A weekend of performance, screenings and lectures celebrating the centenary of Freud's 'Totem and Taboo'.
The series of essays, published in 1913 as Totem and Taboo, captures the quintessential Freud: dazzlingly creative, theoretically brilliant, audacious, controversial and inflammatory. Although calculated to deliver a fatal blow to the theories of Carl Jung (by then his archrival), Freud also sought to demonstrate the value of psychoanalysis to contemporary issues in the social sciences, such as totemism, magical thinking, prohibition and kinship. The work draws on 19th century anthropology to construct a psycho-historical tale of murder, cannibalism, incest and guilt at the dawn of civilisation. The repercussions of this story affect us still.
One hundred years on, Totem and Taboo remains one of Freud’s most incendiary works. It continues to arouse both fascination and repulsion from a wide range of disciplines, inviting constant readings and re-readings, both sympathetic and critical, as successive generations plunder its depths.
Screenings and live performances from:
Auntie Maureen | Katherine Araniello | David Blandy | Jemima Burrill with Mary Prestidge | Brian Catling | Jack Catling | Marcus Coates | Sarah Grainger-Jones | Hunt and Darton Cafe | Poppy Jackson | Alastair MacLennan | Kate Mahony | Jordan Mckenzie | Kirsten Norrie | Benjamin Sebastian | Holly Slingsby | lili Spain | Simon Raven | Daniella Valz Gen | Aaron Williamson | Verity Whiter | Nicola Woodham & Robin Bale | Mirei Yazawa & Chris Dowding | Silvia Ziranek | Liz Zumin |
Lectures and readings from:
Artist, Noah Angell | Anthropologist, Chris Knight | Freud Museum Curator, Sophie Leighton | Academic Historian, Christina Oakley-Harrington | Artist, Fabian Peake |
Damián Ortega's Apestraction exhibition will also be open for viewing all weekend.
For more information and booking details please visit the Freud Museum website.
