Jung and Contemporary Art

Ann McCoy

Ann McCoy is an artist, a retired Barnard and Yale professor, and an Editor at Large for the Brooklyn Rail. She worked with C.G. Jung’s disciple Dr. C.A. Meier, for 28 years in Zurich. She is the recipient of a Guggenheim Fellowship, the D.A.A.D. Berlin Kunstler Grant, the Prix de Rome, Gottlieb Foundation Grant and Pollock Krasner among her many awards. Her work is in the collections of the Metropolitan Museum of Art, MoMA, the Los Angeles County Museum, the San Francisco Museum of Contemporary Art, The Hirshorn, The Smithsonian, Des Moines Art Center, and many others. Her series on Alchemy and Art was very popular on Yale Radio, and she has lectured and written about contemporary art since 1972. Her art writing has been published in The Brooklyn Rail, Art International, and Hyperallergic. Recently she was one of three essayists contributing to a book on William Kentridge for the Broad Foundation in Los Angeles. Many of the artist discussed in this class will be artists Ann McCoy knew personally such as Joseph Beuys, Carolee Schneemann, Ana Mendieta, and Hermann Nitsch.

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JUNG and CONTEMPORARY ART

(Vol. 1)

with ANN McCOY

In the best case scenario, artists have functioned as the nerve ends of society, bringing new content from the unconscious to the viewer. This series will introduce students to a wide range of topics and art works from the last seventy years. Much Jungian writing by analysts tends to use art works as a kind of illustration, rather than exploring the depths of their creative process. Artist such as Hermann Nitsch, whose work is too revolutionary and bloody, have not been included in any Jungian literature. Nitsch based much of his work on Jung’s volume the Mysterium Coniunctionis (1970) and Psychology and Religion: West and East (1970).

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Sundays • 5 Sessions
beginning March 16, 2025

Noon-2 Pacific / 3-5 Eastern / 8-10 GMT

+ Video recordings of all live classes will be made available

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Sale Pricing Ends Dec. 5

Week One: The Feminine

An exploration of the transition from three to four, the inclusion of the feminine. Jung said the 1950, in The Apostolic Constitution Munificentissimus Deus, proclaiming Mary’s ascension into heaven was a turning point, that feminine divinity would be added to the Trinity, producing a quaternity signifying wholeness. This class will look at Jungian writing like Eric Neumann’s The Great Mother: An Analysis of the Archetype, and more recent writing by Ginette Paris such as Pagan Meditations. Some of the artists discussed will be Amelia Mesa-Bains, Carolee Schneemann, Mary Beth Edelson, Teresa Murak, and Louise Bourgeois.

Week Two: Personal Theologies

This class will discuss artists who have evolved personal theologies. Included will be Hermann Nitsch and his revival of the pagan mysteries, Carolee Schneemann and her resurrection of Aphrodite, and Joseph Beuys and his updating of the work of Rudolph Steiner. Included will be discussions of Jean Gebser’s work on the “aperspectival” and will include both art and architecture.

Week Three: Projection Technologies

This week will explore the role of projection beginning with its discovery by the Jesuit polymath Athanasius Kircher in the 1600’s, and the role it has played in the interchange between art and theater. Beginning with George Gross, this discussion will move into contemporary artists like Alfredo Jaar, Krzysztof Wodiczko, William Kentridge, and Tony Oursler. This move into visual transparency was directly linked to both psychological projection, the overlaying of images, and new permutations in consciousness.