DALÍ AT THE HYACINTHE RIGAUD ART MUSEUM

For the first time, the Hyacinthe Rigaud Art Museum hosts a major work by Salvador Dalí (1904–1989) in its permanent collection.
Thanks to an exceptional loan from the Centre Pompidou – National Museum of Modern Art, the painting Partial Hallucination. Six Images of Lenin on a Piano (1931) will be displayed for over a year in a historically rich location: the former reception room of the Lazerme mansion, at the heart of the museum.

This exceptional exhibition marks an important milestone in the museum's programming and foreshadows the major Dalí exhibition planned for 2027 in Perpignan. It allows the Catalan artist to be inscribed in the living memory of the territory while initiating a dialogue between his work, the location, and the public.

Partial Hallucination. Six Images of Lenin on a Piano is a pivotal work in Dalí's journey. Created in 1931, it is directly inspired by a hypnagogic vision (an hallucination occurring at bedtime), in which Dalí sees the faces of Lenin multiplying on the keys of a piano.
This obsessive image is amplified by the addition of typically Dalinian symbols: a napkin, cherries, an armband, ants… The painting is the first explicit evocation of political power in the painter's work and reflects his growing distrust of the alignment of surrealism with communism, under the influence of André Breton.

Alongside this masterpiece, two works from the Rigaud Museum's collections enrich the display:
An original drawing by Dalí depicting the bell tower of Collioure, a rare testament to his attachment to the Roussillon landscape;

A gouache-enhanced photograph by Dalí, showcasing his painting The Perpignan Station or Pop, Op, Yes-Yes, Firefighter (1965), a jubilant nod to this place that Dalí considered "the cosmic center of the universe."

With this exhibition, the Rigaud Museum lays the groundwork for an ambitious project: to better position Salvador Dalí in the cultural history of Perpignan and the region, by highlighting his real and symbolic connections to this territory where the artist saw the convergence of his visions.

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