Psychoanalysis, Creativity, and the Arts
Expanding understanding through a new lens.
About
Chair: Rosa Aurora Chavez, MD, PhD
Washington DMV metropolitan area is the home of a cultural and intellectually vibrant community. Magnificent museums and galleries; theater, dance and music performances from all schools and styles; international cinema festivals; audacious chefs with flavors from all over the globe; writers, artists, academics … and psychoanalysts.
The Psychoanalysis, Creativity and the Arts program seeks to find multiple ways to contribute to the understanding and appreciation of art from psychoanalytic perspectives, and at the same time open ourselves to new ways in which art can expand our understanding of psychoanalysis and enrich our practices and our lives.
The program aims to:
- facilitate dialogues between artists, psychoanalysts, and the community;
- enhance our understanding from psychoanalytic perspectives of intrapsychic and interpersonal processes that make creativity and art possible; and
- develop new ways in which art can expand and deepen our understanding of psychoanalysis and enrich our practices and our lives.
Background
For years our Theater Program offered post-show discussions after theater plays in the DC area. Psychoanalysts, psychotherapists and scholars from our center engaged in lively conversations with actors and actresses, directors, writers, and other members of their production team, and with the audience.
We are now extending this program to all the arts, and transforming it into a more complex program that includes: post-show conversation panels after diverse artistic performances such as theater, music, dance, visual and plastic arts, film, poetry, literature, culinary arts, martial arts, and other artistic manifestations; action seminars to discuss relevant psychoanalytic theories (related to these artistic fields and to the creative process) and to develop strategies for the program; planning and implementation of events; and fundraising.
Advisory Team
Marshall Alcorn, PhD, Literature Advisor
Johanna Arenaza, PsyD, Dance Advisor
Bernard Arons, MD, Music Advisor
Robert Fenton, DSW, Theater Advisor
Joanne Gold, MA, MSW, MEd, Arts and Aesthetics Advisor
Silvana Kaufman, MSW, Film Advisor
David Miller, MD, Visual Arts Advisor