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The reason some portraits don't look true to life is that some people make no effort to resemble their pictures.
Salvador Dali
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Interpretation

What this quote means

This quote suggests that the authenticity of portraits can be affected by the subject's lack of effort to present themselves realistically.

Salvador Dali's quote reveals a deeper commentary on the nature of representation in art versus reality. It implies that a true likeness in a portrait relies not only on the skill of the artist but also on the subject's willingness to be genuine and to reflect their true self, suggesting that the disconnect between appearance and reality can stem from personal effort or intent.

Themes

PortraitArtResemblanceTruthAuthenticity

In practice

Example use cases

This quote can be used in an art class to discuss the importance of authenticity in personal expression.

More from Salvador Dali

There are some days when I think I'm going to die from an overdose of satisfaction.
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Since I don't smoke, I decided to grow a mustache - it is better for the health. However, I always carried a jewel-studded cigarette case in which, instead of tobacco, were carefully placed several mustaches, Adolphe Menjou style. I offered them politely to my friends: "Mustache? Mustache? Mustache?" Nobody dared to touch them. This was my test regarding the sacred aspect of mustaches.
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Let the labyrinth of wrinkles be furrowed in my brow with the red-hot iron of my own life, let my hair whiten and my step become vacillating, on condition that I can save the intelligence of my soul - let my unformed childhood soul, as it ages, assume the rational and esthetic forms of an architecture, let me learn just everything that others cannot teach me, what only life would be capable of marking deeply in my skin!
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The problem with the youth of today' is that one is no longer part of it.
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You have to systematically create confusion, it sets creativity free. Everything that is contradictory creates life
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All of my knowledge, of both science and religion, I incorporate into the classical tradition of my painting.
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