A century of Surrealism on show at London Design Museum

From Salvador Dali's lip-shaped sofa to the dreamlike video clips of Icelandic artist Bjork, Surrealism has influenced design for almost a century.

The complex evolution is now being explored in an exhibition, "Objects of Desire: Surrealism and Design 1924 - Today" at London's Design Museum.

Visitors are welcomed upon arrival by one of the most notorious depictions of the human psyche: "Metamorphosis of Narcissus," painted by Dali in 1937.

The Spanish painter's entire oeuvre was influenced by theories on the subconscious, in particular by Sigmund Freud's

"The Interpretation of Dreams," which he read while studying in Madrid in the 1920s.

Through his British patron Edward James, Dali met the Austrian neurologist in London in 1938. The exhibition begins with the fruit of Dali and James's close collaboration.

Dali created numerous pieces of iconic future for the British poet and patron such as a lobster-shaped telephone, a lamp stand made of champagne glasses, a chair with human arms, and a sofa shaped like the lips of actress Mae West.

But even before Dali, early 20th-century modernist architect Antoni Gaudi had already tried "to give objects which could be purely functional, an emotional kick and a psychological impact through this sort of changing form to something much more organic and emotional," said curator Kathryn Johnson.

Born in literature before spreading to visual art, Surrealism declined as an artistic movement in the early 1950s but it survived in design.

In fact, some of its creations "seem to have really found their moment in this century," Johnson told AFP.

Such was the case for a broken-foot lamp commissioned from Dali in 1937, which was considered too avant-garde for the market...