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Overview

Its Christian subject matter, simplicity of organization, and lack of shock value separate The Sacrament of the Last Supper from most of Salvador Dalí’s other works.  Dalí’s reputation from the late 1920s to the mid-1940s was founded on his surrealist manner and use of Freudian dream imagery.  This tableau of 1955 is both religious and realistic:  the background accurately portrays the view from Dalí’s home on the Catalan coast of northeastern Spain.   Although the rugged cliffs and eroded boulders of his native Catalonia had inspired many of the fantastic forms in his earlier works, here Dalí used the craggy bay of Port Lligat as a straightforward backdrop.

During the late 1940s, Dalí’s return to Christian imagery and traditional values was influenced by three factors:  the devastating effects of the Spanish Civil War and World War II, his reawakened interest in classical art, and his reappraisal of Freud’s psychological principles after meeting the aging psychoanalyst in 1938.  One classic derivation cited by Dalí in connection with his painting was Zurbarán, a seventeenth-century Spanish old master.  The tousled hair of the praying figures, the kneeling postures, and the brilliant whites of their cloaks evoke Zurbarán’s precise, enamel-like handling of paint.

The Italian High Renaissance of the early 1500s was another major source for Dalí’s new classicism.  As in the harmonious presentation of Renaissance schemes, Dalí’s composition is clearly divided:  foreground action and background scenery.  The placement of men around the table is symmetrical, the same figure repeated in perfect mirror image on both sides of Christ.  Moreover, the entire nine-foot-long picture is constructed according to complex mathematical ratios devised by Renaissance scientists and such ancient Greek philosophers as Pythagoras.

Dalí explained the reliance upon this elaborate geometric patterning just after completing nine months of work on the picture:

I wanted to materialize the maximum of luminous and Pythagorean instantaneousness based on the celestial communion of the number twelve:  twelve hours of the day—twelve months of the year—the twelve pentagons of the dodecahedron—twelve signs of the zodiac around the sun—the twelve apostles around Christ.

Thus, The Sacrament of the Last Supper is not an attempt to recreate the meal but a symbolic presentation of the Eucharistic ritual.  Rather than specific apostles, the men at the table are idealized participants.  The strange enclosure—part earthly, part celestial—is not the “large upper room” of the Bible, but an abstract concept embodied by the dodecahedron.

Just as the surrounding cupola appears only partially real, Christ is not corporeally present because his body is partially transparent.  The more tangible allusion to Jesus’ physical presence is the symbolic bread and wine.  This ethereal, disembodied torso above him is more youthful than the standard conception of the Creator, who is typically portrayed as an aged patriarch.  The wide, outstretched arms might represent the resurrected Christ, but the nail holes are absent from the hands, and the wound does not appear on his side.  Perhaps this figure embodies Dalí’s idea that “heaven is to be found exactly in the center of the bosom of the man who has faith!”

Dalí’s The Sacrament of the Last Supper was given to the National Gallery by one of its greatest benefactors, Chester Dale, who donated more than three hundred works of art to the museum.  Dale reputedly suggested the subject matter, and he purchased Dalí’s self-proclaimed masterpiece as soon as it was finished.  He then sent it to the National Gallery, where it was placed on public view the day before Easter in 1956.  As Dale put it, “This is a picture for all time.  It’s too important to keep for a few.”  Dale and Dalí both attended the special preview, and more than seven thousand visitors flocked to the museum to see the painting the first day it was displayed.

The friendship between artist and collector was an enduring one.  Dalí and his wife, Gala, were frequent guests at the Dale’s apartment, while Dale and his second wife, Mary, visited Dalí at his home in Spain.  Dale pronounced Dalí “one of the greatest artists of our day,” and Dalí held the collector in equally high regard.  Upon learning of Dale’s death in December 1962, Dalí mourned the passing of the man he described as “a great patron of the arts,” whom he compared to those of the Renaissance.

Inscription

lower right on tablecloth: Gala Salvador Dali / 1955

Provenance

Purchased February 1956 from the artist through (Carstairs Gallery, New York) by Chester Dale [1883-1962], New York; gift 1963 to NGA.

Exhibition History

1956
The Sacrament of the Last Supper by Salvador Dali, National Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C., 1956.
1965
The Chester Dale Bequest, National Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C., 1965, unnumbered checklist.

