A Salvador Dalí Painting Hides In Plain Sight At A North Carolina Thrift Store
Seaside Art GalleryThe Dalí wood engraving was part of a series of 100 illustrations the artist created between 1959 and 1963.
In January 2020, a volunteer at Hotline Pink Thrift Shop in Kitty Hawk, North Carolina, named Wendy Hawkins was sorting through donations when she discovered a curious piece of art.
“One day I saw this, with a bunch of other paintings lined up on the floor, and I said, ‘This is old, this is something special,” Hawkins told local news station WAVY TV in March 2020.
On a hunch, Hawkins took the thrift store artifact to Seaside Art Gallery in nearby Nags Head. There, local art dealers consulted The Official Catalog of the Graphic Works of Salvador Dalí and determined that the piece was a woodcut print of an authentic Salvador Dalí painting.
The print was part of a collection of 100 watercolors Dalí worked on in the 1950s and ’60s that illustrated The Divine Comedy by Dante Alighieri. The paintings were meant to reflect a journey through Hell, Purgatory, and Paradise. The print from the thrift store was Dalí’s “Purgatory Canto 32,” a depiction of Dante (in red) and his real-life love interest Beatrice (in blue).
These watercolors were later reproduced into 3,500 woodblock engravings, using 35 blocks to create each image. Dalí even signed some of these prints, including the one discovered at the North Carolina thrift store.
Melanie Smith, the owner of Seaside Art Gallery, ultimately purchased the print from the thrift store and sold it herself to a couple for $1,245.
YouTube/WAVY TV 10Art dealer and appraiser Melanie Smith pointing out details on the Dalí print.
As for how the precious Dalí ended up at the thrift store, that remains a mystery.
“We get things donated in the middle of the night and sometimes people just drop off things and leave, so we have no idea who donated it,” said Michael Lewis, the executive director of Outer Banks Hotline, the charity that operates Hotline Pink Thrift Shop.
Regardless of how it came to the store, the art is now in safe hands.
“It’s rare to find anything like this,” said Smith. “It’s like a treasure hunt, and thanks to Wendy, [the print has] been rescued, and brought to light so people in the art world can really enjoy it.”
