surrealism and poverty of signs

Surrealism as a poverty of signs, in which there are too few signs for the signifieds -- so we have to recycle certain signs again and again. Sometimes one sign signifies one thing, another time it signifies another. What we lose, though, is the ability to know, with certainty, which signified the sign is pointing to. As soon as this ability is lost -- or rather, as soon as we become conscious of having lost it -- we are experiencing a surrealist work of art or situation. This is very clear in Un Chien Andalou. Note the recycling of certain symbols from scene to scene, sometimes quite literally (e.g., the black and white striped box).