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Salvador Dalí

In organizing this article to bring it to (hopefully) FA status, I referred to Diego Velázquez for ideas at several points, an article which I brought to FA last year. The biggest difference with Dalí is that, given the fact that many editors have already created articles for several of Dalí's most famous works, I found it unnecessary to rigorously intersperse images and information on many of his works throughout the article (a la Velázquez), with the exception of The Persistence of Memory, which merits a paragraph. Rather, I was content with the selected works section at the end, which gives wikilinks to, on my last count, some 29 of his works. Your comments, as always, are appreciated. --DanielNuyu 21:55, 21 July 2006 (UTC)

• Comment I haven't read the article yet: please fix your footnotes, resolve the problem in your Table of Contents (5 is missing), and put your Categories in alphabetical order, and I'll have a look later. I noticed 3 paragaphs in Madrid and Paris with no references, so if you can be sure you have the article fully referenced, that would also help. Sandy 22:12, 21 July 2006 (UTC)

I fixed the ref punctuation issue and alphabetized the categories; I don't see a ToC issue—for me I see "5 Dalí's politics and personality." I think there is sufficient referencing for a relatively succinct article, with inline cites at certain points, especially for some of the more potentially controversial statements. If there is consensus otherwise, I'll look for some cites (I mainly organized the article and was not the one who originally documented most of the references). --DanielNuyu 22:29, 21 July 2006 (UTC)

Maybe someone with more tech experience can figure out what's going on. Where your TOC 5 should be, my browser shows white space. Sandy 22:45, 21 July 2006 (UTC)

It's a mystery. If I take away the í in TOC 5, my browser shows the entry, and yet, TOC 7 has an í and shows fine on my browser. Tech help needed. Do you enter the accent i as alt-161, or by another means? Sandy 22:54, 21 July 2006 (UTC)

It's alt-161. --DanielNuyu 22:57, 21 July 2006 (UTC)

Seems like IE6 is choking on the comination of í' in a heading: fixed by eliminating his name from heading, which corresponds with WP:MOS. Striking comments above. Sandy 23:11, 21 July 2006 (UTC)

"Inline cites at certain points" doesn't necessarily comply with 2c) factual. As one random example, what is the source for this statement: Dalí was expelled from the academy in 1926 shortly before his final exams when he stated that no one on the faculty was competent enough to examine him. Sandy 22:50, 21 July 2006 (UTC)

Although this is one of the best-known (if not the best-known) facts about his early life, no doubt present in many of the text biographies listed in the references, I have added a citation for it now. --DanielNuyu 08:36, 22 July 2006 (UTC)

Daniel, just a note: please don't strike comments from other editors. As soon as I have a chance, I'll review, update, and strike my comments as necessary. Thanks, Sandy 15:31, 22 July 2006 (UTC)

• Object I left the straightforward peerreviewer script output on the talkpage as recommendation to work on compliance to all Misplaced Pages guideline. These are not minor, but can easily be worked on. Wim van Dorst (Talk) 22:34, 21 July 2006 (UTC).

I have addressed every issue in the script: delinked months and days of the week, linked full dates, left the one list per the suggestion in the nom, removed the weasel word, and alphabetized the il links. The article has already been heavily copyedited. --DanielNuyu 23:02, 21 July 2006 (UTC)

• Comment. The placement of Dalí's self portrait in the middle of its section awkwardly splits up the list of selected works on my browser. RyanGerbil10 (Drop on in!) 03:34, 22 July 2006 (UTC)\

I have resized the image and moved it up. Hopefully it will appear fine on your browser now, although even when set to 1024x it looked fine for me previously. --DanielNuyu 08:38, 22 July 2006 (UTC)

Upon further reading, Object. The article has POV issues, especially in the biographical sections, and lacks citations for some statements which need them. RyanGerbil10 (Drop on in!) 06:04, 22 July 2006 (UTC)

Could you please be a bit more specific? I'm planning to make some changes to the article so I'd like to know which parts give you the most concern. --DanielNuyu 06:59, 22 July 2006 (UTC)

Certainly. A few examples I found, and where they were located:

• "An artist of great imagination, Dalí had an affinity for doing unusual things to draw attention to himself. This sometimes irked those who loved his art as much as it annoyed his critics, since his eccentric manner sometimes overshadowed his artwork in public attention." Last sentence of lead. Such have a citation, at least.

