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Dream, Caused by the Flight of a Bee (Around a Pomegranate, a Second Before Waking Up)
Artist / Origin: Salvador Dalí (Spanish, 1904–1989)
Region: Europe
Date: 1944
Period: 1900 CE – 2010 CE
Material: Oil on wood
Medium: Painting
Dimensions: H: 20 1/8 in. (51 cm.), W: 16 1/8 in. (41 cm.)
Location: Museo Thyssen-Bornemisza, Madrid, Spain
Credit: © 2009 Salvador Dalí, Gala-Salvador Dalí Foundation / Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York, Courtesy of Art Resource, NY/Photo by Erich Lessing
Utatane soshi emaki (A Wakeful Sleep)
Artist / Origin: Tosa Mitsunobu (Japanese, 1434–1525)
Region: East Asia
Date: Late 15th–early 16th century
Period: 1400 CE – 1800 CE
Material: Ink, color, and gold on paper
Medium: Painting
Location: National Museum of Japanese History, Chiba Prefecture, Japan
Credit: National Museum of Japanese History, Chiba Prefecture, Japan
Both of these works feature a woman asleep and presumably dreaming. The nature of the dreams and the presentation of the women are exceedingly different, however. Dalí’s image is a vivid, chaotic scene that is as much the fantasy of the artist as the sleeper. Mitsunobu’s image, in contrast, is marked by serenity and ethereality. We are at once given access to the woman’s dream world and removed from it. How a given artist renders the world of dreaming is clearly not all about fantasy. Images of dreams might also, as these works demonstrate, speak to the intellectual, sexual, social, and artistic values of artist and audience.