Enkidu Meets Salvador Dali - Swans Reflecting Elephants (1937)
Description
This painting is entitled Swans Reflecting
Elephants which he made in 1937. This painting was made using Freud's
theoretical analysis of the paranoia-critical method and was made in the same
year as Metamorphosis of Narcissus painting. So that both this painting
and the Metamorphosis of Narcissus are considered the two best works in Dali's
series of paintings on Freud's theory of the 'paranoia-critical' method. In
this painting there is a swan looking up at his face in the water and seeing
the reflection of an elephant's face. In terms of illustration, Dali's painting
technique for this masterpiece is almost the same as Metamorphosis of
Narcissus and uses almost the same theme. Salvador Dali himself wrote an
essay "The Conquest of the Irrational" which he wrote in 1935.
This essay contains his understanding of Freud's thoughts. It was this essay
that he then tried to embody in the form of the painting Swans Reflecting
Elephants.