Salvador Dali (Spanish, 1904-1989)
Projet pour l’installation Rainy Taxi
Original gouache, pen & pencil on paper, 1968. Female conductor in an umbrella costume and taxi decorated with 4 umbrellas, dedicated “POUR LAR” (Laurance Rudzinoff). Verso in the center “POUR LAR” signed below “Dali” manuscript for RAINING TAXI. Written by Moore ?, vertically on the right “AUTHENTICATED /ON THE / 27 FEB 1970” signed a second time vertically “Dali” and by John Peter Moore “witness” signed J P Moore. Written in pencil to the left “Poly MAT /GOLD LIP (Illegible) F101 LEAF. The drawing is on the reverse of a letter dated 14th March 1968 in Spanish from Mme I de Rosa, The University of Connecticut, addressed to Salvador Dali
Size: Paper size: 18.5cm x 26.7cm
Accompanied by certification of authenticity from Robert & Nicolas Descharnes dated 1st July 2013 number d5241
Literature: Dada, Surrealism, and their Heritage by William S Rubin, Published by the Museum of Modern Art for their exhibition in 1967 (A copy of this sold with the drawing) – see page 154.
This working drawing was executed by Dali in New York at the time of the Museum of Modern Art’s Dada, Surrealism and their Heritage Exhibition, March-June 1968. The artist made it to show how his installation, Rainy Taxi, needed to be erected. In the MOMA catalogue of the 1967 exhibition (Page 154) it describes the Surrealist Exhibition which had opened in January 1938 at the Galerie Beaux Arts. The Exposition Internationale du Surréalisme, organized by Andre Breton and Paul Eluard. The main hall of the Exposition was designed by Marcel Duchamp and Wolfgang Paalen who was responsible for the supervision of the water installations. A reconstruction of the original installation is installed in the open courtyard of the Dali Theatre and Museum in Figueras, Catalonia Spain. In this the lobby was dominated by Dali’s “Rainy Taxi” also known as Mannequin Rotting in a Taxicab. This was a three-dimensional artwork created by Salvador Dali consisting of an actual automobile with two mannequin occupants. A male chauffeur with a shark head was in the front seat, and a female sat in the back seat. A system of pipes causes “rainfall” within the taxi. The female wears an evening dress, her hair is tousled, and lettuce and chicory grow around her. Live snails crawl across her body. Our drawing is a later representation of that earlier theme with just a taxi and a single passenger.
PRICE: On request
