Image copyright AFP/EPA Image caption Ms Martínez says she was born in 1956 as a result of an affair between Dalí and her mother

Forensic experts in Spain have exhumed the body of the surrealist painter Salvador Dalí to extract DNA to settle a paternity case.

Samples were taken from the artist's teeth, bones and nails in a four-hour operation, officials said.

The exhumation followed a court order on behalf of a woman who says her mother had an affair with the painter.

If she is proved right, she could assume part of the Dalí's estate, currently owned by the Spanish state.

It may take weeks before the results of the tests are known.

The surrealist painter, who died in 1989 at the age of 85, was buried in a crypt in a museum dedicated to his life and work in Figueres, in north-eastern Spain.

A crowd gathered outside the museum to watch as police escorted the experts into the building on Thursday evening.

The exhumation went ahead despite the objections of the local authorities and the foundation carrying Dalí's name, both of which claimed that not enough notice had been given ahead of the exhumation.

Image copyright Reuters Image caption A crowd gathered in front of Dalí's museum

María Pilar Abel Martínez, a tarot card reader who was born in 1956, says her mother had an affair with Dalí during the year before her birth. Her mother, Antonia, had worked for a family that spent time in Cadaqués, near the painter's home.

Last month a Madrid judge ordered the exhumation to settle the claim. It is contested by the Dalí foundation, which manages the estate of the artist, who was not believed to have had any children.

Her action is against the Spanish state, to which Dalí left his estate.

Media playback is unsupported on your device Media caption Will Gompertz explained how Dali's body would be removed

Ms Martínez says her mother and paternal grandmother both told her at an early age that Dalí was her real father.

But the claim has surprised many, including Ian Gibson, an Irish-born biographer of Dalí, who said that the notion of the artist having an affair that produced a child was "absolutely impossible".

"Dalí always boasted: 'I'm impotent, you've got to be impotent to be a great painter'," the biographer said.

Salvador Dalí: Life of a surrealist

Image copyright Getty Images Image caption Dalí's wife, Gala, died in 1982 - after which he is said to have lost much of his zest for life

Born on 11 May 1904 in Figueres, Catalonia, Spain

Produced more than 1,500 paintings throughout his career

Married Elena Ivanovna Diakonova - or Gala - in 1934; they had no children

The couple had an open marriage and regularly held orgies at their house - though Dalí is said to have watched rather than participated

Died on 23 January 1989 in Figueres

Photo gallery of Dalí's work</s>Forensic experts in Spain have exhumed the body of surrealist painter Salvador Dalí to extract DNA to settle a paternity case.

Samples were taken from the artist's teeth, bones and nails in a four-hour operation.

The exhumation from a crypt in a museum in the city of Figueres followed a court order on behalf of a woman who says her mother had an affair with the painter.</s>Forensic experts in Spain have exhumed the body of the surrealist painter Salvador Dalí to extract DNA to settle a paternity case.

Samples were taken from the artist's teeth, bones and nails in a four-hour operation, officials said.

The exhumation followed a court order on behalf of a woman who says her mother had an affair with the painter.

If she is proved right, she could assume part of the Dalí's estate, currently owned by the Spanish state.

It may take weeks before the results of the tests are known.

The surrealist painter, who died in 1989 at the age of 85, was buried in a crypt in a museum dedicated to his life and work in Figueres, in north-eastern Spain.

A crowd gathered outside the museum to watch as police escorted the experts into the building on Thursday evening.

The exhumation went ahead despite the objections of the local authorities and the foundation carrying Dalí's name, both of which claimed that not enough notice had been given ahead of the exhumation.

María Pilar Abel Martínez, a tarot card reader who was born in 1956, says her mother had an affair with Dalí during the year before her birth. Her mother, Antonia, had worked for a family that spent time in Cadaqués, near the painter's home.

Last month a Madrid judge ordered the exhumation to settle the claim. It is contested by the Dalí foundation, which manages the estate of the artist, who was not believed to have had any children.

Her action is against the Spanish state, to which Dalí left his estate.
• How the world went crazy for Surrealism

Ms Martínez says her mother and paternal grandmother both told her at an early age that Dalí was her real father.

