Dalí to be exhumed following paternity suit

María Pilar Abel Martínez, known as Pilar Abel, claims the artist behind the melting clock and My mother, my mother, my mother is her biological father, and a court in Madrid has agreed to DNA tests being carried out on the deceased painter.

Pilar says her mother Antonia, who worked as a maid to a family living next door to Dalí in Cadaqués, had an affair with the artist in 1955 which resulted in her birth the following year.

After getting pregnant, Antonia moved away from the area and married someone else, but had told Pilar from earliest childhood – and often in earshot of witnesses – that the iconic artist was her father.

Dalí was married to his muse Elena Ivanovna Diakonova, alias 'Gala', at the time of the affair with Antonia the maid, but they did not have any children together.

Although she did not file a paternity suit until 2015, Pilar – who earns a living as a tarot-card reader – had undergone two tests in 2007 to find out whether Dalí was her father, but never received the results.

No other 'biological remains or personal items' which could contain Dalí's DNA are in existence, the court says, meaning the only way to verify or falsify Pilar's claim is by exhuming her alleged father.

The State-owned Salvador Dalí Foundation intends to appeal against the court's decision, but if it is proven that Pilar really is the painter's daughter, she will inherit half of his estate.

DNA samples, once taken, will be sent to the National Toxicology Institute to compare with those of the claimant.

Photograph from the Sir Elton John Photography Collection, taken by Irving Penn