John Peter Moore, former personal secretary of Salvador Dali, 86
deb...@comcast.net
BARCELONA, Spain (AFP) - The former personal secretary of Salvador
Dali, who was embroiled in scandals involving the surrealist Spanish
painter's works, has died aged 86.
Known as Captain Moore because of his previous service with the British
navy, Irishman John Peter Moore died at his home on Tuesday in the
Catalan sea port of Cadaques where he ran a gallery for many years with
his wife.
His funeral was scheduled for Wednesday.
Moore, reputedly a former British secret services agent with a taste
for Texan cowboy hats, was Dali's secretary from 1962 to 1974 charged
with marketing his paintings abroad.
The pair met when Moore worked with producer Alexander Korda during the
making of the 1955 film "Richard III" and Moore later settled in
Cadaques, where he established a gallery with his wife Catherine Perrot
in the early 1970s.
Dali painted Laurence Olivier in "Portrait of Laurence Olivier in the
role of Richard III", a work that Moore kept for 45 years before
selling it in 2000 to the Dali Foundation for 500,000 dollars.
During the time he worked as the painter's confidant, Moore amassed an
important collection of works that became the subject of controversy
after the artist's death in January 1989.
In October 2004 a court in Figueras, Dali's birthplace, convicted Moore
and Perrot of violating intellectual property rights by changing the
title of a Dali work displayed in their art centre.
The painting of Dali's wife "Double Image of Gala" was stolen in 1974
from the Knoedler Gallery in New York and turned up three years after
the artist's death in 1989 in their Cadaques gallery.
In 1999 police interviewed Moore on suspicion of selling forgeries of
the artist's work and discovered thousands of lithographs with price
tags of 180,000 pesetas (about 1,080 euros, 1,250 dollars) during a
search of his gallery and home.
In November 2004 a Barcelona court ruled that Moore suffered from
senile dementia and was incapable of standing trial on charges of
falsifying and selling unauthorised reproductions of Dali's works.
Over the years, Moore sold off his collection, including to the
Gala-Salvador Dali Foundation, and in 2003 reaped 4.5 million euros
from a sale of 400 Dali works in Paris.
DGH
John P Moore.