Salvador Dalí Reveals the Secrets of His Trademark Moustache (1954)

In a 2010 poll, Sal­vador Dalí’s facial hair was vot­ed the most famous mous­tache of all time. The flam­boy­ant mous­tache was part of his schtick, there’s no deny­ing that. But some have assigned a deep­er mean­ing to it. The Wike­pe­dia entry for Dalí attrib­uted the facial hair to 17th-cen­tu­ry Span­ish mas­ter painter Diego Velázquez (see image). And yet per­haps the influ­ence was more lit­er­ary than painter­ly. Appear­ing on the game show The Name’s the Same in Jan­u­ary, 1954, Dalí was asked (at the 4:00 mark) whether the stache was a joke. To which the Span­ish painter respond­ed, “It’s the most seri­ous part of my per­son­al­i­ty. It’s a very sim­ple Hun­gar­i­an mous­tache. Mr. Mar­cel Proust used the same kind of pomade for this mous­tache.” And there you have it, the artis­tic influ­ence of the world’s most famous facial hair.

Relat­ed Con­tent:

Sal­vador Dalí’s 100 Illus­tra­tions of Dante’s The Divine Com­e­dy

Sal­vador Dali Gets Sur­re­al with Mike Wal­lace (1958)

Q: Sal­vador Dalí, Are You a Crack­pot? A: No, I’m Just Almost Crazy (1969)

A Tour Inside Sal­vador Dalí’s Labyrinthine Span­ish Home


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  • My class I’ve done three home­work and I can’t believe this mous­tache is a joke and also were learn­ing about dalí for our top­ic me I’m YR5

  • C Darryl Mattison says:

    Accord­ing to an exhib­it at the Dali Muse­um in St Peters­burg FL (put it on your buck­et list), when Dali was asked why he wore such a flam­boy­ant mus­tache, his answer was “In order to pass unno­ticed. While every­one is focused on the mus­tache, I am doing what I want behind it.”

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