We can say that the artists with their works were psychoanalysts ante-literam. They first probed those psychic regions which psychoanalysis then allowed to explore. There is a close connection between beautiful artistic , psychoanalysis. In the first there is always a share of anguish and perturbing. We will have a dialogue here with the psychoanalyst Alessio Testani of the relationship between psychoanalysis and art.
Psychoanalysis and the aesthetic stimulus: the meanders of the mind
“We know that the aesthetic stimulus allows us to look inside ourselves. That is, it guides us from external to internal reality. Thus it influences our emotional apparatus. In the past, psychoanalysis has reduced the artistic works to mere symptoms. This in order to understand the latent meanings. And thus coming to debase its own poetic soul. The latter was masterfully intuited by bio. How? With the assertion that it was not psychoanalysis that discovered Oedipus. It is Oedipus, that is a narrative and creative product, to found psychoanalysis ”. Thus begins it psychologist Alessio Testani. Together with him we will delve into the meanings that art can instill in us on a psychoanalytic level.
“Let's think, for example, when in the Zibaldone, James Leopardi speaks of a "deadly" melancholy that annihilates thought. And of a "sweeter than happiness" capable of to generate beauty. Here, some years before Freud, he is giving a double definition of melancholy, similar to the Freudian one ”.
Psychoanalysis of Art or Psychoanalysis of Art?
“Following a recent and fruitful intuition of By Benedetto, we should move from a psychoanalysis of art to a psychoanalysis of art. For example by enhancing our ability to think and represent the our internal world through painting and the visual arts ”- continues Testani.
Psychoanalysis, art and the role of music
“We are inspired by music. It organizes the constellation of sounds. Thus, we can give a discursive structure to the sound world around us. And to our inner world. Or turning to poetry and fiction. These, in fact, are able to express and represent lived emotions. However unconscious. We can therefore find new paths to bridge the gap between pathos e logos ".
The outdated method of the artist's psychology
Our interesting interview with Testani deepens with his examination. "The method of starting from the work of art to try to understand the psychology of the artist has now been almost completely set aside. This sort of psychobiography dealt with artistic works as if they were dreams or unconscious fantasies. Practically transforming the artist into an analysand. The first to have taken this path was Freud with the essay on Leonardo from 1910 ".
"In another job, Michelangelo's Moses, Freud's aim is not fathom the work of art in order to delineate the inner world of the artist. How much instead unveiling universal psychological states common to all. As in this case, the control of anger ”.
“It is also interesting when analyzing a work of art regardless of the artist's internal world. This, as if the artistic product had an unconscious of its own. As well as an independent psychic life. As in Freud's essay The delirium and the dreams in the "Gradiva" by W. Jensen ".
Art as a control of existential anguish
"'According to Ferrari, literature arises from an artist's need to control the anguish of existence. It therefore assumes the role of self-treatment. For The jet, the artificial nature of expressive products can be compared to that of dreams ".
“The work of art does not arise only from the artist's immediate hallucinatory satisfaction of desire. Rather, it is a sort of accommodation between the pleasure principle and the reality principle ".
The relationship between art and psychoanalysis for Melanie Klein
“For Melanie Klein and her followers, the artist creates under the pressure of two psychological instances. Persecutory anguish and depressive anguish. In the first case they are generated harmless symbols. Symbols that are able to replace those objects felt as threatening. In the second case we are witnessing a reconstruction mechanism of the lost object ".
Art: creating phantasms in order to build oneself
“Let's now look at the perspective of bio. We can say that the mind is built when it is able to phantasmatically create elements. Both art and the dream they are the fruit of this creation &. So it is psychic development it is necessarily linked to creative abilities ".
Brilliant and innovative theories: Matte Blanco
"For the Chilean psychoanalyst Matte Blanco, initially the artist with an act of pride tries to destroy God. And to replace him in the creative act. Later he experiences a depressive feeling of weakness and helplessness. The same experiences of self-exaltation and self-denigration are experienced by the user in front of a work of art ".
