Book Section
Marlon Miguel
Inner World and Milieu
Art, Madness, and Brazilian Psychiatry in the Work of Nise da Silveira
This short essay focuses on the work of Brazilian doctor Nise da Silveira, a pioneer in psychiatry who introduced artistic tools to work with psychiatric patients, especially those diagnosed as psychotic. She founded the Museum of Images from the Unconscious in 1952 inside an asylum in Rio de Janeiro to assemble and exhibit the works produced by her patients. As an iconoclast who did not systematize her theory, she engaged with several European psychiatrists, psychoanalysts, and thinkers to produce a very innovative reflection and practical clinical work. Her work resonates in particular with French Institutional Psychotherapy, as well as with Frantz Fanon’s psychiatric work in Algeria, but, differently from the former, places art at the core of its clinical method and proposes a radical positioning against every form of medicalized approach.
Keywords: psychoanalysis; psychiatry; institutional psychotherapy; Silveira, Nise da; milieu; Brazil; Fanon, Frantz
| Title |
Inner World and Milieu
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| Subtitle |
Art, Madness, and Brazilian Psychiatry in the Work of Nise da Silveira
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| Author(s) |
Marlon Miguel
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| Identifier | |
| Description |
This short essay focuses on the work of Brazilian doctor Nise da Silveira, a pioneer in psychiatry who introduced artistic tools to work with psychiatric patients, especially those diagnosed as psychotic. She founded the Museum of Images from the Unconscious in 1952 inside an asylum in Rio de Janeiro to assemble and exhibit the works produced by her patients. As an iconoclast who did not systematize her theory, she engaged with several European psychiatrists, psychoanalysts, and thinkers to produce a very innovative reflection and practical clinical work. Her work resonates in particular with French Institutional Psychotherapy, as well as with Frantz Fanon’s psychiatric work in Algeria, but, differently from the former, places art at the core of its clinical method and proposes a radical positioning against every form of medicalized approach.
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| Is Part Of | |
| Place |
Berlin
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| Publisher |
ICI Berlin Press
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| Date |
2 April 2024
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| Subject |
psychoanalysis
psychiatry
institutional psychotherapy
Silveira, Nise da
milieu
Brazil
Fanon, Frantz
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| Rights |
© by the author(s)
Except for images or otherwise noted, this publication is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 International License.
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| Language |
en-GB
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| page start |
125
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| page end |
148
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| Source |
Displacing Theory Through the Global South, ed. by Iracema Dulley and Özgün Eylül İşcen, Cultural Inquiry, 29 (Berlin: ICI Berlin Press, 2024), pp. 125–48
|
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Cite as:
Marlon Miguel, ‘Inner World and Milieu: Art, Madness, and Brazilian Psychiatry in the Work of Nise da Silveira’, in Displacing Theory Through the Global South, ed. by Iracema Dulley and Özgün Eylül İşcen, Cultural Inquiry, 29 (Berlin: ICI Berlin Press, 2024), pp. 125-48 <https://doi.org/10.37050/ci-29_09>