• ref added. some quotes from it: *"One of the most renowned and controversial artists during the 20th century was an eccentric Spanish painter by the name of Salvador Dalí" ... "Some of Dalí’s early eccentric behavior can be best linked to his father" ... "Cadaqués 'is said to encourage eccentricity bordering on outright madness'..." This is not a POV statement; if anything, it underestimates the importance of this quality in his reputation. --DanielNuyu

• "Some trends in Dalí's work that would continue throughout his life were already evident in the 1920s, however. Dalí devoured influences of all styles of art he could find and then produced works ranging from the most academically classic to the most cutting-edge avant-garde, sometimes in separate works and sometimes combined. Exhibitions of his works in Barcelona attracted much attention, and mixtures of praise and puzzled debate from critics." Last sentence of section entitled "Madrid and Paris." Needs a citation.

• another ref added; again, many of these statements have the appearance of generalization, but they are actually quite accurate descriptions of what was going on with Dalí at the time. From the reference: "By 1926 he had been expelled for extravagant behavior. Such artistic anarchy set the tone for his life. He was quick to explore a variety of avant-garde trends, working his way through phases of Cubism, Futurism, Purism and the metaphysical style of de Chirico. Self-portraits abound. From the late 1920s the influence of Picasso, whom he met in Paris, became increasingly important and he dallied between using a classical, figurative style and working in a Cubist manner." --DanielNuyu

• "his muse and future wife," from the first sentce of the section entitled "Gala until WWII." No assertion of how his wife was his muse is made, and the claim is not referenced.

• another ref added; this is an article about Dalí, not Gala, and a quick visit to her article would answer basic questions about her in the context of the art world at the time. Her importance in Dalí's life is legendary; from the reference: "In 1929, Dalí met Gala, the muse and inspiration for the rest of his years as an artist..." Muse and inspiration are two good words to succinctly describe the importance of Gala for Dalí, and they are now there with the ref in the article. --DanielNuyu

• "The fact that he chose to live in Spain while it was ruled by Franco drew criticism from progressives and many other artists. As such, probably at least some of the common dismissal of Dalí's later works had more to do with politics than the actual merits of the works themselves." From the section "Later Years in Catalonia." Unsourced claim, needs a reference.

• see below; I would say Navarro's diatribe is a case in point of what's being said here. --DanielNuyu

• "...possibly a murder attempt by a greedy caretaker..." Also from "Later Years in Catalonia." No reference is made who the caretaker is, or why he would want to do something like that.

• Your guess is as good as mine as to the exact circumstances of the fire—who it was, what exactly happened. Many sources say what one I have found says, that "The cause of the fire is unknown; it may have been a suicide attempt by the painter, a murder attempt by a member of his staff or a simple accident..." which I will list, but since the New York Times wrote in 1984 that "The fire...was caused by a short-circuit in the electrical system," and this is documentable, I will list both sources. --DanielNuyu

• "He has sometimes been portrayed as a fascist supporter, especially by his enemies in surrealist groups." From "Politics and Personality." Which enemies? Needs a source.

