Two Monsters
Parallels in ‘The Fame Monster’ and ‘Inventions of the Monsters’
There are undeniable parallels between the two works!
Dark Art in Dark Times
Inventions of the Monsters was painted in 1937, a year before Hitler’s annexation of Austria in March 1938, a year after the start of the Spanish Civil War. This was a painting made in turbulent times. Dali was introduced to the Surrealists by Joan Miró in 1929. The same Surrealist Andre Breton who termed Dali “synonymous with revelation in the most resplendent sense of the word” later kicked him out in 1934 for what he deemed the ‘glorification of Hitler-ian fascism’. For what it’s worth, I personally don’t think Dali was enamored with Hitler, but I’m fairly sure he wasn’t explicitly anti-fascist. Which is no defense of whatever abhorrent things he undoubtedly did.
The Fame Monster dropped in 2009 bringing eight new tracks to “The Fame” universe, with Gaga describing the two albums as ‘yin and yang’. In 2009, the world was reeling from global recession and artists beginning to note hypercommercialism as an emerging problem. Digital connection was not yet the behemoth of ever-connectedness we have today, but was not far off as Facebook dominated the social media landscape. It’s now romanticised as a more innocent time, but we were already experiencing some of the evils of digital omnipresence; the strain you experience from growing up on an un-erasable Internet where everything you say simultaneously matters a lot, but not at all. In 2009, it was becoming apparent that certain factions of society had too much power, as banks were bailed out by governments with what felt like impunity to people who had lost their homes, or like my husband, graduated in a landscape where businesses were firing, not hiring. It’s not surprising the tone of albums released in 2009 were darker, but also focused on the affordable joys of partying, friendship, relationships, somewhat amplifying DIY fashion. I saw a lot of tutorials on customizing denim cutoffs and jackets that year.
The obvious parallel is social unrest as the backdrop: economic recession for Gaga’s album, war across Europe for Dali’s painting. Instability, unclear futures reflected in the darker tones of both works.
Monsters
In The Fame Monster each track spotlights a specific monster, a personification of aspects of fame, and also aspects of life. In talking about the ‘re-release’ The Fame Monster Gaga says:
“On my re-release The Fame Monster, I wrote about everything I didn't write on The Fame. While traveling the world for two years, I've encountered several monsters, each represented by a different song on the new record: my 'Fear of Sex Monster,' my 'Fear of Alcohol Monster,' my 'Fear of Love Monster,' my 'Fear of Death Monster,' my 'Fear of Loneliness Monster,' etc." "I spent a lot of nights in Eastern Europe, and this album is a pop experimentation with industrial/Goth beats, 90's dance melodies, an obsession with the lyrical genius of 80's melancholic pop, and the runway. I wrote while watching muted fashion shows and I am compelled to say my music was scored for them.”
I took considerable artistic license and assigned monsters to some tracks below, putting a question mark where I wasn’t so sure.
Bad Romance: Fear of Love Monster
Alejandro: Fear of Men Monster?
Monster: The Sex Monster?
Speechless: Fear of Death Monster
Dance in the Dark: Self Monster
Lovegame: Lust, Control Monster
Paper Gangsta: Deception and Betrayal Monster
Beautiful, Dirty, Rich: Greed and Vanity Monster
Telephone: Suffocation Monster
So Happy I Could Die: Fear of Alcohol Monster. Fear of Loneliness Monster?
Teeth: Truth Monster
Dali put numerous monsters in his painting, terming them so. In his congratulatory telegram to the Art Institute of Chicago upon the purchase of the painting, he mentioned these explicitly:
Horse women: ‘maternal river monsters’
Flaming giraffe: ‘masculine apocalyptic monster’
Cat angel: ‘equals divine heterosexual monster’
Hourglass: ‘metaphysical monster’
Gala and Dali: ‘equal sentimental monster’
Little blue dog*: ‘not a true monster’
*the little blue dog is hard to find, he’s in the bottom right.
