Critical research. This piece by Salvador Dali is of his own mother, who appears to be in her late 50s. She is positioned in a three quarter view and her chin is tilted slightly down.

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Critical Research #6                                                                Zakir Hussain

Title of Work: Portrait of the Artist's Mother Dofia Felipa Dome Domenech De Dali

Artist Name: Salvador Dali

Size: Unavailable

Medium: Oil on Canvas

Year: 1920

Source:

This piece by Salvador Dali is of his own mother, who appears to be in her late 50’s. She is positioned in a three quarter view and her chin is tilted slightly down. She is a slightly heavy set woman and of a light complexion yet with little bits of rosy undertones that give her the appearance of being of Spanish decent. Her eyebrows are arched; her cheekbones are flat which causes her face to cave inwards a little. The woman’s lips are pouted slightly and covered with a shade of a saturated and pure red lipstick. She has black hair, and she wears a dress that has what appears to be a veil around the collar. The rest of the dress is blue, but is painted in a way that gives the appearance of an ocean or possibly clouds and the area of yellow shaped above it looks like a sun. Overall, she appears to be a typical tradition housewife, the type of woman who no matter at what age always finds the time and cares about looking her best, and whose sole interest is the happiness of her family.

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Her face is composed of similar tones that are all based off the same yellowish-reddish-light brown color. Overall, there are light tones in the face. The use of various tones of the same base color in the face creates unity, because the base color serves the function of their bringing connectivity between the colors, thus, unity. The use of light tones in the face also contrasts with the background color, which is a darkish-brown that is almost black. Similarly, the light blue and yellow tones in the dress also contrast the background. This contrast produces balance due to there being ...

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