Salvador Dali sculpture titled "Gala Gradiva" signed and numbered 639/1000 TM

Gala’s real name was Helena Ivanovna Diakonova. She was 10 years older than Dalí and when they met in 1929 she was also married to the poet Paul Eluard and mother of a little girl. She also had a lover, Max Ernst, who painted her in a number of portraits.

It was a love at first sight. In his Secret Life, Dalí wrote: “She was destined to be my Gradiva, the one who moves forward, my victory, my wife”. The name Gradiva comes from the title of a novel by W. Jensen, the main character of which was Sigmund Freud. Gradiva was the book’s heroine and it was her who brought psychological healing to the main character.