I noted additional monsters, including the Female Figure with Sort of Dissolving Head, which I read to imply being muddled, manipulated, confused – parallel to Gaga’s Paper Gangsta and Teeth. In Dali’s time I can imagine this referencing the manipulation of the public into war, the division of society. I note the egg, which I see as a glimmer of hope against the ‘maternal river monster’ noting ‘maternal’ can encompass exceptional cruelty (birth inherently so, mother-wound more painful than Daddy Issues) but also exceptional hope (birth is new life, a forced future-facing outlook: children are synonymous with future).
Universal Fears
Both works focus on timeless fears: death, for one. Dali’s hourglass, butterfly, indeed the general mood being ominous because of the war. Gaga in Speechless writes about her father refusing a heart procedure, which no doubt made her reflect on the fragility of her parents, the ephemerality of existence itself. Both works seem to reflect on violation, with Gaga talking about this explicitly in Monster, which we can parse more accurately as a reflection on assault with what we know about her life today.
Dali violates the giraffe, setting in ablaze, his horse-headed woman a violation of nature. Both works don’t necessarily make immediate sense, giving me a huge hit of nostalgia for the days of symbolism-laden art, when things did not need to be stated as immediately and explicity. This is partial romanticism on my part, partial awareness that unless things are spelled out, we don’t seem to be able to read meaning into things anymore, indeed we obfuscate the ability for viewers to do so in our own work. The lyricism in Brat, for example stands in direct contrast to the metaphor-laden Teeth (in later Gaga work, Judas).
A curious difference is the optimism which shines through Gaga’s album, but despite icons and symbols of hope, is lacking in Dali’s painting. It is impossible this opinion is not tinted with the lens of nostalgia, because I grew up with Gaga’s album and am far more familiar with it. I do think there is some objective truth in the feeling of Gaga’s album being positive, even if purely that it is dance music, which was experienced in togetherness – whereas Dali’s art creates some distance purely through egocentricism of theme (you can’t unsee his face, you can sing Gaga’s lyrics).
Dali also titles the painting such that monsters are doing the invention, whereas Gaga’s monsters are self-invented in tandem with socially constructed identity, self-experienced. It’s not the monsters that have the power, in her work so much – in Dali’s, they are empowered.
Masks abound in Dali’s painting, which of course echoes the many masks Gaga wears. I cannot yet talk more about this.
Money Made With Love is Art?
Dali said he had a “A pure, vertical, mystical gothic love of cash”. Which may explain why he designed the Chupa Chups logo, of all things. It’s undeniable he did a good job, placing the logo on the top of the sucker instead of the left, so you would always see it no matter how the lollipop was placed. Gaga during her ARTPOP days wanted to reverse Warhol who wanted to make art of the soup can, by ‘putting the art on the soup can’. I’m not sure that Dali beat her to it because he was not quite as literal as putting a Bosch print on a McQueen dress, or a Koons on the album cover…but I wouldn’t say he didn’t.
Gaga remains a hypercommercial, if not the most commercial, artist of our times: featuring in blockbuster movies, Vegas residencies, two Haus Labs marketing emails weekly, tour tickets retailing with multiple zeros at the end of the price tag. It is intriguing that her merch may sell out, but she doesn’t: the integrity coming maybe from the feeling that everything is genuinely felt, even if it’s expensive.
Finally, I would like to introduce the interesting coincidence that Joan Miró who introduced Dali to the Surrealists, painted ‘Carnaval de Arlequin’ in 1924. Gaga released her album Harlequin a full 100 years later, in 2024, in a melding of her own cinematic universe and that of Todd Philips’ Joker.
Another interesting link is Dali’s Mae West lips sofa turning up in ‘House of Gucci’ in a scene where Maurizio, played by Adam Driver, is in the middle of flirting with Paola Franchi. He tells her initially not to be scared of touching anything, but later says “actually, be a little scared, that couch costs more than most people’s apartments in Monte Carlo”.