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Presentation of the book ‘La Musa Surreale’ (The Surreal Muse) by Alessandra Redaelli
24 October 2025 @ 18:00 - 19:30
Presentation of the book ‘La Musa Surreale’ (The Surreal Muse), in the presence of the writer, journalist and curator Alessandra Redaelli, who will talk about Surrealism through the eyes of a muse. The book will be available for purchase during the evening.
Inspired by the life of Gala Dmitrievna, the narrative voice is finally that of a woman: the muse of Surrealism.
In the novel, Gala stands out as the pivotal character of an era, the driving force behind the literary career of Paul Eluard – France’s greatest poet – and the artistic career of Salvador Dalí, the very symbol of Surrealist painting.
Locked away in her castle in Púbol, in the heart of the province of Gerona, Spain, a now mature Gala tells her story in the first person, from when she was still called Elena Dmitrievna and arrived from Russia in Switzerland to be treated for tuberculosis in a sanatorium and to meet, there, a very young and shy Paul Eluard.
Then passion flares up, and her unwavering faith in the talent of a boy who becomes a man and establishes himself as one of the leading figures of Dadaism and Surrealism. Then came her encounter with Max Ernst, the ménage à trois that scandalised Paris, and later, the arrival of the young Dalí in the couple’s life and the birth of a love that excluded everything else and became the driving force behind a unique and revolutionary art form.
Punctuated by memories, regrets for a youth now gone, and heartbreaks for the young lovers who accompanied her in her final years, Gala’s story is that of a divisive woman who knew how to make herself hated by the world as much as she knew how to make herself adored by the men who stood by her.
But it is also the story of a century that left no room for women, and an opportunity to reflect on the stories of all the female figures who were wrongly considered secondary characters in art and who instead contributed fundamentally to its evolution.
Link to the book: https://www.vandaedizioni.com/prodotto/ottobre-la-musa-surreale/
