Le Cannibalisme des objets (1933)
centers on one of the most charged motifs in Dalí's Surrealist
vocabulary, a woman's high-heeled shoe. At the center of the present
composition, it floats surrounded by two hands, while a spoon sits posed at
the ready above. While overhead a dense, swirling mass coalesces into a human
form, seemingly sucking matter from the interior of the shoe into its mouth. In
the present work, Dalí has created an image that is simultaneously erotic, violent,
absurd and unsettling. The title, inscribed by the artist in the upper left
corner, describes that the act depicted is not ordinary destruction but a
very particular kind of self-consumption, in which objects turn on themselves
and devour their own meaning.


The present work was acquired directly from the artist by its first owner,
Prince Jean-Louis de Faucigny Lucinge, who was among a circle of twelve
Parisian collectors known as the Zodiac group. Formed at the end of 1932, the
group provided Dalí with a guaranteed monthly income in exchange for works on
paper and paintings, offering the financial foundation that allowed him to
work with exceptional freedom and productivity during this pivotal period.