The Napoleon of Neuroses and the Queen of Hysterics
Digital Modelling on Washi over canvas on wood panel
27 cm x 36 cm
Not For Sale
Digital print after an original painting by Wilf Tilley, remodelled as an age-toned, Japanese woodblock print. The Napoleon in this case was the great, nineteenth century, French neurologist, Jean-Martin Charcot whose Tuesday lectures at the Salpêtrière Hospital, Paris, were a mixture of the clinical and the theatrical. His Queen of Hysterics was "Blanche" (Marie Wittman). The general understanding of the original painting of 1887, upon which Tilley based his own, by André Brouillet (Une leçon clinique à la Salpêtrière) is that it shows Wittman in an hysteric fit while under the influence of hypnosis (a method that greatly interested Sigmund Freud who spent about half a year studying under Charcot). The picture here represents a detail of the original now in the Université Paris Cité. The term "hysteria", based upon its ancient, Greek root, referred to the curious and erroneous notion of a trans-locating uterus. Charcot's contribution was to change its meaning to a condition of the central nervous system that might affect both men and women. Freud later adapted it to a psychological condition. Surprisingly, the term was only removed altogether from the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM) in 1980. Unsurprisingly, the original picture has attracted much analysis – feminist, sociological, psychoanalytic and medical historical. Members of the larger audience, not shown in this detail, also included notable and influential pupils of Charcot including Gilles de la Tourette and Joseph Babinski. (Part of the Ballon d'essai Series).
Digital print after an original painting by Wilf Tilley, remodelled as an age-toned, Japanese woodblock print. The Napoleon in this case was the great, nineteenth century, French neurologist, Jean-Martin Charcot whose Tuesday lectures at the Salpêtrière Hospital, Paris, were a mixture of the clinical and the theatrical. His Queen of Hysterics was "Blanche" (Marie Wittman). The general understanding of the original painting of 1887, upon which Tilley based his own, by André Brouillet (Une leçon clinique à la Salpêtrière) is that it shows Wittman in an hysteric fit while under the influence of hypnosis (a method that greatly interested Sigmund Freud who spent about half a year studying under Charcot). The picture here represents a detail of the original now in the Université Paris Cité. The term "hysteria", based upon its ancient, Greek root, referred to the curious and erroneous notion of a trans-locating uterus. Charcot's contribution was to change its meaning to a condition of the central nervous system that might affect both men and women. Freud later adapted it to a psychological condition. Surprisingly, the term was only removed altogether from the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM) in 1980. Unsurprisingly, the original picture has attracted much analysis – feminist, sociological, psychoanalytic and medical historical. Members of the larger audience, not shown in this detail, also included notable and influential pupils of Charcot including Gilles de la Tourette and Joseph Babinski. (Part of the Ballon d'essai Series).