The Creation of Dali's Divine Comedy

In 1950, Salvador Dalí was invited by the Italian government to commemorate the 700th anniversary of the birth of Dante Alighieri, Italy’s most famous poet, by creating a series of illustrations for Dante’s masterpiece, Divina Commedia. Dante’s epic poem is considered one of Italy’s national treasures.

Written in first person, it describes Dante’s journey through Hell (Inferno), Purgatory (Purgatorio) and Heaven (Paradiso) in 100 verses, so called cantos. The poet Virgil guides him through Inferno and Purgatorio, while Beatrice, Dante’s ideal woman, takes him through Paradiso. Beatrice was a woman from Florence whom Dante had met in childhood and admired from afar.

At a deeper level the story represents, allegorically, the journey of life in the search of purpose and higher values.

Dante Alighieri (1265-1321) was a great poet and a master of Italian literature. The Divine Comedy is a milestone in the history of European literature. It was the first literary narrative not written in Latin, as it was customary during the Middle Ages, but used the common Italian language widely spoken in Tuscany.

Learn more about the Divine Comedy suite and how it was created.

The Divine Comedy - Paradiso

Salvador Dali, Original Wood Engraving, Dante

Salvador Dali, Original Wood Engraving, The Angel

Salvador Dali, Original Wood Engraving, New Image of Beatrice

Salvador Dali, Original Wood Engraving, The Sphere of Mercury

Salvador Dali, Original Wood Engraving, The Sphere of Venus

Salvador Dali, Original Wood Engraving, The Angel of the Sun

Salvador Dali, Original Wood Engraving, Opposition

Salvador Dali, Original Wood Engraving, The Shine of Glorious Bodies

Salvador Dali, Original Wood Engraving, Thus Was the Earth Created

Salvador Dali, Original Wood Engraving, Christ's Apparition

Salvador Dali, Original Wood Engraving, Dante's Ecstasy

Salvador Dali, Original Wood Engraving, The Ancestor's Apparition

Salvador Dali, Original Wood Engraving, The Divine Foreknowledge

Salvador Dali, Original Wood Engraving, The Mystic Ladder

Salvador Dali, Original Wood Engraving, Triumph of Christ and The Virgin

Salvador Dali, Original Wood Engraving, The Joy of the Blessed

Salvador Dali, Original Wood Engraving, Dante Recovers His Sight

Salvador Dali, Original Wood Engraving, Gloria Patri

Salvador Dali, Original Wood Engraving, The Walk toward God

Salvador Dali, Original Wood Engraving, The Creation of Angels

Salvador Dali, Original Wood Engraving, To The Empyrean

Salvador Dali, Original Wood Engraving, The Archangel Gabriel

Salvador Dali, Original Wood Engraving, Preparation for the Final Prayer

Salvador Dali, Original Wood Engraving, Saint Bernard's Prayer

Salvador Dali, Original Wood Engraving, The First Sphere

Salvador Dali, Original Wood Engraving, Dante's New Doubt

Salvador Dali, Original Wood Engraving, The Highest Beauty of Beatrice

Salvador Dali, Original Wood Engraving, Beatrice

Salvador Dali, Original Wood Engraving, Beatrice's Splendour

Salvador Dali, Original Wood Engraving, The Language of the Bird

Salvador Dali, Original Wood Engraving, The Sixth Sphere of Jupiter

Salvador Dali, Original Wood Engraving, The Angel of the Seventh Sphere

Salvador Dali, Original Wood Engraving, Saint James and Hope