Eyes Wide Shut: Psychoanalysis and Art - Mutual Reflections

With its exploration of erotic and aggressive drives as the forming and transforming forces of human subjectivity and culture, as well as with its interest in the symbolic language of phantasy, dreams and play, psychoanalysis has prevailed as an inspirational source for artists and an invaluable resource for thinking about art in the twentieth century and on, into the new millennium. The course will focus on contemporary artistic and art historical engagements with this ‘science of the unconscious’, and will examine psychoanalysis’ various theoretical reflections on the nature of creative processes, the meaning of artworks, and the affective qualities of the aesthetic encounter. We will discuss images that invoke such themes and dynamics as fetishism, melancholia, abjection, reparation, transitional and transformational objects, and will read key psychoanalytic essays alongside the writings of art critics and scholars who employ psychoanalysis as methodological and interpretive frameworks.