• I removed the last clause, although I think it could be reasonably understood in the context of the article. Also, a reference of an article by JHU professor Vicente Navarro has been added which is clearly the source of much of the Franco information. --DanielNuyu

• "Dalí sent telegrams to Franco, praising him for signing death warrants for political prisoners." Also from "Politics and Personality." A claim like that needs a source to back it up.

indeed, it's just false. I can attest that I never got a single telgeram from Senor Dalì in my life.--Francesco Franco aka Lacatosias 09:19, 18 August 2006 (UTC)

• see above, line also referenced. --DanielNuyu

Sorry for the laundry list. I hope it's helpful. Cheers, RyanGerbil10 (Drop on in!) 08:09, 22 July 2006 (UTC)

I hope I have adequately addressed some of these issues. And I hope it's clear that many of these statements are valid and not nearly as controversial as we may be led to believe. Please see my changes, and keep the comments coming. --DanielNuyu 09:44, 22 July 2006 (UTC)

I wish I could give you more comments, but that was my entire srock of them. Because of that, I change my vote to Support. RyanGerbil10 (Drop on in!) 16:55, 22 July 2006 (UTC)

• Comment: I thought it is probably worth mentioning Salvador's fascinations with stereo images and paintings. The book Stereogram (Horibuchi, S. (1994). Stereogram (pp. 8-10, pp.22, pp.32, pp.36). San Francisco: Cadence Books. ISBN 0929279859) shows five stereo paitings from Salvador (including the Dali's hand drawing back the golden fleece mentioned in the article itself. Unfortunately, there is only one page of text talking about his fascination with stereograms. You can find more information googling him with the keyword stereo. You'll find pages such as and . Fred Hsu 16:12, 22 July 2006 (UTC)

• I'm going to be gone until late Tuesday, so I'll try to address this (and NCurse's points) when I return. (In the meantime, Raul, please keep the nomination around—thanks.) --DanielNuyu 08:22, 23 July 2006 (UTC)

• Weak object:

• there's nothing about Dalí and the cinema, theatre, fashion, photography, science, design, architecture, litterature, sexuality (see french article)

• The section to address this point, which seems to be the last unaddressed complaint around here at the moment, is on its way. --DanielNuyu 01:22, 5 August 2006 (UTC)

• Cinema: The article contains a reference to Un Chien Andalou, arguably Dalí's most important project in film, information about Buñuel, a wikilink with description for the less famous L'Âge d'Or, as well as a reference to his Disney project both in the lead and in the listing of works. Given the fact that this information exists spread throughout the article, I do not find it necessary to address film in the Endeavors outside of painting section.
• Theatre: In Endeavors outside of painting, information about Dalí's work in Mariana Pineda, Bacchanale, and a few other plays has been added.
• Fashion, photography: These are addressed in the subsequent paragraph.
• Science: What can be said about Dalí in the context of science is done so in the next paragraph.
• Architecture, literature: These have been briefly addressed as well.
• Sexuality: The role of sex (symbolically, for instance) in Dalí's artistic works, as well as notes on his own sexuality, appear laced throughout the text of the article. It is therefore unnecessary to include it in the new section.

I hope that these edits are adequate in addressing the issue of the comprehensiveness of the article. In my opinion the article is now excessively thorough, and, inevitably, adding all of this detail about his other work dilutes to some extent the emphasis on the painting. I have tried to remind the reader that by far his primary contribution is in painting by adding the painting of the Disintegration to reflect his view on the new science. Please see this newest section. If there is anything else of concern, let me know. --DanielNuyu 11:52, 8 August 2006 (UTC)

• there is nothing about Dalí's symboles : pain, key, sea, elephant, piano

• A section on symbolism is forthcoming. --DanielNuyu 03:30, 29 July 2006 (UTC) There is a new section on symbolism now. Please have a look. --DanielNuyu 03:54, 29 July 2006 (UTC)

NCurse _work 07:19, 23 July 2006 (UTC)

• Object: I myself have suffered much from copyediting complaints, but I think this article is in need. It doesn't really meet Criterion 2a.

Upon (When) Francisco Franco's coming came to power in the aftermath of the Spanish Civil War, Dalí came into conflict with his fellow surrealists over political beliefs. As such Dalí , and was officially expelled from the predominantly Marxist surrealist group.

• I have rewritten this line. --DanielNuyu 22:32, 26 July 2006 (UTC)