The Sacrament of the Last Supper

Salvador Dalí spent nine months creating this monumental Last Supper, completed in 1955. Christ sits at the center of a table set within a transparent dodecahedron, the twelve-sided form Plato associated with the universe. The disciples bow their heads, faceless and universal.

Dalí merged Catholic mysticism with his study of mathematics and nuclear physics. The arms of a colossal, half-visible Christ figure spread above the scene, blessing from another dimension. Behind everything, the bay of Port Lligat where Dalí lived glows in dawn light.

The work among the most popular at the National Gallery of Art, drawing visitors who might not otherwise seek out Surrealist art. Dalí called it "arithmetic and philosophical cosmogony based on the paranoiac sublimity of the number twelve."