Controversial Windows

Before this:

There was this:

Before Barney's created the very controversial Helmut Lang window display in NYC 2009, Salvador Dali created a window display for a shop called Bonwitt Teller on 5th Avenue in 1939.

His display (images could not be found of the actual windows) consisted of two windows inspired by Narcissus.  The first one (called Day) had a mannequin that looked much like the creepy one he is holding in the picture above stepping into a bathtub filled with water.  The water had Narcissi floating on top along with three wax hands reaching out of the water holding mirrors.  The second window (called Night) had a bed with a canopy made of a buffalo eating a pigeon and a second creepy mannequin laying on a bed of hot coals.  People, of course, were outraged by the Surrealist's display (I mean, this was 1939). 

But what I think is most interesting is the transition of shock, awe, and controversy.  What Salvador Dali created was more haunting.  He did not portray violence in the way that Barney's did with the "assasination window".  This is one of the most interesting changes in culture over the seventy year difference.  We fear not what we do not know as much as what we know too well, ourselves.

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