The Psychoanalysis of Aesthetic Experience

In The Psychoanalysis of Aesthetic Experience: Self, Relationship and Culture, George Hagman eloquently provides an overview of ideas regarding the aesthetic foundation of human experience and the way in which this aesthetic perspective can shed light on human development, culture, and analytic clinical process. The book discusses the relationship between the psychology of art and the aesthetics of psychoanalytic treatment. Hagman presents a comprehensive psychoanalytic model of the psychology of aesthetics, creativity, beauty, ugliness, and the sublime, as well as a theory of aesthetics across the dimensions of subjectivity, self, intersubjectivity, and culture. Starting from the point of early childhood development, he argues for the importance of exploring the implications of this important psychological phenomenon for clinical practice, highlighting how aesthetics can shed light on a dimension of the psychotherapeutic process that has thus been neglected. This book is an illuminating and informative read for all psychoanalysts, and anyone interested in the intersection of psychoanalytic practice, aesthetics, creativity, and culture.

George Hagman is a clinical social worker and psychoanalyst in private practice in Stamford, USA. He is on the faculty of the Training and Research in Intersubjective Self Psychology Foundation (TRISP) and the Westchester Center for the Study of Psychoanalysis and Psychotherapy. He is the author of Art, Creativity, and Psychoanalysis: Perspectives from Analyst-Artists (2016), Creative Analysis: Art, Creativity and Clinical Process (2014), and The Artist's Mind: A Psychoanalytic Perspective on Creativity, Modern Art and Modern Artists (2010).

Foreword to the First Edition by Carl Rotenberg xii Preface xiv 1 Introduction 1 The Developmental Matrix of Aesthetic Experience 2 Idealization 3 The Creative Process 4 The Sense of Beauty 6 Ugliness 7 The Sublime 7 Festival 8 2 Understanding Aesthetic Experience 13 The Philosophy of Aesthetic Experience 13 A New Psychoanalytic Model of Aesthetic Experience 24 3 The Development of Aesthetic Experience 27 4 Idealization and Aesthetic Experience 37 Idealization: A Developmental/Relational Model 43 Clinical Illustration 48 Idealization in Creativity and Aesthetic Experience 52 5 The Creative Process 55 Creativity and Selfobject Experience 63 Clinical Illustration 72 6 The Sense of Beauty 77 The Contribution of Psychoanalysis to Our Understanding of Beauty 79 The Psychoanalytic Understanding of the Sense of Beauty: An Integration 85 7 On Ugliness 93 The Problem of Ugliness 94 The Problem of Ugliness and Psychoanalytic Theory 95 Encountering Ugliness 98 Ugliness in Psychopathology 106 Clinical Illustration 107 Conclusion 109 8 The Sublime 111 A Brief History of the Sublime 111 Psychoanalytic Contributions to the Concept of the Sublime 115 The Psychoanalytic Sublime 117 The Maternal Aesthetic: The Matrix of Beauty 118 The Paternal Aesthetic: The Source of the Sublime 119 The Psychological Function of the Sublime 126 9 Art and Self 129 Creativity: Context and Process 133 Art and Gesture 136 What Art Is 139 Does Art Heal? 140 Psychopathology and Creativity 144 10 Art, Creativity, and the Clinical Process 146 Aesthetic Experience in Life and Therapy 146 The Sense of Quality 148 Creativity 150 Case Example: Paul 152 Conclusion 157 11 Festival 158 Metasubjectivity 162 Intersubjectivity 163 Subjectivity 164 Culture 165 12 The Musician and the Creative Process 168 The Psychological Experience of Music 168 Music and the Creative Process 170 Case Illustration: Alan 174 Discussion 177 13 Cruising Beauty: Obsession and Self-Crisis in Thomas Mann's Death in Venice 179 Discussion 183 Conclusion: Triumphant Beauty 188 14 Hitler's Aesthetics: A Psychoanalytic Perspective on Art and Fascism 189 The Role of Aesthetics in Hitler's Life 190 The Longings and Failures of a Young Artist 191 The Psychological Function of Hitler's Aesthetic 195 Hitler's Hatred of Modernism 197 The Abuse of Beauty: A Fascist Aesthetic 199 In the End 200 References 202 Index 207