But the claim has surprised many, including Ian Gibson, an Irish-born biographer of Dalí, who said that the notion of the artist having an affair that produced a child was "absolutely impossible".

"Dalí always boasted: 'I'm impotent, you've got to be impotent to be a great painter'," the biographer said.
• Born on 11 May 1904 in Figueres, Catalonia, Spain
• Produced more than 1,500 paintings throughout his career
• Married Elena Ivanovna Diakonova - or Gala - in 1934; they had no children
• The couple had an open marriage and regularly held orgies at their house - though Dalí is said to have watched rather than participated</s>So surreal. Salvador Dalí’s body was exhumed in Spain on Thursday, July 20, and forensics experts discovered that his signature mustache was still completely intact.

Lluís Peñuelas, the secretary general of the public foundation that oversees Dalí’s estate, announced Thursday that his famous facial hair was well-preserved. “The mustache kept its classic 10-past-10 position,” he said, according to The New York Times. “Finding this out was a very emotional moment.”

Dalí, who died in 1989 at age 84, was buried in the Dalí Theatre-Museum in Figueres, Spain. Forensics experts collected DNA samples from the surrealist painter's remains for a paternity case. According to The New York Times, some of his hair and nails and two long bones were removed.

The exhumation was performed following claims from 61-year-old Pilar Abel that she is the legendary painter's daughter. If the late maestro is in fact her father, she could claim one fourth of the estate worth hundreds of millions of dollars. The paternity test results are expected in the next few weeks.

Abel, a tarot card reader, claims that her mother had an affair with the artist in Figueres. Dalí and his Russian wife, Gala, had no children, although Gala had a daughter from a previous marriage to French poet Paul Éluard.

According to The New York Times, the foundation said in a statement on Friday that is considers the process “entirely inappropriate” because “there is no evidence that claimant Pilar Abel Martinez’s claim has any legal basis.” If the paternity test is not a match, the Salvador Dalí Foundation will go after Abel for the costs of the exhumation.

Sign up now for the Us Weekly newsletter to get breaking celebrity news, hot pics and more delivered straight to your inbox!

For the latest celebrity entertainment, news and lifestyle videos, subscribe to Us Weekly's YouTube Page!</s>The body of the artist Salvador Dalí is due to be exhumed late on Thursday in order to settle a paternity suit brought by a woman who claims to be his daughter.

The surrealist painter, who died in 1989 at the age of 85, was buried in a crypt in a museum dedicated to his life and work in Figueres, in north-eastern Spain. Samples will be taken from his remains to see if they match the DNA of the claimant.

The process is going ahead despite the objections of the local authorities and the foundation carrying Dalí's name, both of which claimed that not enough notice had been given ahead of the exhumation.

It will require the removal of a 1.5-tonne slab covering his tomb in order to reach his body.

María Pilar Abel Martínez, a tarot card reader who was born in 1956, says her mother had an affair with Dalí during the year before her birth. Her mother, Antonia, had worked for a family that spent time in Cadaqués, near the painter's home.

Last month a Madrid judge ordered the exhumation to settle the claim. It is contested by the Dalí foundation, which manages the estate of the artist, who was not believed to have had any children.
• How the world went crazy for Surrealism

Ms Martínez says her mother and paternal grandmother both told her at an early age that Dalí was her real father. She told El Mundo newspaper that her grandmother said to her: "I love you a lot but I know that you're not the daughter of my son. What's more, I know who your father is - he is Salvador Dalí."

One day, Ms Martínez says, she asked her mother: "Am I really Salvador Dali's daughter? Because look at how ugly he was." She says her mother replied: "Yes, but he had his charms. And yes, he is your father."

Ms Martínez's action is against the Spanish state, to which Dalí left his estate. If she is confirmed to be his daughter, she could assume his surname and be entitled to part of that estate.

But the story of the supposed affair has surprised many - not so much because Dalí was married in 1955, but because of his complex sexual tastes. And for some, this is why the thought of Dalí making a woman pregnant seems unlikely.

