Bidspirit auction | DALI SALVADOR: (1904-1989)

DALI SALVADOR: (1904-1989) - DALI SALVADOR: (1904-1989) Spanish surrealist artist. Book signed and with original drawings, being a softcover edition of Wine, Women and Words by Billy Rose, illustrated by Salvador Dalí, published by Simon and Schuster, New York, 1948. The large 4to edition, comprising 128 pages and bound in the publisher's original pictorial wrappers designed by Dalí, features numerous illustrations by the artist throughout. Signed ( ´Dali´ ) by the artist to a clear area at the foot of the title page, also adding two attractive original drawings in pen, ink and wash, heightened in red, in his hand, depicting a bullfighter wearing a traditional montera and holding a sword and vivid red muleta to the left, and a slender female figure in theatrical costume, standing with both arms dramatically raised, to the right. The binding a little loose and with some light age wear and minor staining, G Billy Rose (1899-1966), the celebrated American theatrical impresario, lyricist and showman, published Wine, Women and Words in 1948 as a characteristically colourful collection of autobiographical reminiscences and anecdotes from his career in American entertainment. Dalí supplied an extensive series of illustrations for the volume, including a portrait of Rose and numerous full-page and smaller compositions. The association between the two men had begun several years earlier: in 1944 Rose commissioned Dalí to execute a series of paintings for his Broadway revue The Seven Lively Arts, although the works were subsequently destroyed in a fire at the Ziegfeld Theatre.