The Creative Dilemma: The Influence of Schiller''s Aesthetics on the Life and Work of Otto Rank

The impact of philosophical wisdom on the pioneers of psychoanalytic work is presented in this article, in particular the influence of Schiller's aesthetics on the theoretical and clinical work of Otto Rank. The essay will compare and contrast Schiller's major themes—in particular his notions of the aesthetic impulse, will, and his concept of harmonia—with aspects of Rank's contributions, namely, his notions of creativity and the art of living. Drawing from Schiller's aesthetic vision, Rank's notion that art and play are foundational sources for healing is described in the author's own clinical work.     

Art within analysis: scapegoat, transference and transformation

Through clinical example and pictorial illustration, the author examines ways in which art offers a particular means of psychological transformation in states which may otherwise be in expressable. A transference to the art work itself is proposed. It is submitted that, mediated within the transference/ countertransference dynamic, this 'scapegoat transference' facilitates a particular process of psychological differentiation. The aesthetic qualities of art presented within analysis will resonate with other countertransference affects. Clinical material demonstrates how observation of this--aesthetic countertransference--leads to a distinction between the 'diagrammatic' and the 'embodied image. The process of integration of shadow material is furthered by the temporary safe-keeping of the art work by the analyst.     

Re-Collection in Existential Psychotherapy with Couples and Families Dealing with Death

Re-collection is a treatment dynamic in existential family therapy in which the client family is helped to remember and honor meanings that family members have previously actualized and deposited in the past. This shrinks the family meaning vacuum and those symptoms and problems that grow and flourish in a family meaning vacuum. In this article, an existential orientation to re-collection with families who are dealing with the death of a loved one is presented, described, and illustrated with case material.     

PSYCHOANALYSIS AS APPLIED AESTHETICS

The question of how to place psychoanalysis in relation to science has been debated since the beginning of psychoanalysis and continues to this day. The author argues that psychoanalysis is best viewed as a form of applied art (also termed applied aesthetics) in parallel to medicine as applied science. This postulate draws on a functional definition of modernity as involving the differentiation of the value spheres of science, art, and religion. The validity criteria for each of the value spheres are discussed. Freud is examined, drawing on Habermas, and seen to have erred by claiming that the psychoanalytic method is a form of science. Implications for clinical and metapsychological issues in psychoanalysis are discussed.     

On the Art of Finding Arguments: What Ancient and Modern Masters of Invention Have to Tell Us About the "Ars Inveniendi"

This paper deals with what has been called "ars inveniendi" (art of finding) in antiquity, medieval and early modern times. A survey of different techniques of finding tenable and relevant arguments is presented (among them, the Topical tradition, Status theory, Debate theory, Encyclopedic systems, Creativity techniques). Their advantages and disadvantages are critically compared. It is suggested that a mixture of strategies of finding arguments should be used. Finally, a few remarks showing the relationship beween the strategies of finding arguments and creativity in general are given.     

The authority of pleasure

The aim of the paper is to reassess the prospects of a widely neglected affective conception of the aesthetic evaluation and appreciation of art. On the proposed picture, the aesthetic evaluation and appreciation of art are non‐contingently constituted by a particular kind of pleasure. Artworks that are valuable qua artworks merit, deserve, and call for a certain pleasure, the same pleasure that reveals (or at least purports to reveal) them to be valuable in the way that they are, and constitutes their aesthetic evaluation and appreciation. This is why and how art is non‐contingently related to pleasure. Call this, the Affective View. While I don't advance conclusive arguments for the affective view in this paper, I aim to reassess its prospects by (1) undermining central objections against it, (2) dissociating it from hedonism about the value of artworks (the view that this value is grounded in, and explained by, its possessors’ power to please), and (3) introducing some observations on the practice of art in support of it. Given that the objections I discuss miss their target, and given the observations in support of it, I conclude that the affective view is worth serious reconsideration.     

Elements of a counter‐exhibition: Excavating and countering a Canadian history and legacy of eugenics

Into the Light, a recently mounted collectively curated museum exhibition, exposed and countered histories and legacies of 20th‐century “race betterment” pedagogies taught in Ontario's postsecondary institutions that targeted some groups of people, including Anishinaabe, Black, and other racialized populations, and disabled and poor people, with dehumanizing ideas and practices. This article advances understandings of the transformative potential of centralizing marginalized stories in accessible and creative ways to disrupt, counter, and draw critical attention to the brutal impacts of oppressive knowledge. The “counter‐exhibition” prioritized stories of groups unevenly targeted by such oppression to contest and defy singular narratives circulating in institutional knowledge systems of what it means to be human. The authors draw on feminist, decolonial and disability scholarship to analyze the exhibition's curation for the ways it collectively and creatively: (1) brought the past to the present through materializing history and memory in ways that challenged archival silences; and (2) engaged community collaboration using accessible, multisensory, multimedia storytelling to “speak the hard truths of colonialism” (Lonetree) while constructing a new methodology for curating disability and access (Cachia). The authors show how the exhibition used several elements, including counter‐stories, to end legacies of colonial eugenic violence and to proliferate accounts that build solidarity across differences implicated in and impacted by uneven power (Gaztambide‐Fernández).     

Short-term mood repair through art-making: Positive emotion is more effective than venting

We examined two mechanisms by which creating visual art may serve as a form of short-term mood repair. After viewing a film that induced a negatively valenced mood, participants were given a self-report affect grid that assessed mood valence and arousal. Participants then engaged in one of three tasks: creating a drawing expressing their current mood (venting), creating a drawing depicting something happy (positive emotion), or scanning a sheet for specific symbols (distraction control). Mood valence and arousal were then reassessed. Arousal remained unchanged after the interventions in all conditions. Valence became more positive in all three conditions, but the greatest improvement occurred after the positive emotion intervention. Valence improved no more after venting than after the control task. Results show that in the short-term, attending to and venting one’s negative feelings through art-making is a less effective means of improving mood than is turning away from a negative mood to something more positive. These findings are consistent with research on the beneficial effects of positive emotions and cast doubt on the often assumed view that artists improve their well being by expressing suffering.     

中国古典美学中的身体及其映像

Richard Shusterman’s Pragmatist Aesthetics: Living Beauty, Rethinking Art was published in China in 2002. In the preface of the Chinese edition, the author claimed that his tentative idea of soma esthetics was encouraged by Chinese philosophy and other ancient Asian philosophy. Shusterman’s background in pragmatist philosophy greatly constrains his understanding of the body in classical Chinese aesthetics in that he only pays attention to the technical aspects of physical training while neglecting the philosophical basis of this training. In Chinese philosophy the orientation of the body, the relationship between the body and the universe, the body characteristic of the beauty of nature and the beauty of art, etc., is a theoretical response to Shusterman’s oriental misreading. Translated by Lei Yongqiang from Wenyi Yanjiu 컄틕퇐뺿 (Literature & Art Studies), 2007, (4): 23–31