Ian Gibson, an Irish-born biographer of Dalí, says the idea of the Catalan artist ever having had an orthodox physical relationship with a woman is "absolutely impossible", despite five decades of marriage to Elena Ivanova Diakonova, his Russian wife more commonly known as Gala.

"Dalí always boasted: 'I'm impotent, you've got to be impotent to be a great painter'," the biographer said.
• Born on 11 May 1904 in Figueres, Catalonia, Spain
• Produced more than 1,500 paintings throughout his career
• Married Elena Ivanovna Diakonova - or Gala - in 1934; they had no children
• The couple had an open marriage and regularly held orgies at their house - though Dalí is said to have watched rather than participated

His close friendship with the gay poet Federico García Lorca has fuelled speculation that Dalí was homosexual, although Ian Gibson believes they never consummated their relationship.

Carlos Lozano, who was for a time part of the painter's inner circle, told the biographer that "Dalí was totally unable to have any sexual relations with anybody, not even, probably, with Gala... He hated being touched and when he touched you it was like being clawed by an eagle."

Dalí's sexual eccentricities appeared to feed into his work and in 1956, the year of Ms Martínez's birth, he wrote in his diary: "I feel in a state of permanent intellectual erection."

Paintings such as The Great Masturbator (1929), in which a woman's face emerges out of the side of a giant human profile, beneath which a large winged insect is resting, and nuzzles against a man's bulging groin, contributed to his reputation for bizarre erotic tastes.

Lluís Llongueras, an artist and writer who knew Dalí from the early 1960s until his death, traces much of his friend's attitude to sex back to his childhood. He says that when Dalí was a teenager his father traumatised him by constantly showing him pictures of penises mutilated by syphilis.

However, Llongueras says Dalí's preference for watching others engaging in physical contact rather than doing so himself made perfect sense for someone with his gifts.

"He was an artist and so he was a great voyeur - all of us artists have to be voyeurs, otherwise how could we work with the human body?" he said.

But Dalí's interests went beyond eroticism and the human form, straying into memory, religion and even the world of science. His 1963 painting Galacidalacidesoxiribunucleicacid is a tribute to Francis Crick and James D. Watson, the scientists who identified the structure of DNA.

"I think that Dalí would greatly enjoy being exhumed, it's a totally surrealist event," said Gibson. "He'd be thrilled, I'm quite sure, by the whole business."</s>In Madrid, a court has ordered that the remains of surrealist artist Salvador Dali be exhumed. Wochit-All</s>We recently heard that the remains of Salvador Dalí were to be exhumed, as a woman who believes she is the prolific artist’s daughter sought a paternity test. Well, it’s happened. His body was taken from the place of burial, the Dalí Museum Theatre in Figueres, Spain, and samples of hair, nail, teeth and bones were taken to extract DNA. While we wait for the paternity test results, the forensics team also found Dalí’s iconic mustache, totally intact.

Lluís Peñuelas, secretary-general of the Dalí Foundation, told the Spanish publication El Pais: “The mustache preserved its classic 10-past-10-position. Checking it was very exciting moment.” You can just imagine that clock-face-like, waxy facial hair still going strong three decades later.

Narcís Bardalet, who embalmed the artist in 1989 and was also present at the exhumation and tests, described it as “a miracle”, according to the New York Times. “Salvador Dalí is forever.”

Awnings and tents were set up inside the museum’s glass-roofed atrium to prevent the use of drones used to capture any photographs or footage, according to Hyperallergic.

It was last month that a judge ordered the procedure, despite pleas from the painter’s estate foundation and the mayor of Figueres. Now the exhumation and tests have been completed, news as to whether Pilar Abel, a 61-year-old tarot reader, is actually Dalí’s daughter will come back in a few weeks. The pair were meant to have had their affair in 1955 in Port Lligat, the small fishing village where Dalí and his wife Gala, built a house.

