A recurring image in even the most outlandishly surrealistic works of Salvador Dali was the coastline surrounding his Spanish homeland. In “Person at the Window,” Dali (1904 – 1989) depicted his younger sister, Ana Maria, gazing at the Bay of Cadaqués, expressed with subdued colors that emanate a peaceful feeling uncommon in his work. Ana Maria was Dali’s only female model until his wife, Gala, replaced her in 1929. The brother and sister were extremely close until Ana Maria published an autobiography describing Dali in a way that displeased him. He retaliated by creating another version of this painting that depicted her in an obscene and unflattering manner.

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