This accurate hand painted reproduction of Salvador Dali’s original Portrait of Paul Eluard is of the highest standards. The original was finished in 1929, the same year Dali met Gala who was the wife of the French surrealist Poet Paul Eluard at the time. Some critics say the theme represents the artist’s frustrations and emotions far more than it represents the Poet. Gala was a Russian immigrant who was ten years older than Dali aand who ultimately became his wife and muse until she died on June 10th 1982.

Paul Eluard was born Eugene Grindel in the French Capital’s suburb of Saint-Denis. He met Gala (then Helena Ivanovna Diakonova) while in Switzerland recovering from Tuberculosis: Just one year later, in 1917 and at seventeen years old Eluard married Gala and began to write poetry. In 1918 he met the father of surrealism Andre Breton and became known for his surrealist poetry. There is little documentation with regards to Dali’s definitions of this oil painting – Indeed much is open for speculation. Even so, with the threatening pose of Eluard in the composition one can believe he saw the Poet as a rival and hostile. Indeed, this is one of Dali’s most intimate and personal oil paintings that is like the artist full of intrigue and elaboration.