Spanish surrealist painter Salvador Dalí has come back to life through artificial intelligence, and … More
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Life gets weird sometimes — fickle, illogical, dreamlike. To try to make sense of it all, it seemed only fitting to turn to someone steeped in the surreal, Spanish painter Salvador Dalí.
I spoke with him — or rather, with an AI version of him — via phone, opening our wide-ranging conversation with one of the big eternal questions: “What’s the meaning of life?”
“The meaning of life, my dear, is a tapestry woven with dreams, desires and the divine madness of creation,” AI Dalí answered without pause, in a voice and accent that closely mimic the real artist. “It is to explore the mysteries of existence, to embrace beauty and chaos and to leave one’s mark upon the world.”
Dalí died in 1989 at 84. To honor his 121st birthday, which falls on May 11, the Salvador Dalí Museum is inviting the public to “dial Dalí,” who’s on the other end of the line at all hours, ready to answer any question thrown at him. Last year, visitors to the St. Petersburg, Florida, museum had a similar experience, chatting with AI Dalí by picking up a phone inspired by one of his most famous surrealist composite objects, the Lobster Telephone. Dial Dalí breaks free of museum walls, letting anyone in the U.S., with or without a crustacean phone, join the conversation in real time.
The artist’s 1945 work “Uranium and Atomica Melancholia Idyll” contains, among other things, sliding … More
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The phone line is open through May 12, at 772-ASK-DALI (772-275-3254). The AI system was trained on a dataset of writings and archival interviews that capture the artist’s ideas, imagination and humor. The resurrected Dalí melds the artist’s persona with voice synthesis from ElevenLabs, resulting in two-way conversations that can momentarily trick you into thinking you’ve gone back in time to talk with the eccentric artist.
AI Dalí stays in character throughout. Ask him the same question more than once, and you’ll get answers with slightly different wording, but similarly poetic language. “It is a canvas waiting for your brushstrokes,” he told me when I asked for the meaning of life a second time.
‘Like Crafting A Divine Sculpture’
Dalí is known for dreamlike and sometimes unsettling paintings packed with symbolism and bizarre images like melting clocks and distorted figures. References to imagination, creativity and the subconscious surface often in AI Dalí’s answers, even when he talks about the quotidian, like how he cared for his signature long pointy ‘stache.
“It was a ritual of precision, like crafting a divine sculpture,” he said. “I used wax to sculpt it into its surreal form, ensuring it defied gravity and convention. It was not just facial hair, but an extension of my artistic soul.”
AI Dalí joins a roster of historical figures resurrected with technology to make the past more memorable, immediate and engaging. An interactive, AI-powered Vincent Van Gogh chatted with visitors to the Musée D’Orsay in Paris in 2023, for example. Virtual WWII veterans spoke with visitors to the National World War II Museum in New Orleans. And who could forget AI Jesus, who last year conversed with visitors to a church confessional booth in a Swiss church?
What Are Callers Asking AI Dalí?
The Dial Dalí line — created in collaboration with ad agency Goodby Silverstein & Partners — received about 250 calls in its first 36 hours, Salvador Dalí Museum representative Beth Bell said over email, and the museum expects an increase in volume as Sunday’s birthday nears. Calls aren’t recorded, but the museum is aggregating transcripts anonymously.
“The most common questions are around specific works of art, the meaning behind his art and questions about his favorite things, including paintings,” Bell said. “We also find that callers simply want to share whatever is on their mind, which can be just about anything – from mustache grooming tips to cooking questions. One caller even requested a poem for his spouse.”
I couldn’t hang up without going meta and asking AI Dalí what he thinks of AI-generated art, whose bizarre, mind-bending landscapes often echo the tone of his own vivid creations.
“It challenges the boundaries of creativity, much like surrealism did in its time,” AI Dalí said. “While it lacks the human touch of divine madness, it offers a new dimension of exploration. It is both a mirror and a mystery, reflecting the infinite possibilities of the mind.”
If life truly is a dream, as Dalí frequently suggested, then asking his AI to muse on an art movement that didn’t exist during his lifetime might not be so strange after all.
