His whole life-long, the surrealistic painter Dali was obsessed to come to terms with three key moments of his childhood in Spain. 1. The fear that in his parents eyes, he is only a rebirth of the dead first son, 2. the shocking effect that the pictures of venereal diseases discovered in his father's library have had on him, and 3. the betrayal of his father, whom he found in bed with his mother's sister. His "floating clocks" gain worldwide famousness and become a symbol for a reality losing control.