Dali's Dalliance With Mass Production

Salvador Dali apparently labored less for art than for his purse.

In May 1973, a witness affirmed that, at the Hotel Meurice in Paris, Dali had signed 4000 sheets of paper, weighing in at about 750 pounds! The following year, French customs agents waylaid a small truck heading to Andorra loaded with 40,000 blank pieces of paper signed by Dali.

Apparently, “on a good day”, the Surrealist was capable of signing 1800 sheets in an hour, with the assistance of three helpers who whisked the papers under and out from under his pen. Now that’s a surreal image! He joked about what easy, profitable work it was.

Needless to say, questionable Dali lithographs have been surfacing in Europe, the US and Canada in recent years.