The new book by the famous French writer and art critic Catherine Millet is dedicated to the “great and terrible” Salvador Dali, a man who not only built a myth about himself, but also forced those around him to accept this myth. The extraordinary personality of the artist was manifested in the honesty and merciless observation with which he revealed to the public the hidden facets of his own psyche, as well as those aspects of the life of the body that are rarely spoken about out loud. It is quite clear that Millet, the author of the acclaimed book “The Sexual Life of Catherine M.,” creates a text that runs counter to the canons of classical art history. The writer accepts the challenge of her hero and, reflecting on Dali’s pictorial and literary work, his habits, manias, fantasies, projects his discoveries onto her own life.

If the voice, the lively speech of Salvador Dali is characterized by a special lyricism, his texts, on the contrary, are stunning in their directness. Descriptions of the human body and human sexuality are striking in their realism and often touching in their simplicity. This could not leave me indifferent and became the starting point for thinking about the connection between the acuity of visual perception and masturbation. This book is an art historical study that reveals the hidden response that Dali’s works found among contemporary artists, and reveals that this is also nothing more than as a projection of our morality. My approach is objective because it is based on a careful study of both the artist’s texts and his paintings. But I also recognize the inevitable subjectivity of what I do, due to the fact that I “read” myself into Dali’s text. That’s why I found myself drawn into this work because Dali’s work has interested me for a very long time and very personally. I decided not to limit or hide this subjective involvement of mine in any way. After all, it is she who is the driving force behind understanding other people’s creativity. Catherine Millet