In this specific case, Dalí was singled out not as an individual but rather as a symbol of the past, the bygone era of modernism. Although by the time Mekas had met Dalí he was, indeed, still incredibly popular, a frequent guest of various television shows, and a face instantly recognized by the general public, the real heyday of Dalí the artist, Dalí the avant-garde icon was behind him.
After WWII, the avant-gardists of the world never stopped creating art, but the ones creating trends were the members of New York’s art scene, which included Mekas, Mačiūnas and many others. So essentially, Warhol, Lennon and Ono were part of the same generation. They were the ones whose ideas and works began to take the world by storm at the same time as Mekas’. They were his equals. We chose Dalí as a symbolic counterpoint that emphasized the fresh, avant-garde artistic way of thinking of Mekas and his entire generation. The wink, a sort of poetic metaphor, was the idea of co-curator and poet Edmondas Kelmickas, who observed it resembled the transitional moment between two frames on a cinema screen.