ABSTRACT
This chapter focuses on Szeemann's work through an unusual set of engagements involving a refashioning of the role of the department store and its window. His long-standing but sparsely addressed relationship with the department store Warenhaus Gebrüder Loeb AG, Bern, Switzerland serves as a prism through which to discuss the idiosyncratic function of spectacle in Szeemann's seminal thematic exhibitions, first by discussing two group exhibitions staged in the store's display windows, and then by examining the complex role of an installation Szeemann custom-ordered from Loeb AG's props workshop when preparing his famous "Bachelor Machines" exhibition. By 1970, Szeemann was further pursuing his interest in the relationship between art and the city by researching and planning an ambitious, five-part exhibition on the cultural history of "the street" to be shown at the Van Abbemuseum in Eindhoven. In the 1970s, Harald Szeemann's curatorial methodologies triggered huge controversies, but today his legacy as transformative agent, researcher and author has been canonized.