Bibliography

1956
Bruner, Louise. "Dali Really An Artist For All His Cutting Up." Toledo, Ohio Blade (5 August 1956): 5, repro.
1956
"Dale Buys Dali Canvas." New York Journal-American (27 January 1956): 1.
1956
"Dali's 'Last Supper' His As 'Junk' by Theologian." The Sunday Star (4 November 1956): A-1, repro. A-35.
1956
"Dali's 'Last Supper' in U.S. Gallery." New York Herald Tribune (23 March 1956): repro.
1956
"Dali's 'Last Supper' to Have Preview in Capital." New York Journal-American (22 March 1956): 3, repro.
1956
"Dali's 'Last Supper' Will Be Shown Here." The Washington Daily News (22 March 1956): repro.
1956
"Dali's Latest On View at National Gallery March 31." The Evening Star (22 March 1956): A33, repro.
1956
"Dali's Place in Religious Art." Christianity Today (10 December 1956): 26-27, 34.
1956
"'Greatest Religious Painting' Of Present Day Is Purchased By Chester Dale Of Resort." Palm Beach Daily News (27 January 1956): 1.
1956
Portner, Leslie Judd. "Art in Washington. National Unveils Dali Painting." The Washington Post and Times Herald (1 April 1956): E7, repro.
1956
"'Sacrament of Last Supper' Will Be Shown to the Public." Palm Beach Daily News (25 March 1956): 13, repro.
1956
"Salvador Dali. His most recent major work." Apollo 63 (May 1956): 143.
1956
Time (19 November 1956): 46.
1956
White, Jean. "Gallery Puts on Exhibit Its First Dali Painting." The Washington Post and Times Herald (1 April 1956): A15.
1957
Wagner, Charles A. "460-Year Variation on a Sacred Theme." Sunday Mirror Magazine (14 April 1957): 10-11, repro.
1958
Hellman, Geoffrey T. "Custodian." The New Yorker (25 October 1958): 77.
1958
Morse, A. Reynolds. Dali: A Study of His Life and Work. Greenwich, Connecticut, 1958: repro.
1958
"Sacrament of the Last Supper." The Commercial-Mail (3 April 1958): 1, repro. [newspaper from Columbia City, Indiana].
1958
S., R.U. "Dali's Masterpiece? An Interpretation." Findings (March 1958): 7, repro.
1959
[author name illegible]. "I've been thinking..." The New York Ave-news (23 March 1959): 11.
1960
Twentieth Century French Paintings from the Chester Dale Collection. National Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C., 1960 (2nd ed.): 19, repro.
1965
Summary Catalogue of European Paintings and Sculpture. National Gallery of Art, Washington, 1965: 36.
1965
Twentieth Century French Paintings & Sculpture of the French School in the Chester Dale Collection. National Gallery of Art, Washington, 1965 (rev. ed.): 18, repro.
1966
Mills, John FitzMaurice. "Art Forum." The Irish Times (11 February 1966): repro.
1966
Walton, William. "Parnassus on Potomac." Art News 65 (March 1966): 37, repro. 39.
1968
National Gallery of Art. European Paintings and Sculpture, Illustrations. Washington, 1968: 29, repro.
1973
Morse, Albert Reynolds. Salvador Dali: A Guide to His Works in Public Museums. Cleveland, 1973: 50, repro.
1975
European Paintings: An Illustrated Summary Catalogue. National Gallery of Art, Washington, 1975: 90, repro.
1976
Descharnes, Robert. Salvador Dali. New York, 1976: 46, 68.
1985
European Paintings: An Illustrated Catalogue. National Gallery of Art, Washington, 1985: 112, repro.
1988
Wheeler, Marion, ed. His Face--Images of Christ in Art: Selections from the King James Version of the Bible. New York, 1988: no. 69, repro.
1991
Kopper, Philip. America's National Gallery of Art: A Gift to the Nation. New York, 1991: 248, 249, color repro.
1992
Etherington-Smith, Meredith. Dali. London, 1992: 397, 411.
1993
Descharnes, Robert and Gilles Néret. Salvador Dalí 1904-1989: L'oeuvre peint. 2 vols. Cologne, 1993: 2:no. 1098, repro.
1994
Hasman, Melvin. Spiritual Life in the Good Ol' USA: Story-Essays on Popular Culture and Christianity. La Mesa, California and Mansfield, Ohio, 1994: 89-91, repro.
1995
Harris, Stephen L. The New Testament. A Student's Introduction. 2nd ed. Mountain View, 1995: 8, repro.
1995
Seerveld, Calvin. A Christian Critique of Art and Literature. Sioux Center, Iowa, 1995: 51-52, fig. 9.
1996
Pelfrey, Robert. Art and Mass Media. New York, 1985. Reprint, Dubuque, Iowa, 1996: 244-245, fig. 9.20.
1997
Radford, Robert. Dali. London, 1997: 244-246, fig. 157.
1998
Kuntz, Paul Grimley and Lee Braver. Ascent/Descent." Encyclopedia of Comparative Iconography: Themes Depicted in Works of Art, ed. Helene E. Roberts. 2 vols. Chicago and London, 1998: 1:77, 80.
1998
Pennanen, Valerie Hutchinson. "Communion." In Encyclopedia of Comparative Iconography: Themes Depicted in Works of Art, ed. Helene E. Roberts. 2 vol. Chicago and London, 1998: 1:186, 188.
2001
Trescott, Jacqueline. "The Accessible Surrealist. Dali Work Can Now Be Viewed by Wheelchair Users." The Washington Post (22 November 2001): C1, C8, repro.
2003
Cable, Jacqueline. "Dali's 'Last Supper' - isolated but still captivating at the National Gallery." Catholic Standard (17 April 2003): 17-18, 21.

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