@article{ref1,
title="Aesthetic experience",
journal="International journal of psycho-analysis",
year="2008",
author="Sirois, François J.",
volume="89",
number="1",
pages="127-142",
abstract="An initial clinical question, ‘Why does an analysand talk about his/her relationship with an aesthetic object?’ opens an investigation into the nature of aesthetic experience. Three principal aspects of the psychoanalytic approach are presented: sublimation, a Freudian concept concerning the vicissitudes of the drives; reparation, a Kleinian concept linked to depressive anxiety; and transformation, a concept of object-relations theory about primitive ego-states. The article discusses the psychic function of aesthetic feelings in mastering anxiety as related to ego, id and superego. The transformation of the experience of passivity is a common link underlying these aspects. Such transformation relies on tolerating ambiguous and contrary feelings within the self, fostered by contact with an aesthetic object. This balance can, however, be upset: two excessive forms of aesthetic experience ensue, namely, fascination and bewitchment. The first belongs to the experience of awe; the second can lead to claustrophobic anxiety. The initial clinical question requires an elaboration of aesthetic transference, a variant of the narcissistic transference, whereby the analysand invites the analyst to share his/her internal state as a common unspoken object.<p />",
language="",
issn="0020-7578",
doi="10.1111/j.1745-8315.2007.00015.x",
url="http://dx.doi.org/10.1111/j.1745-8315.2007.00015.x"
}