Separation and individuation in Picasso’s Guernica

Abstract

A systematic, psychoanalytically oriented analysis of Picasso’s preparatory studies for his master‐painting Guernica as well as of his many alterations in the course of his work on the painting itself revealed a prominent concern with issues of attachment and of separation, differentiation and maturation, in association with loss, death and destruction. Background information on the circumstances of Picasso’s work on the painting, his personality and his biography, as well as information gleaned from other of his works from various periods of his life were also taken into account. Integration of the direct findings from the analysis of Guernica’s evolution and from this comprehensive background information suggests that the process of creating Guernica represents a symbolic attempt at individuation and establishment of separateness from the mother, by means of aggressive acts expressed towards representations of the mother figure in the painting. The preparatory studies and the painting itself are perceived as transitional objects.

Key words:

• applied analysis
• development
• individuation
• Picasso
• creative process

1. This article is based on the author’s Doctoral Dissertation on the role of emotional processes in creative activity which was supported in part by the Salinsky Grant at the Sigmund Freud Center for Psychoanalytic Research and by a grant from the Robert H. and Clarice Smith Center for Art History, both at The Hebrew University of Jerusalem. The author wishes to thank Professor Rivka Eifermann for her helpful comments.

1. This article is based on the author’s Doctoral Dissertation on the role of emotional processes in creative activity which was supported in part by the Salinsky Grant at the Sigmund Freud Center for Psychoanalytic Research and by a grant from the Robert H. and Clarice Smith Center for Art History, both at The Hebrew University of Jerusalem. The author wishes to thank Professor Rivka Eifermann for her helpful comments.

Notes

1. This article is based on the author’s Doctoral Dissertation on the role of emotional processes in creative activity which was supported in part by the Salinsky Grant at the Sigmund Freud Center for Psychoanalytic Research and by a grant from the Robert H. and Clarice Smith Center for Art History, both at The Hebrew University of Jerusalem. The author wishes to thank Professor Rivka Eifermann for her helpful comments.

2. All works by Picasso published in the volumes of the catalogue compiled by Zervos (1932–69) are thus denoted: the number following the letter Z signifies the volume and the numbers after the colon signify the number of the work.