As various tales have gone round over the years, it’s known that Dalí and Gala, his business manager and model muse, had an unconventional relationship. As NPR details, he only visited Gala in their castle home with written permission. Gala was encouraged to keep lovers, while Dalí claimed to be both impotent and a virgin, while still surrounding himself with younger, beautiful muses. He often claimed he wanted nothing from women but their beauty, preferring to be a voyeur. Their relationship produced no children, and thus no heir to his huge estate. Spanish law would give Abel, if proven to be his child, a quarter of the estate.

Abel first brought her claims to light in 2007, and the court case began in 2015. She filed in place of her mother who suffers from Alzheimer's disease. Abel has asserted that she wants recognition as the painter’s daughter, “after that, whatever corresponds to me.”

Though the Gala-Salvador Dalí foundation complied with the exhumation a statement detailed that they “consider the exhumation performed on Salvador Dalí’s remains entirely inappropriate.”

“There is no evidence that claimant Pilar Abel Martínez’s claim has any legal basis, as the only grounds provided constitute a notarial statement from a woman who claims to be a friend of the mother, stating that the latter told her that her daughter’s father was Salvador Dalí.”

While this case continues, resuming in September, there’s still very much an appetite for the surrealist artist’s work. The Royal Academy London will host the first-ever exclusive dialogue between Dalí and Marcel Duchamp: the exhibition will include 80 paintings, sculptures, Readymades, photographs, drawings, films and archival items, and will use the pair’s unlikely friendship as a point to explore aesthetics, philosophical and personal connections.</s>In a case as eccentric as the man at the heart of it, the remains of the famed surrealist Spanish artist Salvador Dalí were exhumed on Thursday night following a paternity claim by a tarot card reader.

Dalí, who died in 1989 at the age of 84, is buried under the crystal dome of the Dalí Theatre Museum in Figueres in the north of Spain, around 90 miles outside of Barcelona. His tomb lies where the theater's stage used stand.

Experts successfully removed biological samples from the surrealist artist's body, a court spokeswoman told The Associated Press.

“We oppose this decision,” said Imma Parada, spokeswoman for the Dalí Museums and Foundation. “We appealed but haven’t received an answer yet. In parallel, we presented an alternative schedule because the decision said that the exhumation had to take place today in the morning. We suggested it take place during closing time and this was accepted.”

The woman who says Dalí was her father, Maria Pilar Abel, was born in 1956, and claims her mother had an affair with the painter in the 1950s while she was working for his family. She has been fighting to have Dalí recognized as her father since 2007, according to Spain El Pais newspaper.

“I know about this because my grandmother told me,” she said in late June after the court decided in her favor. “The only thing that can dictate if I am the daughter of Salvador Dalí is DNA.”

The court ruled that the DNA tests were necessary to make a genetic comparison with Dalí due to a lack of other biological or personal remains. Dalí has no other children and bequeathed his estate to Spain after his death.

The foundation didn't know how long it would take to know the results of the DNA test, but said that it would be in time for the next trial in the paternity case scheduled for September.

Dalí, whose appearance was marked by a long waxy mustache, is perhaps best-known for his 1931 painting. "The Persistence of Memory," featuring melting clocks. He is also known for his films, performance art, sculpture and writing.</s>And the artist’s biographer Ian Gibson said: “I think that Dali would greatly enjoy being exhumed, it's a totally surrealist event. "He'd be thrilled, I'm quite sure, by the whole business." Dali’s remains will be accessed and samples of DNA taken as part of a legal action brought by a woman who claims to be his daughter – 61-year-old tarot card reader María Pilar Abel Martínez.

The surrealist painter died in 1989 at the age of 85 and the process is going ahead despite the objections of the local authorities and the Dali foundation. Ms Martínez claims her mother Antonia, who lived near the painter's home in Cadaqués, had an affair with Dali during the year before her birth. Last month a Madrid judge ordered the exhumation to settle the claim and today a 1.5-tonne slab covering Dali’s tomb will be raised in order to reach his body. The Dali foundation, which manages the estate of the artist, is contesting the claim and is adamant Dali had no children.

