Salvador Dalí – Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland — Plate VIII (1969)

Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland — Plate VIII (1969)

Artist: Salvador Dalí
Title: Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland — Plate VIII
Series: Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland Portfolio (1969)
Year: 1969
Medium: Heliogravure in colours on Mandeure paper
Image Size: 39.4 × 26.7 cm (15 1/2 × 10 1/2 in)
Sheet Size: 43.2 × 29.2 cm (17 × 11 1/2 in)
Edition: 2,500 — this example: 1,650/2,500
Signature: Signed “Dalí / 1968” in plate
Watermark: Mandeure
Printer: Princeton University Press, New Jersey
Publisher: Maecenas Press — Random House, New York
Frame: Unframed
Type: Limited edition heliogravure — from the complete Alice portfolio

Description : 

Plate VIII is the most quintessentially Dalínian image in the entire portfolio — a composition that could only have been made by the artist who painted The Persistence of Memory, and who understood clocks not as instruments of measurement but as organisms of psychological time. At the centre of the composition, a melting clock — Dalí’s most personal and most universally recognised motif — drapes itself over a bifurcating amber tree trunk, its face bearing legible roman numerals, its body dissolving downward into an arch through which a tiny Alice-figure is visible, suspended in the luminous interior of the clock’s own time. Above, the tree’s canopy bursts into teal and blue-green foliage against the pale sky, populated by four precisely rendered butterflies — their hyperrealistic wings a deliberate contrast to the surrealist dissolution of the clock below.

The composition brings together the two registers of Dalí’s visual intelligence at their most integrated: the entomological precision of the butterflies, observed with the care of a natural history illustrator, and the psychological distortion of the melting clock, operating by the logic of dream rather than observation. Carroll’s Mad Hatter’s obsession with time — clocks that run wrong, tea parties fixed at six o’clock forever — finds its perfect visual expression in an image where time itself has lost its rigidity and become as fluid and as malleable as amber. The plate signature appears lower centre in warm brown, flanked by teal ground cover.

Printed by Princeton University Press on Mandeure paper and published by Maecenas Press / Random House, New York, 1969.

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FAQ

Is this an original Dalí print?
Yes — an original heliogravure in colours on Mandeure paper, signed “Dalí / 1968” in the plate, from the 1969 Maecenas Press / Random House edition of 2,500.

What is the edition size?
2,500 impressions — this example is number 1,650.

Can I acquire the complete portfolio?
Yes — the complete set of 14 framed prints plus the first edition book is available separately. Contact us for details.

What is a heliogravure?
A photomechanical intaglio printing technique of exceptional tonal range and chromatic subtlety — one of the finest reproductive processes in the history of fine art printing.

Is the work framed?
No — sold unframed. Please contact us for framing options.

Do you ship internationally?
Yes — worldwide, with museum-grade flat packaging, full insurance, and shipment tracking.

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