The Persistence of Memory is a painting done by artist Salvador Dalí that, in my opinion, could be one of the most thought-provoking and interesting painting I've ever seen. This was painted by Dalí in 1931 and is considered one of his most recognizable works. It is currently held at the Museum of Modern Art in New York City and has been there since 1934.
To me, this painting is definitely significant. There are so many little underlying parts and details to be examined in here. For me and probably for most people, the clocks are the most interesting. At first glance, it's like "What?!" I wasn't really sure why they looked so fluid and soft. It also, in a way, plays with your mind, since clocks are so precise and strict. Clocks have fine lines, precise markings, and solid, specific rules. They're mechanical. So when you see something like this painting, it makes no sense. It makes you think "How can the hands of the clock move? Where did the markings go? How can it be bent and tangled like that?" and even deeper things like "If our clocks suddenly became like that, what would constitute time? Is time mechanical or is it fluid?" I soon came to understand that Dalí was getting at something very similar through his painting. The sagging pocket-watches suggest the irrelevance of time during sleep and the being in the middle of the painting resembles, at least to many, a human being asleep. Basically, when we're asleep and unconscious, time doesn't pertain, only memories do. To me, this actually makes sense. It's actually pretty easy to see that distortion of time, especially when you attempt to think about your own dreams; it just doesn't all add up in the confines of time. I think it also could have been a visual depiction of Einstein's theory of relativity. Einstein basically said that time itself is relative and not fixed. I think that could definitely work in the context of the melted clocks and the irrelevance of time.
A couple other interesting things I noticed in the painting is the use of light and the insects on two of the clocks. I thought it was really interesting how Dalí used light to show a contrast between obvious and not-so-obvious things. I think that the parts that are in the light, like the rocks, platform, and ocean are things that are constant, obvious things that are considered set-in-stone. Conversely, I think the shaded parts like the clocks and the being all, in a way, position toward this dark hole in the painting which shows that they're more creative and fluid ideas that are not as constituted as the light objects.Finally, the insects are definitely an interesting and probably disturbing point of the painting. If you look closely, there is a swarm of ants on the orange watch and a single fly on the clock right next to it. I think that signifies that regardless of how time is viewed or constituted, it will eventually lead to death.
I think this painting is really interesting and full of different ideas and details to explore. I think it can give viewers a new, visual way of viewing time and some questions to ponder. I also think that it dates back to some older ideas about the relativity of time and can show the viewers some of the thoughts and ideas that were going on in this time period. I think this is an essential work of art to be seen by anyone who's remotely interested in art because it's so abstract and full of little tiny details to be discovered.
I really enjoyed reading this. It is very nice! (: Nice job!! (:
ReplyDeleteNicole, I found this very intersting to read.
ReplyDeleteAfter reading only the first paragraph I stopped and thought for a little bit. Often I think of myself in the essence of time and how I never have time to do anything, how if you think about it time flies too fast(I am fifteen, where have those years gone...??), how I waste too much time sleeping and doing other things, how time dominates my life. But at the same time, sometimes I feel like time is going way to slow to be real. I feel stuck in a place for an eternity when it has actually been only few minutes. I agree with the fact that time is relative.
I also agree with Nicole when you say that everytime you look at this painting you can find something new, because when I first looked at this painting I had not noticed the bugs at all.
Nicole, I really liked how you took a step back in order to analyze the painting. You didn't just point out the obvious, like "the clocks are bent and distorted," or "the painting is dark in color." You looked at it from 360 degrees. The way you dissected the concept of time, asking whether it was meant to be a rigid system of ticking, or whether it could be fluid and free-form like the clocks in the painting show. Your insight to this painting made me think about the true meaning behind this work of art, and honestly, I don't even know if I can interpret it's meaning. I also liked how you pointed out that every time you look at the painting, you see something you didn't notice before. That was true for me. I had to look at it about four times before I realized that there was a giant spider on the orange pocket watch. Your insight to this work of art really made me take a step back and analyze the thoughts that went in to creating this painting, and what it really means.
ReplyDeleteNicole,
ReplyDeleteI was very intrigued with your observations about Dali's "The Persistence of Memory". This painting has been a favorite of mine ever since 3rd or 4th grade. I love the general strangeness of it, but never really thought there was an underlying meaning. I also never noticed the bugs on the clocks; this could also explain how just because time goes on, it doesn't mean that all life will. It almost looks as if the human-esque shape is being pinned down by the melting clock. In the end, time catches up to us. No matter how fast we think time is going by, we cannot escape it.
You pointing out the shadows made me look at the specific directions of them. The shadows are pointing east; but there's a large black spot in the bottom right corner (where the light source should be coming from.) This is very interesting to me. How could light come from dark? Maybe this could also relate to dreams; how things that make sense in the dream don't have to when you wake up.
Nicole, I really liked your insight about time's relation to dreams and sleep. I've experienced myself some pretty weird experiences with time and sleep. Sometimes I doze off while doing homework late at night and I have this really complex dream where a series of events that seem to take hours, yet I wake up a few minutes later all confused. You pretty much exposed everything interesting in the painting so it was hard for me to come up with something different to add. However, I think I might have found another small thing to contribute. The gray blob/being in the center of the painting seems to fade away into the darkness. I think this completes the author's thought about sleep; not only is time being shaped by the dreamer, but the dream is taking us from the light world that we know, into the darkness that we don't. This shows how in dreams, our mind has full control, yet at the same time, we enter the unknown.
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