Salvador Dalí, one of the most influential artists of the 20th century.
Salvador Dalí is probably the most famous artist of the Surrealist movement, and although his association with the group was short-lived, its ideas and themes continued to influence the Spanish artist’s work for the rest of his life.
Dalí’s disturbing, dreamlike pieces are both striking and unforgettable, and interest in his work has remained steady over the past decades. He was a hugely prolific artist, experimenting in many different fields, including printmaking. Indeed, prints account for 75% of his work sold at auction, and they generally fetch between £100 and £500, with some reaching far higher prices.
Below is a list of the seven most sought-after Salvador Dalí prints. If you own a Salvador Dalí print and would like to find out more about how much it might be worth, or how to sell it, get in contact with Mark Littler today.
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Figura De Cajones
This 1937 woodcut in colours was sold by Sotheby’s in April 1989 for £220,000, exceeding its estimate by £40,000. Drawers (cajones) are among the many recurring images that pervade Dalí’s work, alongside clocks, lobsters, grasshoppers, eggs, and many others.
In Dalí’s art, drawers almost always symbolise the subconscious, memory, and hidden parts of the human psyche, something the artist was fascinated by. He was a great admirer of Sigmund Freud, the famed Austrian psychoanalyst, and much of his work revolves around concepts and ideas that Freud explored and wrote about, including dreams and the subconscious. Dalí was so fascinated by Freud’s work that he once stated the body “is nowadays full of secret drawers that only psychoanalysis is capable to open.”
Figura De Cajones sold by Sotheby’s in 1989
La Divine Comédie, From Dante Alighieri, L’Enfer/La Purgatoire/Le Paradis
In the early 1950s, the Italian government commissioned Dalí to create a series of illustrations for a deluxe edition of Dante’s epic 14th century poem, The Divine Comedy, to celebrate the 700th anniversary of the Italian poet’s birth. Dalí was delighted, but the appointment of a self-proclaimed “Surrealist void of all moral values” was controversial, and ultimately, the contract was terminated.
Dalí, however, was already engrossed by it, and he decided to offer the project to Joseph Forêt, a French publisher, instead. The result was an extraordinary collection of 100 watercolours made between 1951 and 1960, and the subsequent prints Dalí created are now highly sought-after; this complete portfolio of all 100 prints was sold by Bonhams & Butterfields in May 2011 for £65,934.
La Divine Comédie, From Dante Alighieri, L’Enfer/La Purgatoire/Le Paradis sold by Bonham’s in 2011
Les Chants De Maldoror
Les Chant De Maldoror is an 1869 French prose poem written by the Comte de Lautréamont. It failed to make an impact when first published, but it was rediscovered and subsequently championed by the Surrealists many decades later. The provocative work follows the central character, Maldoror, and it is replete with transgressive themes of violence, sexuality, and blasphemy.
Rather than illustrating specific scenes from the book, however, Dalí mostly worked by employing the paranoiac-critical method he’d developed, which involved inducing a state of paranoia and tapping into the subconscious. The resulting 42 images are a typically Dalí-esque mixture of the bizarre, the striking, and the nightmarish, and this complete portfolio of the prints was sold for £49,041 by Christie’s in October 2017.
Les Chants De Maldoror sold by Christie’s in 2017
Fantastic Beach Scene
This etching was sold by Christie’s in November 2016 for £47,583, and it was dedicated to Edward James, Dalí’s wealthy British patron and fellow eccentric. The print dates from 1935, when Dalí had established himself as an innovative surrealist artist and was focusing on growing his reputation.
Beaches often form the backdrop for Dalí’s work, which is hardly surprising, given the artist’s main residence for much of his life was on the coast. In 1930, Dalí bought a small fisherman’s hut on Catalonia’s Costa Brava; over the years, he purchased more neighbouring huts, and by the 1950s, he’d created a large, labyrinthine residence, decorated with an eccentric and eclectic mixture of items.
Fantastic Beach Scene sold by Christie’s in 2016
Le Colosse, For Aurélia
This hand-coloured print comes from Dalí’s Aurélia series, and it was sold for £46,402 by Phillips in October 2013. The series took its name from the novella of the same title by the 19th century French writer, Gérard de Nerval. Aurélia was Nerval’s final piece of work before his suicide (the culmination of a number of breakdowns over the years), and it recounts his descent into madness. In many ways, the dreamlike text is proto-Surrealist, and the movement was heavily influenced by it and its visionary creator.
Le Colosse, For Aurélia sold by Phillips’s in 2013
Les Amours De Cassandre
These ten engravings with extensive hand-colouring demonstrate Dalí’s impressive draughtsmanship and the technical skill he showed from a young age. The series was created to illustrate the 1552 French text, Les Amours de Cassandre, by poet Pierre de Ronsard. The prints were sold by Sotheby’s in September 2023 at the Freddie Mercury: A World Of His Own auction. The event saw over 1,400 items from the rockstar’s estate go up for sale, including Les Amours de Cassandre, which reached a staggering £45,000, more than five times its estimate.
Les Amours De Cassandre sold by Sotheby’s in 2023
Les Caprices De Goya
Dalí was a great admirer of Old Masters such as Johannes Vermeer and Diego Velázquez, even going so far as to cultivate a Velázquez-style moustache. Dalí’s admiration of Goya – frequently dubbed the last of the Old Masters – is made clear in this series of prints, which was inspired by Goya’s satirical series of 80 aquatints published in 1799.
Titled Los Caprichos (The Caprices), Goya’s original series mocked the follies of the 18th century Spanish society in which he lived. Dalí’s reinterpretation adds surrealist elements and colour to Goya’s prints, whilst retaining the satirical angle and mocking condemnation of the originals. The complete series of Dalí’s Les Caprices De Goya is made up of 80 prints, but even a small number can sell well at auction; these ten were sold by Phillips in April 2019 for £38,623.
Les Caprices De Goya sold by Phillip’s in 2019
