Youngest daughter of Felipa Domènech and Salvador Dalí. Sister of Salvador Dalí, whom she modeled for in several of his paintings, and friend of some of his friends, such as Federico García Lorca, with whom she maintained a close friendship, as is shown by her correspondence donated to the Federico García Lorca Research Center. In the missives Anna Maria recalls that the poet “was obsessed by a great fear of death. If we went somewhere and there was a white calm, the sight of the bottom made him dizzy: it seemed to him that we were flying and would have to fall. If there was a swell, he feared that the waves would come over and engulf us. He only felt no fear of death on Sundays, at mass, when he saw eternal life.
Anna María was a teenager in 1925 but Lorca’s personality captivated her. Lorca, equally captivated, responded to her letters from Granada with confidences.
During Lorca’s first visit to Cadaqués in 1925, the poet and playwright read his last finished work, Mariana Pineda, to the entire Dalí family, including his younger sister, who was 17 years old. There were several readings: first at the house in Cadaqués, later at the notary’s office of Dalí’s father, and finally at the Barcelona Athenaeum. Anna María was a teenager in 1925, but Lorca’s personality subjugated her. Lorca, equally captivated, responded to her letters from Granada with confidences: “Here there is an incredible amount of historical melancholy that reminds me of that fair and neutral atmosphere of your terrace, where sometimes the Lydia [Lydia de Cadaqués, the singular character in love with the writer Eugenio D’Ors] puts a dash of strong pepper that makes the visible grace of the air stand out even more”.
The friendship between the two grew during the four months of the poet’s second visit to Catalonia in 1927, during which he finally premiered Mariana Pineda at the Goya Theater.
At the beginning of the Civil War she was arrested and imprisoned on charges of espionage by Republican soldiers in the rearguard who were fleeing to France. She was imprisoned for 17 days, assaulted and raped. Although she did not consider herself a writer, she published four books about Cadaqués and her brother: Tot l’any a Cadaqués (All year long in Cadaqués), Des de Cadaqués (From Cadaqués), Miratges de Cadaqués (Mirages of Cadaqués) and Salvador Dalí seen by his sister Anna Maria Dalí, in response to her brother’s autobiography.
She died in Cadaqués in 1989.
