達利Salvador Dali 畫作--- Figure at a Window

Figure at a Window, 1925

As a youth, Dali did numerous portraits of his sister, Ana-Maria, often painted on copper and very small in size. This one, larger and on canvas, is considered one of the most beautiful. It was shown on Dali's first one-man exhibition, in Barcelona at the Dalmau Gallery in November 1925.

In her book "Salvador Dali, visto por su hermana", Ana-Maria wrote: "The portraits that my brother painted of me during this period are innumerable. Many were simple studies of hair and a bare shoulder." She remembers the long hours of posing during which, serving as his model, she never tired of "looking at the landscape which from then on and forever was a part of me. Indeed Salvador always painted me near a window!" Such a portrait is 'Seated Girl, Seen from the Back'.

In 'Figure at a Window', Ana-Maria poses in the room on the first floor of the paternal home in Cadaques which Salvador used as a studio.

When corresponding with Ana-Maria, Lorca wrote: "My stay in Cadaques was so marvelous that it seemed to me like a beautiful dream, particularly the awakenings with what one sees from the window."

For the painter this room remains associated with a closer, sadder vision. In 1950, while he was working on the little rhinoceros painted in bas-relief on the base of 'The Madonna of Port Lligat', he was told of his father's death. It was there, in front of that window, that he had seen him for the last time.