes another tiger, while in front of that second tiger a rifle's bayonet touches (or nearly touches) the woman's right arm. The bayonet, as a symbol of the stinging bee, may thus represent the woman's abrupt awakening from her otherwise peaceful dream. This is an example of Sigmund Freud's influence on surrealist art and Dali's attempts to explore the world of dreams in a dreamscape. It has also been suggested that the painting is "a surrealist interpretation of the Theory of Evolution."

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