This thesis explores how we might think the relation between psychoanalysis and the cultural field through Donald Winnicott’s concept of the environment, seeking to bring the concept into dialogue with more “classical” strands of psychoanalytic theorizing. A substantial introduction sets out the rationale behind the thesis by reading Freud and Winnicott in relation to the “classic” and the “romantic”, or the “negative” and “positive”, in psychoanalytic thought. It goes on to outline the value of bringing these tendencies together in order (...) to think the relationship between psychoanalysis, culture and change. The chapters which follow move from psychoanalysis as a “cultural cure” – a method and discourse drawing on and feeding into a broad conception of cultural life – towards a notion of “culture as cure” informed by Winnicott’s theory of the environment. Chapter one examines Freud’s refusal of the “culture”/ “civilization” distinction and considers what it means for the idea of a cultural cure. Chapter two considers whether Winnicott’s thinking about “culture” ultimately prioritises the aesthetic over the political. Chapter three uses Aldous Huxley’s Brave New World to explore an analogy between totalitarianism, technology and maternal care. Chapter four turns to the series In Treatment to think about the intersections of therapy and technology in terms of reflection and recognition. Chapter five employs Ian McEwan’s Saturday as a means to reflect on the capacity of culture to cure. Ultimately, I suggest that social “cure” may require more than “good-enough” cultural forms and objects, but Winnicott’s “romantic” theorization of the aesthetic, coupled with a “classic” attention to structures of power and oppression may offer a means of thinking the relationship between psychoanalysis and culture in potentially transformative ways. (shrink)

I describe how close attention to the process of sculpting clay from the perspective of Material Engagement Theory can create a detailed description of a mutable sense of agency and of self. First, I show that sculpting is associated with a loss of sense of agency and self. Second, that to sense agency as a systemic phenomenon creates anxiety. Third, that meaning in an art encounter develops in association with an anterospective viewpoint. Fourth, that within the logic of the extended (...) mind, emergent meaning becomes openly available for further exploration. Fifth, that artistic creativity is not an opaque process. It proceeds in a similar manner to other forms of human, sense-making activities. Finally, that playing seriously with clay can be used in an investigative manner—as a tool for material conceptualisation. (shrink)

This article discusses practice-near research in human services, a cluster of methodologies that may include thick description, intensive reflexivity, and the study of emotional and relational processes. Such methods aim to get as near as possible to experiences at the relational interface between institutions and the practice field. Psychoanalytically informed approaches to research are particularly fruitful here. In this article these are discussed in relation to the reflective practice and critical reflection traditions which have been widely discussed within social work, (...) healthcare, education, and allied fields. Drawing on Clifford Geertz's distinction between experience-near and experience-distant inquiry, this article also discusses the relationship between practice-near and practice-distant approaches. These may be used in parallel to investigate different but related objects of interest and can be used to triangulate different data when focussing on the same object; finally practice-near and practice-distant methods can be combined in interpretive procedures which depend on an oscillation between immersion within and distancing from the field. It is within such interpretive activity that habits of attention and interpretation developed in clinical settings, and described in the work of Wilfred Bion, can be brought to bear usefully on data analysis. (shrink)

This PhD thesis examines the concept of poiesis, that is ‘calling into existence that which was not there before’, in the context of obstruction in studio practice. It poses the question ‘Is there a methodology that engages with obstruction which in turn calls new work’? In this thesis, the concept of poiesis emerging from the late Dr. Murray Cox’s ‘Aeolian Mode’, is analyzed alongside a concept of praxis, (a philosophical companion to poiesis), familiar to artistic practice. This thesis describes the (...) orientation of the original idea, The Aeolian Mode, clinically developed by Dr. Murray Cox in Broadmoor Psychiatric Hospital. This PhD seeks to identify if there are similar ‘tenets of approach’ held within the methodology of ‘The Aeolian Mode’, that would be useful or are identifiable in artistic studio practice. This thesis draws on the work of the philosopher, Professor Richard Kearney, specifically Kearney’s ideas on the necessity of ‘the other’ for ‘radical possibility’ to occur. It maps a context of both Freudian and Jungian interpretations of art practice, identifying how these ideas have shaped the way art is seen today. Furthermore, it challenges the Freudian idea of ‘pathography’ and favours a Jungian approach of ‘individuation’ in the understanding of creative processes. It develops a ‘methodology of the conversation’, interviewing students, established artists, tutors about their approaches to obstruction/poiesis in art practice. Additionally, it examines my own obstruction to painting and identifies the methodology that released me from this obstruction. Conducting these interviews on art practice has enabled me to confirm my initial concerns about Freudian ‘pathography’ whilst validating the possibility of the Jungian concept of ‘individuation’ being of use to art practice. Finally, this PhD discusses the implications for further study and research, which have emerged during the ‘methodology of the conversation’ and the task of dissolving my obstruction to painting. (shrink)