How Salvador Dal's art found a home in Florida

When Mike Wallace interviewed Salvador Dalí in 1958, the painter seemed to believe that he might live forever.Asked what he believed would happen to him when he died, the Surrealist replied, "Myself not believe in my death.""You will not die?""No, no.

Believe in general in death, but in the death of Dalí? Absolutely no, not."Dalí did die, in 1989.But in a way, he was right.

The artist lives on at the Dalí Museum in St.Petersburg, Florida.The collection chronicles his career through more than 2,400 of his works, from oil paintings to sculptural mashups to fine jewelry.

Inside the Dalí Dome, a "Dalí Alive 360" show fully immerses visitors in his art."Its spirit is based in Dalí's," said Hank Hine, the executive director of the museum.

"That is, Dalí was always trying to do things in new ways.The amazing thing about Dalí is that his impact is still felt today, not only in art, but in culture generally."Today, Salvador Dalí may be a household name, but his name first belonged to his parents' firstborn son.

"His parents named him after his dead brother," said Hine."That saddled him with a burden of identity that lasted all his life, and can explain a lot of his art – for instance, his double images, where you see one thing, and you see another.

So, this Salvador Dalí was always wondering, 'Am I myself or am I the other?'"Many of Dalí's works combine the real and the surreal – a juxtaposition he could pull off thanks to his training as a precise classical painter."He can paint like an old master; however, he wasn't content to stay there," said program director Kim Macuare.She said Dalí found inspiration by diving deep into the subconscious: "He was very interested in the writings of the Austrian psychoanalyst Sigmund Freud.

And so, when he cuts the drawers into the Venus, what's he's imagining is, 'What would happen if we could go up and open the drawers and look inside someone to see what really makes them tick?'"As far as ticking goes...