When Salvador Dalí met Andy Warhol: a surreal New York encounter
A meeting of minds and egos occurred in downtown New York in the mid-1960s when Salvador Dalí and Andy Warhol crossed paths. Dalí, the supremo of surrealism, was one of the only artists capable of matching Warhol, who pioneered pop art and radicalised what high art meant. Both were outlandish, each bending convention in their work. At the same time, each had a begrudging respect for the other’s work while quietly aiming to outdo the other.
The two first met in the St. Regis Hotel, Dalí’s home turf. Every winter, he’d rock up to Room 1610, usually flanked by his wife and an assortment of animals, not limited to boxes of flies and his pet ocelot. While Warhol was famed for popularising the phrase: “15 minutes of fame,” Dalí understood cultivating celebrity best. While Warhol used others for his, Dalí created his headlines by being consistently strange and could be found routinely screeching: “Dalí had arrived!” in the hotel reception.
In 1965, Dalí had caught wind that Warhol was around and ushered him into his room. Photographer David McCabe witnessed the spectacle of these two megalomaniacs meeting and later recalled Warhol knocking back wine to kill the nerves. Within seconds of entering the room, Dalí was ceremoniously knighting him.
Sensing Warhol’s growing reputation as one of the finest artists to emerge from the New York scene, Dalí instantly took command of their interaction, which was less of a chat and more a choreographed dance that put him in control. He put an Incan headdress on his head. After an awkward five minutes, Warhol squirmed and whispered a panicked plea to McCabe: “David, we gotta go.”
Warhol was so embarrassed that he instructed McCabe not to include his photographs of the encounter in any collections, fearing they didn’t align with his usual presentation. That said, he met with Dalí many times after that, willingly suffering through being put on a spinning wheel while paint was poured over him on one occasion.
They had a unique hold on each other, and it seemed Warhol was looking for Dalí’s approval in some sense, despite his obvious trepidation about what the eccentric artist might do to him next. By weathering his weirdness, Warhol earned his respect. Dalí later gave him another gift in a full circle moment to the headdress incident.
“Dalí was really sweet,” recalled Warhol. “He’d brought a plastic bag full of his used-up palates as a present to me.”
The palates were a symbolic passing of the torch and a reflection of the changing of the guard. Dalí was the older artist, but he effectively christened Warhol as his successor. They went on to work together and developed a strange kinship. It was a far cry from their first meeting. In McCabe’s resurfaced pictures, Warhol sheepishly clutches a glass of wine while Dalí poses confidently for the camera. That picture mortified Warhol but was the best reflection of their dynamic.
