Dali at the NVG

A week or two ago, on Fathers Day (what were we thinking?) I visited the Salvadore Dali exhibition 'Liquid Desire' at the NVG in Melbourne. (13 June - 4 October)

I'm not a Dali fan, but it does hold a certain retro fascination for me. I was looking forward to seeing a broader range of his work than those familiar pieces we all associate with this somewhat 'outre' artist, especially his drawings, sculptures and photographic experiments with space.

It's the first time I've really come up against a large show where the experience of the art is so plainly influenced by the quality of the curating.
Aside from the size of the crowds - which were pretty unbearable and snail paced, I thought the design of the exhibition did no favours to the enormous number of works on show.

In the first 'room', ceiling to floor small works from Dali's early years were hung as close as postage stamps. Delicate and bizarre little drawings were displayed about a foot or two from the floor, or higher than eye level and crammed together so that appreciating their simplicity or individuality was difficult.
Large, closely spaced tracts of dense wall information were everywhere, to tell the unedited story of his career. Their indigestability served to prevent crowd flow or conversely deterred people from taking in the information at all, and the walls of further round rooms were carpeted in vertical 150 mm wide striped grey and charcoal plush fabric.
It was difficult to separate the experience of the show from the artwork - and intensely claustrophobic.

In all a disappointment. I didn't see any elephants on stilts - my favourite piece, and the jewelery though beautiful was mounted in view cases at breast height (which made for rather comic visions of visitor interaction). The sculptures dotted about were fascinating, though few.

I really wish I could be more positive about the show - it was a major one and there were some stunning pieces in it.
My partner loved it, so of the 4 of us one was content that he'd seen an amazing exhibition on Fathers Day - the rest of us were happy for that !