Ms Martínez told Spanish newspaper El Mundo her mother and grandmother both told her Dali was her real father and added that her grandmother said: "I love you a lot but I know that you're not the daughter of my son. What's more, I know who your father is - he is Salvador Dalí." She added that she eventually asked her mum "am I really Salvador Dali's daughter? Because look at how ugly he was." Her mother allegedly replied: "Yes, but he had his charms. And yes, he is your father."

Dali left his estate to the Spanish state. If Ms Martínez is confirmed to be his daughter, she could assume his surname and be entitled to part of that estate. The exact value of the estate is unknown but Dali acquired a reputation among the Surrealist group for his desire to accrue wealth. And his works are now valued in the tens of millions of dollars. In 2011 a 1929 Portrait de Paul Eluard changed hands at Sotheby’s for $22.4m and a year later Dali’s Printemps Necrophilique was sold at thesame auction house for $16.3m.</s>Figueres (Spain): Forensic experts in Spain have removed hair, nails and two long bones from Salvador Dali’s embalmed remains to find genetic samples for a paternity test—a move that opens the possibility for a woman who says she is the surrealist artist’s daughter to claim part of the Dali estate.

Officials said Friday that the artist’s mummified remains were so well conserved that even his famous moustache had survived the passing of time and remained in “its classic shape of ten past ten,” referring to the positions of the hands on a clock.

Dali was buried in the Dali Museum Theatre in the northeastern Spanish town of Figueres, his birthplace, when he died at 84 years old in 1989. The exhumation followed longstanding claims by Pilar Abel, a 61-year-old tarot card reader, who says her mother had an affair with Dali in the town.

In June, a Madrid judge finally ruled that a DNA test should be performed to find out whether her allegations were true.

Forensic experts opened the artist’s coffin on Thursday night in a sensitive operation that involved using pulleys to lift a 1.5-tonne stone slab.

Lluis Penuelas Reixach, the secretary general of the Gala Dali Foundation, said Dali’s remains—including his moustache—are well conserved, mummified after the embalming process applied 27 years ago. He was speaking to reporters on Friday during a press conference in Figueres.

According to judicial authorities, only five people—a judge, three coroners and an assistant—were allowed to oversee the removal of the samples out of respect for the remains and in order to avoid any contamination.

Representatives of the foundation managing Dali’s estate said on Friday the evidence backing Abel’s claims weren’t enough to justify the intrusive exhumation, and that it will continue a legal battle to nullify the paternity test.

Dali and his Russian wife Gala—whose birth name was Elena Ivanovna Diakonova—had no children of their own, although Gala had a daughter from an earlier marriage to French poet Paul Eluard.

Abel, who for a while made her living by reading tarot cards on local television, was born in Girona, a city close to Figueres. She has fought for the exhumation because she wants legal proof that the artist was her biological father after an alleged affair between her mother and Dali.

If proved right, she could claim one fourth of the painter’s estate which is now in the hands of a public foundation, according to her lawyer Enrique Blanquez. There are no current estimates of the value of that fortune.

If she is proved wrong, the Dali foundation will seek financial compensation for the costs of the exhumation.

Either way, minimizing the disruption to the museum’s operations and to the rest of Dali’s remains is the priority for the foundation managing Dali’s estate, according to its secretary. “It’s important for Salvador Dali to be returned to rest in the interior of his museum’s dome,” Penuelas said.

During a press conference this week, Abel explained how her mother and grandmother told the family secret when Abel was still young. Years later, she said she asked her mother again, who confirmed to her the story was true.

The foundation and the museum in Figueres took steps to make sure no images of the exhumation may emerge in public. Before work in the crypt began on Thursday, mobile phones were put in a deposit and a marquee was installed under the museum’s glass dome to prevent any photography or video from drones.

The biological samples will travel to a forensic laboratory in Madrid for analysis, a process that could take weeks.
The remains of surrealist painter Salvador Dalí are exhumed following a Madrid court order on settling the paternity claim of a woman who is allegedly the painter's natural daughter. Various experts contest the claim, noting Dalí's sexual eccentrism (including a public boast about his "impotency") and that the action being against the state (Dalí bequeathed his estate to Spain). If proven, this woman could assume part of Dalí's estate.