John Lennon and Salvador Dali redefined the 20th century from their respective lanes. They were titans of their craft and larger-than-life characters who pushed pop culture forward. Historically, in 1969, the two shared lunch and put the world to rights.
The man responsible for the meeting of minds between these two icons is the late photographer Robert Whitaker. He enjoyed a strong working relationship with both figures, having captured The Beatles on many occasions from 1964-66. Whitaker is responsible for some of the best-known photographs of the band, including the album cover for the US-only release, Yesterday and Today.
Whitaker was introduced to the group after photographing their manager, Brian Epstein, for an interview in The Jewish News while The Beatles were on an Australian tour. He later explained: “I photographed Epstein, saw he was a bit of a peacock and a cavalier, and put peacock feathers around his head in photographic relief. He was knocked out when he saw the picture.
“After that, he saw an exhibition of collages I had at the Museum of Modern Art and immediately offered me the position of staff photographer at NEMS, photographing all his artists. I initially turned it down, but after seeing The Beatles perform at Festival Hall, I was overwhelmed by all the screaming fans, and I decided to accept the offer to return to England.”
From that moment on, Whitaker became extremely friendly with The Beatles and accompanied them on tour across the world. Once they stopped touring, there was no need for his services anymore, but the photographer continued to document the ‘Swinging Sixties’ even after parting ways with the ‘Fab Four’.
However, as the scene began to change, Whitaker pursued different areas of interest, including his artistic hero, Savaldo Dali. On his website, it states he later recalled: “’Pictures, let’s take lots of pictures. I love being photographed by a sympathetic person. I am the greatest prostitute in posing for pictures in the world’. These were Dali’s first words to me when I was taken to meet him by Douglas Cooper in 1967.”
In 2005, Whitaker brought the surrealist exhibition ‘Salvador Dali meets The Beatles’ to Liverpool, which cultivated his two strongest interests. Speaking to the Liverpool Echo to promote the exhibition, Whitaker explained how he introduced Dali to Pete Brown, who worked for Epstein and later took the artist to Lennon. “He kept a photograph of John hanging from a coat hanger on his wall,” Whitaker said.
The meeting occurred while Lennon was on his honeymoon with Yoko Ono in Paris, which was later referenced in ‘The Ballad Of John And Yoko’. He sings: “Drove from Paris to the Amsterdam Hilton, Talking in our beds for a week, The newspapers said, say what you doing in bed? I said we were only trying to get us some peace.”
Unfortunately, information about the meeting is scarce, but judging from Whitaker’s revelation about Dali’s coat hanger, Lennon made quite an impression on the Spaniard. The two of them seemingly never again crossed paths, but their Parisian lunch is a seismic cultural moment between two iconic figures. Only Yoko Ono is alive to tell the story of the historic encounter, and it’s a tale we deserve to hear. Hopefully, the truth will be established one day.
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