Dali and Film

I reconnected with my sanity after the break-in at the Tate’s Dali and Film show. My brother was down from Cambridge with a friend, so we all met up on Sunday afternoon. The exhibition, and indeed the Tate, was deliciously and surprisingly empty, which allowed a relaxed viewing experience and an even more relaxed tea-time experience afterwards. Indeed, we got the best table in the upstairs café – right on the windows overlooking the river, the Millennium Bridge, and St Paul’s. St Paul’s was framed by beautifully arranged cranes – lots of building happening in the city right now.

My impeccably Marxist tutors at University left me with a distinct feeling that Surrealism was a Suspect Project, and that Dali was the biggest fraud of all. So I was delighted with the exhibition – a really interesting look at his work in film and its impact on his painting. Personally, I think his collaboration with Hitchcock was the highlight.

I suppose this is what Art History is – once people begin to forget the immediate ideological context and their own position relative to it, their response to the image becomes slightly more open to other influences.

Tea was so restorative. I had a delicious watermelon and ginger smoothy, and a faultlessly executed rhubarb crumble. The Tate is so lucky it has some of the most spectacular spaces in London for its dining rooms – the Rex Whistler room at Tate Britain and this glassed-in room perched over the river and the city. Wow.

Dali and Film
Tate Modern
1 June - 9 September 2007