Salvador Dali: The Swallow's Tail (1983)

Salvador Dali completed his last painting in the spring of 1983. The work is titled Swallows Tail and is the last in a series of paintings he did based on Catastrophe Theory, originated by the French mathematician Rene Thom in the 1960s. Catastrophe theory is a brand of mathematics that studies how small changes in circumstances can lead to sudden shifts in behavior. The painting was Dali's attempt to represent his understanding of this mathematical theory. Salvador Dali died in 1989, aged 84.