Josée Leclerc on the intersection of art and psychoanalysis

by Silvia Cademartori

Josée Leclerc, Graduate Program Director of the Creative Arts Therapies program, has written a book that says there is a point where art and psychoanalysis meet.

Art et psychanalyse: pour une pensée de l’atteinte is based on Leclerc’s thesis for her PhD in the Humanities. In it, she examines the way images can sometimes produce a powerful, destabilizing effect on the viewer.

Some people are touched by a work of art, while others are not. For example, an innocuous painting of water being poured from a jug may cause someone to have an emotional reaction, such as inexplicable sadness.

The reaction is not in dispute, Leclerc said. Rather, she is interested in “how we can convey such happenings when we have an inability to master what makes it happen.”

Leclerc makes her argument by comparing and contrasting Freudian and neo-Freudian concepts, including the notions of presentation and representation in art. She says, “while representation is the describable aspect of what the viewer sees in art, presentation is what is not directly describable, nonetheless produces a powerful effect on the viewer.”

She also draws on the work of French art critic Georges Didi-Huberman, who integrates psychoanalytic discourse into his examination of the art object.

Her book is not about art therapy, but Leclerc says there is a link. Art therapy involves helping people with emotional issues deal with their problems by having them come to their own understanding of what their art reveals.

“The therapeutic effect of art therapy can be the shock of the unconscious image, and not only what is intentionally reproduced.”

Concordia has had an arts therapy program for nearly 25 years and currently offers a two-year Master’s in Creative Arts Therapies with options in drama and art. Long autonomous from its administrative parent, the Department of Art Education, Creative Arts Therapies has just been granted departmental status.

Leclerc teaches the art option in the program. She is also an art therapist and psychoanalytic psychotherapist in private practice.

Art et psychanalyse: pour une pensée de l’atteinte is published by XYZ éditeur and will soon be available at the Webster Library.