SALVADOR DALÍ — Dali by Dali, Harry N. Abrams, New York, 1970

Harry N. Abrams, Inc., New York, 1970. Translated from the French by Eleanor R. Morse. Hardcover. 156 pages, 14 × 20 cm. Inscribed on the front free endpaper: Angus, Happy Birthday, Love from Anne + Ricky.

Published in 1970, at the point when Dalí was beginning to formalise the Theatre-Museum in Figueres, Dali by Dali is a self-portrait presented as an indexing system. Dalí appears here as author, subject, historian, archivist and approving authority. The work is divided into five operational categories: The Planetarian Dalí, The Molecular Dalí, The Monarchical Dalí, The Hallucinogenic Dalí, The Futuristic Dalí. One artist. Multiple departments.

The book does not so much document a career as reorganise it in advance. Paintings, photographs, statements, scientific references and historical material are absorbed into a structure controlled by the person being described. By 1970, the retrospective has started to behave like an institution.

The English edition adds another layer. Eleanor R. Morse, the translator, was not external to the Dalí network. With A. Reynolds Morse, she assembled one of the major American collections of his work, later forming the basis of the Dalí Museum in St Petersburg, Florida. Author. Collector. Translator. Museum. The usual distance between these positions becomes unusually small.

Dalí states the procedure himself: Instead of writing a history of Art, I am writing the art of History.

The title is even more efficient. DALI BY DALI. Attribution completed before the book is opened.

The copy later enters another system altogether. Angus. Happy Birthday. Love from Anne + Ricky. No institutional context supplied. The monument becomes a gift. The gift becomes an object. The object remains available for reassignment.

Condition: very good. Securely packed; tracked UK and international shipping available.