Museum of Monterey, with its collection of art and historical artifacts relating to the California coastal community, is set to transform into a museum devoted to Spanish surrealist Salvador Dali.

The Monterey Herald reports that Ukranian-American businessman Dmitry Piterman is planning on displaying his collection of 543 Dali works at the museum, permanately. Much of the museum's current holdings would be transferred to related institutions.

Dali worked in the Monterey area in the 1930s and 40s, and played host to wildly surreal parties. He was an early member of the Carmel Art Association and summered at the famed Hotel Del Monte, once located at the entry/exit of the scenic loop called 17 Mile Drive.

With a working name of Dali 17, the Monterey venue will become the third major Dali museum, along with one in St. Petersburg, Florida, and in the artist’s hometown of Figueres in Catalonia, Spain.

Piterman, who has a home in Pebble Beach, has collected Dali since the 1980s. His is the second largest private collection of Dali's work in the U.S.

“[Dali] studied philosophy, he studied psychology, he studied dreams, he studied science and he incorporated all of these in his paintings,” Piterman said. “It’s that kind of out-of-the-box thinking and out-of-the-ordinary art that impresses people around the world.”