Art: The Soft Watch and the Beady Eye

At Paris' Pompidou Center, a Salvador Dali retrospective

The Salvador Dali retrospective of 436 works from 1920 to the present day, which opened at Paris' Pompidou Center in December and will run until mid-April, is—one need not hold one's breath—a resounding popular success. The number of people who crowd into the show on the Beaubourg's top floor every day is between 8,000 and 12,000, a remarkable turnout for a live artist in a country whose public has never much liked modern art. Only Tut could pack them in like this. Culture votes with its...