- April 29, 2025
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A vignette in the conservatory refers to Salvador Dalí's fascination with comedic sex symbol Mae West. Dalí designed the "Mae West sofa," based on the screen legend's lips. The original is in the Dalí Theatre and Museum in Spain.
Visitors should pay close attention as they enter the welcome center, because close attention is being paid on them. (Klint Lowry)
Cactus growing out of a piano standing in a koi pond emulates Dalí's use of juxtaposition in his images. (Klint Lowry)
A "living mustache" hovers in the conservatory above rows of plants planted to create a one-point perspective. (Courtesy photo)
As visitors move from one large vignette to another, they should keep an eye out for smaller touches added to create a Dalí dreamsape. (Klint Lowry)
"Rosa Floridali," is part of the rarely displayed"Floridali" set of lithographs created by Dalí in 1968 and on loan from The Dalí Museum in St. Petersburg for the "Gardens of the MInd" exhibition. (Courtesy photo)
Dalí often used eyes as a symbol of perception. (Klint Lowry)
Dalí was fascinated with "Divine Geometry," especially spirals. (Klint Lowry)
Giant butterfly wings and palm leaf ribs form an elephant in a fig tree.(Klint Lowry)
"Hatched" trees are indicative of Dalí's surrealism, with the egg motif a favorite symbol of his, representing life and renewal. (Klint Lowry)
The Wall of Eyes looks out over the conservatory. (Courtesy photo)
Butterflies as leaves is straight from Dalí's imagery. (Klint Lowry)
Selby Gardens built a butterfly house and filled it with native Florida species for the Dalí exhibit. (Klint Lowry)
"Lys" is part of the rarely displayed Floridali collection of lithographs on loan from the Dalí Museum in St. Petersburg. (Courtesy photo)
A boat filled with cactus perched in a tree is very Dalí in itself. The added touch is in the name "Gala," the name of Dali's wife. (Klint Lowry)
The staff at Selby Gardens set out transform the greenhouse and gardens into "a Dalí dreamscape." (Klint Lowry)
Two eggs and a twig mustache invite visitors into the Museum of Botany and the Arts. (Klint Lowry)
An "ethereal piano" blends in with the hanging plants in the conservatory. (Courtesy photo)
An olive tree growing from the skeletal remains of a boat is a re-creation of a bit of landscaping Dalí had at his home. A photo of it can be seen in the Museum of Botany and the Arts.
Greenhouse manager Angel Lara describes a vignette that incorporates photographic images of Dalí's home in coastal Spain.
Crutches supporting trees were common in Dalí paintings, and there are few life-size re-creations i the exhibit.
For those with even a casual interest in art, the name Salvador Dalí is synonymous with surrealism, and for almost everyone the name is sure to conjure up two images: the second being of the Dalí himself, who loved to publicly present himself as the wild-eyed mad genius with the cartoonishly oversized waxed mustache.
We’ll get the the first image in a second.
But there was much more to the genius than immediately meets the eye, says Dr. Carol Ockman, curator of “Salvador Dalí: Gardens of the Mind,” the fourth annual exhibition in the Jean & Alfred Goldstein Exhibition Series at Marie Selby Botanical Gardens.
This may be the most ambitious entry in series yet, and if it is, it’s because Salvador Dalí’s work is so well-suited for the setting.
“The natural world fascinated Salvador Dalí,” Ockman says, “but not many people focus on that aspect of his work.”
This may be the first time Dalí was presented in a Botanical garden setting, Ockman adds, and the “living museum” of Selby Gardens is a magnificent setting to do so.
“What we want you to feel like when you're going through the conservatory and in the gardens, we want you to feel like you're entering Dalí's imagination,” she says, “you're entering a Dalí dreamscape at every turn.”
The exhibition uses several motifs that that run through Dalí’s work. Which bring us to that first image everyone associates with Dalí: There isn’t a melting clock to be found.
Instead, the exhibition combines Dalí’s frequent use of botanical imagery with motifs and principals he applied throughout his career: juxtaposition, perspective and patterns.
The Dalí Museum in St. Petersburg is co-curator for the exhibition. Its curator of education, Peter Tush, was a valuable contributor to the design of the exhibition, says Selby Gardens Horticulture Director Mike McLaughlin.
“He helped us refine our designs, make sure they were truly Dalí,” McLaughlin says. “And that was one of the challenges we have in designing an exhibit like this, because we could do something surreal or even bizarre. So we needed both Carol and the curators at the Dalí museum to help us define that.”
Visitors can ground their dreamscape stroll in reality in the Museum of Botany & the Arts, where a collection of photographs by Clyde Butcher shows Dali’s beloved home in Spain. As the grand finale to the Dalí exhibition is the rarely displayed lithographic series “Floridalí,” on loan from The Dalí Museum.
