Good night is art work for some...
HELLO Dali! I can’t swear this is a true story because I heard it from the friend of a friend of someone he vaguely remembers meeting in a pub three Christmases ago, who said he’d been told it by his next-door neighbour whose wife had run off with his best mate eight years before.
And he still misses him.
Not the greatest start to a story, is it?
But do read on, because it involves one of the most distinguished names in the art world, so by the time you’ve finished reading it you’ll feel like you’ve mingled with the great and the good for a few moments – and with any luck it may also cause you to break into a smile.
And if there’s one thing this world needs right now, it’s more smiles!
Two young art graduates, an Italian-american from Brooklyn, New York, named Rocco Dyall and Bolivian-born Miguel Vasquez, worked in the Toledo Museum of Modern Art, Spain.
While Rocco had an administrative position, Miguel was tasked with ascertaining the precise age of every one of the museum’s enormous collection of works painted by the renowned surrealist Salvador Dali. Which reminds me…
Years ago, while wandering around the National Gallery in London I suddenly saw what looked like one of Dali’s famous paintings.
Fascinated, I stared at it for a good 10 minutes, then as one of the gallery’s attendants strolled past, I said: “You must feel really honoured to be able to be this close to a Dali original and spend time with it every day”.
He shot me a withering look and said: “Look again, chum. It’s not a Dali. Someone hung a plastic clock too close to that radiator!”
To bring this story to a muchneeded finish – and remember I can’t be sure this is true – at the end of every working day, as the two art graduates left the Toledo museum, this is the way they told each other good night.
The Italian-american would say… “See you later Dali dater!”
And the Bolivian would say…you guessed it…
“In a while, Rocco Dyall!”
Yes. I am available for panto in 2022.