“Christ of St John of the Cross”, Salvador Dalí, 1951, Kelvin Grove Art Gallery and Museum.
Like the One depicted, this painting has had a very varied reception. When it was shown in London and then purchased by Glasgow Corporation in 1952, many critics and artists disapproved, but it was, and continues to be a huge hit with the general public. The name derives from a sketch of Christ hanging on the cross and viewed from above made by the Spanish mystic St John of The Cross. The image of Christ on a cross suspended in the air was not new in western art. This was often how artists showed visionary experience and famously it is how artists showed the Ecstasy of St Francis when he received the stigmata. Much has been written about the artist’s possible sources and theories abound. Dalí seems to have been content to leave us guessing and perhaps was even inclined to cultivate a level of intrigue. What is clear is that this Christ is no man of sorrows. He looks like a Greek God of antiquity and although he appears to hang from the cross there are no nails and no wounds. Dalí based this figure on photographs of the suspended body of a well-built Hollywood stunt man whom he had hired. The arms of the cross and of Christ are outstretched to form an inverted triangle the sides of which meet on the horizon below him. In terms of perspective, this is the vanishing point, and it gives the painting an extraordinary power when you stand before it. Viewed from above, Christ is mysteriously lit from below. For me, this places Christ outside of everything. This Christ is One who hovers over all, reminding us that “through him all things were made” (John 1:3); even light. It is personal to Dalí own religious experience, and the scene below is recognisable as Portlligat, the small village on coast between Barcelona and the French border where Dalí lived at the time. For me this image is remarkably reassuring; communicating the abiding truth Christ reigns over our all.
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