"In 1936 Salvador Dali inadvertently caused more sensation than he had intended at the International Surrealist Exhibition at the New Burlington Galleries. On a hot summer's day he made a dramatic entrance for a lecture he was due to give, holding in one hand two Russian wolfhounds on a leash and in the other a billiard cue. On his head was a diving helmet. He strode on to the stage and tried to remove the helmet but it had been bolted down. The audience waited, unaware that Dali was suffocating. He was finally rescued and practically dead when released. The audience applauded what it thought was a humorous pantomime."
Sources
Penny McGuire, Observer Magazine, Nov. 20, 1985
