'Shitakiri', translates to "Tongue cut sparrow" in Japanese which is the story of an elderly couple, the man being kind-hearted whilst his wife always complained, using her tongue to voice her negative thoughts. The man bought a sparrow to bring himself peace even though the woman despised it. Then once the man was away the woman cut out the sparrows tongue leaving the man distraught due to her harming his sparrow and the sparrow flying away. The following day he found the sparrow and it showed him a new beautiful place to live away from his wife. Sparrows are thought to symbolise personal prosperity in Japan. Salvador Dali illustrated this piece as part of his ten suite Japanese fairy tale collection of dry point etching in pochoir created in 1974.
The present works, Japanese Fairy Tales suite highlights Dalí's ability to merge Japanese folklore with surrealist techniques, creating a unique cross-cultural experience that reflects his broader fascination with Eastern art and ideas. The suite is an extraordinary combination of Eastern mythology and Western surrealism, seamlessly blending different cultural elements. The masterful use of colours emote and allow us to feel the tone of the works with bright vivid colours creating a surreal, dreamlike state, strongly broken up by the red sharp injection of red alluding to the east.