{"id":686920,"date":"2026-01-10T14:44:12","date_gmt":"2026-01-10T14:44:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/686920\/"},"modified":"2026-01-10T14:44:12","modified_gmt":"2026-01-10T14:44:12","slug":"on-this-day-dali-bunuel-and-dani-carvajal-a-trio-of-spanish-geniuses-have-links-to-this-weekend-in-january","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/686920\/","title":{"rendered":"ON THIS DAY: Dali, Bu\u00f1uel – and Dani Carvajal? A trio of Spanish geniuses have links to this weekend in January"},"content":{"rendered":"

IT\u2019S one of the coldest, darkest weekends around Spain, where traditionally not much happens and nobody has any money or energy left.<\/strong><\/p>\n

With the festivities finally behind us and Reyes, January 6, marking the official end of Spanish Christmas, most of the country\u2019s locals will be looking for a cheap and quiet weekend.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s a good time then to recall a famous artist\u2019s ingenious money-making skills, as well as a leading film-maker and a top footballer.<\/p>\n

SALVADOR DALI & GALA<\/strong><\/p>\n

When Andy Warhol said that \u2018business is an art and art is a business\u2019, he might have had Spanish surrealist Salvador Dali in mind.<\/p>\n

It was on January 11, 1974, that the Catalan painter\/sculptor inaugurated the Gala Foundation, which became one of the most successful money-making art enterprises in history.<\/p>\n

READ MORE:<\/strong> REYES: The connections to Spain\u2019s top composer and a now extinct rare mountain goat<\/a><\/p>\n

Today, nearly four decades after the artist\u2019s death, the Foundation is making more money than ever.<\/p>\n

It consists of three \u2018museums\u2019 \u2013 the Dal\u00ed Theatre in Figueres, the Dal\u00ed House in Portlligat and the \u2018Castle Gala\u2019 in P\u00fcbol.<\/p>\n

Whether or not you consider Dali a genius or a madman, he knew how to make money.<\/p>\n

As fellow artist and leader of the surrealist movement Andre Breton put it, the Gala Foundation made \u2018Avida Dollars\u2019 to use a clever anagram.<\/p>\n

So what or who exactly was Gala?<\/p>\n

Gala Diakanova was actually Dali\u2019s wife and muse. After her death in 1982, he became a recluse, and did not live much longer himself.<\/p>\n

His account of how he met and wooed her is enlightening.<\/p>\n

He bought the most expensive red silk shirt that he could find, then ripped out the left chest area, corresponding to where his heart was located.<\/p>\n

Proudly, he smeared his own \u2018perfume\u2019, which mainly consisted of donkey excrement, across his left nipple, and went to call on her.<\/p>\n

Unsurprisingly, she shunned him in no uncertain terms. Dali, though, took this as a triumph.<\/p>\n

Well, he must have done something right, because she married him in 1931, and they were separated only by death, 50 years later.<\/p>\n

LUIS BU\u00d1UEL<\/strong><\/p>\n

Do you loathe dinner parties, those dreadful middle-class events where everyone is vying to keep up appearances?<\/p>\n

If so, you will enjoy Luis Bu\u00f1uel\u2019s film, The Discreet Charm of the Bourgeoisie. On January 10, 1972, it won the Oscar for the Best Foreign-Language film.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

The Spanish director is arguably the most sarcastic human being who ever lived, satirizing the dinner party mercilessly.<\/p>\n

A group of \u2018nice\u2019 people (lawyers, architects) led by \u2018Fernando Rey\u2019 keep trying to hold a posh meal, but things continually go wrong.<\/p>\n

Bu\u00f1uel died in 1983. As a young man, he had been a surrealist film maker and knew Salvador Dal\u00ed and Federico Garcia Lorca well.<\/p>\n

He attributed his wry outlook on life to his Aragonite upbringing. Aragon, he used to say, is stuck between Catalunya and Castile, and also very much part of \u2018Old Spain\u2019.\u00a0<\/p>\n

READ MORE:<\/strong> MICHAEL COY introduces us to his hero \u2013 George Santayana: A Spanish-American thinker famous for his pithy sayings<\/a><\/p>\n

Being neither one nor the other, there was only one imperative \u2013 to laugh at both.<\/p>\n

Bu\u00f1uel lived and worked in various countries, including France, Mexico and the USA, but never lost his wholly Spanish outlook.<\/p>\n

Today he is recognised as one of the truly great movie directors and famous internationally.<\/p>\n

DANI CARVAJAL<\/strong><\/p>\n

This Sunday, Dani Carvajal will celebrate his 34th birthday.<\/p>\n

The Real Madrid star and captain came up through the club\u2019s youth system, but was surprisingly suddenly sold to the German club, Bayer Leverkusen at the age of 20.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

A year later, the Madrileno rejoined Real for 6.5m euros, and has played for the first team ever since.<\/p>\n

The full-back made his debut in the Champions\u2019 League in September 2013, against Galatasaray, a game which Madrid won 6-1.<\/p>\n

That first season as a senior player was a memorable one: Carvajal played 45 times, and scored two goals.\u00a0<\/p>\n

The campaign\u2019s highlight was undoubtedly the Champions League Final.\u00a0<\/p>\n

The match, played in Lisbon, was an all-Madrid affair, Real versus Atletico and it looked like Real were going to lose, until an equalising goal forced extra time.<\/p>\n

READ MORE:<\/strong> Daring swashbuckle and the restoration of honour: MICHAEL COY on a Spanish theatrical classic -the Mayor of Zalamea<\/a><\/p>\n

The Merengues scored three times in the added half-hour, eventually winning easily.<\/p>\n

The Real legend made himself a local favourite when he gave Barcelona fans the \u2018middle finger\u2019 in 2016 and was quick to apologise.<\/p>\n

The opening game of the 2018 season saw Carvajal on the scoresheet, netting the club\u2019s first goal of the campaign.\u00a0<\/p>\n

It was particularly enjoyable for him, because the opponents were Getafe (and Dani is a native of the rival Madrid suburb, Leganes).<\/p>\n

Everything went smoothly until 2024 when he suffered a serious injury tearing the cruciate ligament in his right knee, putting him out of the team for a year.<\/p>\n

But incredibly he came back in July 2025, and looks like he\u2019s got plenty more to give this season.<\/p>\n

Click here to read more La Cultura News<\/a> from The Olive Press.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"IT\u2019S one of the coldest, darkest weekends around Spain, where traditionally not much happens and nobody has any…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":686921,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5312],"tags":[2000,299,162350,207698,18104,8626,115494,104,18106],"class_list":{"0":"post-686920","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-spain","8":"tag-eu","9":"tag-europe","10":"tag-gala","11":"tag-luis-bunuel","12":"tag-news-spain","13":"tag-newspaper","14":"tag-salvador-dali","15":"tag-spain","16":"tag-the-olive-press"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@uk\/115871341898647008","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/686920","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=686920"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/686920\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/686921"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=686920"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=686920"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=686920"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}