July 26, 2018, Thursday - Freud on the Couch: Psyche in the Book opening reception at MCBA/Open Book

Time: 6-8 pm

Location: Minnesota Center for Book Arts/Open Book Cowles Literary Commons

Freud on the Couch: Psyche in the Book

Freud on the Couch: Psyche in the Book, a new exhibition featuring book works inspired by the psychoanalytical concepts of Sigmund Freud, will travel to Minnesota Center for Book Arts (MCBA) from July 20-September 30, 2018. Freud on the Couch features works by nearly 30 international artists that either directly or indirectly draw from Freudian concepts, theories, and themes. This provocative exhibition asks viewers to find parallels between the ways that visual art and psychoanalysis act as frameworks for the collective unconscious.

Artists featured in the exhibition include Thorsten Baensch, Sarah Bryant, Crystal Cawley, Ken Campbell, Maureen Cummins, Anne Deguelle, Gerhild Ebel, Stefan Gunnesch, Karen Hanmer, Anna Helm, Susan Johanknecht, M. M. Lum, Jule Claudia Mahn, Patrizia Meinert, Simon + Christine Morris, Didier Mutel, Susanne Nickel, Yasutomo Ota, Waltraud Palme, Veronika Schäpers, Robbin Ami Silverberg, Herbert Stattler, Marian St. Laurent, Ines von Ketelhodt, Carola Willbrand, and Sam Winston. Through various forms of book art, they explore Freudian concepts such as the dream state, consciousness, memory, multiple personalities, fixation, and ego/id, combined with analytic techniques such as hypnosis and free association.

Freud on the Couch was organized by Susanne Padberg of Vienna’s Galerie Druck & Buch, which is located next door to the famous Berggasse 19, the house where Freud founded psychoanalysis. The traveling exhibition comes to Minnesota Center for Book Arts from the Center for Book Arts in New York, where it made its U.S. debut. Following its showing at MCBA, the exhibition will continue on to the San Francisco Center for the Book.