Salvador Dalí
Ronsard – Les Amours De Cassandre, Weeping Willow, 1968.
Hand-colored etching on archival paper.
Hand-signed by Dali in pencil and numbered at the lower margins.

Les Amours de Cassandre—In his rendition of “Les Amours de Cassandre” by Ronsard, Dali illustrates the favorite themes of the famous poet and humanist from the French Renaissance.
His wonderful portrait of Ronsard, wearing a toga and a wreath of laurel, is a humorous reminder of the “Carpe diem” of Epicurus.
Love, Death, and the passing of time, expressed with much refinement and harmony in their association with the cycles of nature, remind us of our vulnerability as mortal beings.
In “L‘Art Poétique,” Ronsard compared poetry with painting: “The ear is the judge of the structure of verse, while the eye is the judge of brushstrokes.”
Intuitively, he had opened the way to a Dalinian interpretation.

A suite of 18 original etchings, some reworked in drypoint, of which ten are 15 x 11 inches, and eight are vignettes published in 1968.

Salvador Dali – Off The Wall Gallery, Houston, Texas.