Salvador Dali Masterpiece "Printemps Necrophilique"

Salvador Dali's surrealist dreamscapes inspired the imaginations of millions; now it looks like the artist's wildest dreams are about to become a reality. His 1936 masterpiece "Printemps Necrophilique" will lead Sotheby's surrealist auction next month. Originally owned by Dali collaborator and fashion designer Elsa Schiaparelli, the piece is expected to sell for over $10 million on May 2 in New York.

The painting features a seated man and flower-headed woman set in a puzzling desert that fades from hyperrealistic to hallucinatory. The piece embodies Dali's ability to shift seamlessly from memory to the subconscious as a leader of the surrealist movement. Surrealism serves as a great inspirational force behind contemporary fine art, literature and fashion, a fact which is reflected in surrealist works' soaring prices. "Surrealism is the last great movement of 20th-century modernism to be fully appreciated in the marketplace," said Simon Shaw, the head of Impressionist and modern art at Sotheby's.