Presentation at Waterstones book launch for Relative Relations 28.2.2008
Introduction
As most of you know my name is Jane McAdam Freud. This, both fortuitous
and burdensome pairing comes from both parents. McAdam is my mothers surname
and Freud is my father's.
Anyway I am absolutely thrilled to be here at Waterstones for this book
signing and please let me know if you would like me to write anything
else for example a special tribute for a friend or something. I am quite
happy to do that.
Anniversary
I am 50.
That is half of 100 - the ideal lifespan, today's middle age, a second half of life, a second chance even.
If you put 50 side by side with a twin 50 divided by a separating line it reads 50 stroke 50 or 50 1 50 which is infact very apt.
Wholly appropriate that this book Relative Relations was made during my artist's residency at the Freud Museum in 2006 and that it is the result of an exhibition, which was a tribute to Freud on the 150th celebration of his birth - and the catalogue is being launched here now, in a parallel celebration of my 50th birthday. Hence the pairing -50150.
Pairings
As you may have become aware, I am interested in pairing.
In Relative Relations I pair my created works with Freud's collected works.
Sigmund Freud collected over 2000 objects of antiquity. These were Egyptian,
Classical and Eastern sculptures. Freud collected sculpture.
During my residency at the museum I made a series of drawings of those sculptures. They can be seen both on the Freud Museum website and on my website janemcadamfreud.com. Prints made from these drawings can also be seen, in the flesh/ink as it were, at the Freud Museum, where they are also for sale.
I found remarkable similarities between works I had previously made and the objects Freud had chosen to collect. He collected medals, reliefs and busts, figures and fragments, all of which appear in my past body of work. Any intent to follow in Freud's footsteps 'in matters of preference' was certainly not a conscious one. Whether unconscious or programmed it remains - a twinned collection.
In Relative Relations I show photographs of these pairings. This is a posthumous collaboration on the part of Sigmund Freud and I only hope he likes it and is in agreement! Otherwise, as a self proclaimed atheist he is blissfully unaware.
Information
'Relative Relations' was nominated for the AXA art exhibition catalogue
of the year.
This art book documents the corresponding exhibition in triptych, symbolically shown in three venues. At the Muzeum Novojicinska in Pribor, Czech Republic (Sigmund Freud's first home); at his last home, now the Freud Museum in Hampstead and also at the Harrow Museum local to my current home.
It is strange to think that Freud, the famous Viennese analyst was Czech. With the borders having changed, what was Austro-Hungary (with Vienna as its capital) has since become the Czech Republic. Freud's birth place which was at the time in Austria is now located in the Czech Republic, rarely acknowledged in writing but recognised conceptually through my exhibition and its documentation.
Relative Relations features 36 pages of colour photographs. The texts include a preface by Michael Molnar - Director of The Freud Museum, an introductory essay by Henry Kim - Curator at the Ashmolean Museum and a closing essay by Rune Frederiksen - Classical Archaeologist and Research Fellow at Worcester College, Oxford, It also contains my interview conducted by Stephen Feeke - Curator at the Henry Moore Institute.
This art book tells a story. 'Chapter one: The Door Opens' leads onto 'Chapter two: Behind the Curtains'. As in a novel these suggestive titles go on to unravel the 'plot'. My story is revealed through the paralleled images of my works displayed alongside Freud's antiquities. Illustrated new works are also explained through the narrative which is further played out in the interview. The pairings explore the link between influence and coincidence, narration and relation. I examine those links through our common interest - sculpture
Relative Relations shows ancient and modern objects displayed side by side, setting up subtle resonances which become further evident in the film "Dead or Alive".
Film
The film shows the pairings morphing into each other. This merging back
and forth of Freud's antiquities to my sculptures, from past to present
virtually closes the gap of time. Great similarities can be found in the
forms and motifs of the pairs At a midway point the two objects merge
together and form a third image of a "virtual" object, different
from both, that does not exist but is a combination of the two. For me
this is the unknown:- but what I really like is that the third object
is in many cases an aesthetic improvement on both the individual objects.
The film is accompanied by the background music of Kathleen Ferrier. The
classical music sung by Kathleen Ferrier is from three tracks. One of
the tracks is "I Will Lay Me Down in Peace" by Maurice Green.
I chose this music as Kathleen Ferrier was a contemporary of Freud and
they are neighbours in death at the Golders Green Crematorium in London.
(I like the idea of Freud analyzing Ferrier while she sings to him, therefore
entertaining each other in the long expanse).
You will notice that there are two breaks in the music. One is to symbolize
the tragedy that the singer, seriously ill with bone cancer, suffered.
She got through the opening night of Orfeo successfully, but at the second
performance a bone in her leg broke while she was on stage. This was her
final performance.
The other break in the music is to symbolize the break in Sigmund Freud's
only BBC broadcast. A bomb fell and he was rushed off unable to finish.
The title "…Dead or Alive" references one of the images
shown in the book under the chapter of the same name. This image shows
a photo of the famous couch merged with my drawing of Freud smoking a
cigar. There are many ideas here. One of the ideas is about Freudian theory
and whether it is still relevant in psychoanalysis.
The other idea behind the image is that Freud is perhaps more alive in death (as an icon) than he was in life where being looked was not his favourite occupation. Ironically, everyone would now recognise Freud's image as it is so frequently seen.
The final idea behind putting Freud on his own couch is to show that he was not his own best therapist as he is continuing to smoke which was the cause of his ill health, much pain and eventual death. He fought this addiction for much of his adult life yet with all his knowledge of the mind and how it works he could not apply it to himself suggesting that one cannot administer ones own therapy.
I believe that culturally we need what Freud gave us, (psychoanalysis) as much now as we ever did and that its genuine use in politics and diplomacy between nations might help peoples and nations to get on with each other.
Art and psychology fit well together and like the surrealists through to the conceptualists I bow to the pairing. The future of this union holds some exciting projects for me. I have been asked to moderate at a conference on art and pschoanalysis in Florence this coming May. I am 50 ----and after many years of hard labour in the field of art finally a few things are coming together. However l am still at the younger end of the 'saga' group.
Negatives
On this note there are naturally negatives to do with 50 which are also
present and numerous and about which I am in complete denial- for example
the need to be adult -to grow up, middle age spread and the menopause.
In contradiction to Freud I think denial is a wonderful thing!
Anyway I will,
now focus on the positives and the book.
The Book
Relative Relations is a Limited Edition hardback of 300. Any edition after
this, should I be so lucky, would be in paperback.
300 is a very small edition for a book and rarity is economically always
a good thing.
It is being sold symbolically at half what it cost to produce, which brings
us back to 50 - half of a century and my birthday launch - the reason
we are all here.
Thank you
Thank you everyone for coming. This book is really ode to all of you-as
its title indicates. All relationships are relative and I count everyone
here as my friend, relatives included. I have known some of you for many
years and others of you for not so long, and I want to thank you all equally
for such generous and loving friendship - not to mention for being of
endless fascination to me -following the Freudian way.
I would also like thank Simon at Waterstones, the staff, my designer Woojung
Chun and all those who have helped during this event - Peter and John,
Craig, Meg, Alica, Sheera and Reanne.
Extra thanks to Peter my husband for his exra ordinary love and support.
© Jane McAdam Freud
© Jane
McAdam Freud