Soft Construction with Boiled Beans: A Closer Look

Ninety years after it was painted, Dalí's Soft Construction with Boiled Beans (Premonition of Civil War) has come to St. Petersburg from the Philadelphia Museum of Art for A Body at War. The installation in the James Family Wing frames the painting with black-and-white historical imagery about the divisions that preceded the Spanish Civil War. A Closer Look is the docent-led version of the encounter: a 30-minute pop-up tour through the canvas's minutely rendered details, its symbolism and its political moment, with time left for questions and shared observations. The exhibition also invites comparison with Goya and Picasso, two Spaniards who made their own images of a nation at war.