jung and the restless - artforum.com / scene & herd

jung and the restless - artforum.com / scene & herd:

"AS IF WALKING INTO A DREAM, I entered the Barneys flagship store of yore on Seventeenth Street, which after a brief incarnation as Loehmann’s (the retail version of bardo?) is now reborn as the Rubin Museum of Art, where Prada trinkets have been displaced by Himalayan deities, Chanel by chakra charts, and pricey wrinkle cream by ancient Tibetan mandalas and cosmologies. All suffused in a gentle amber glow, the vaguely Asiatic stylings of a live violinist added to the Zen Palate ambience. In a corner, for no explicable reason, a black-clad modern dancer struck various yoga-like poses, like an extra from a beatnik fantasy.

Despite the Barneys-to-Buddhist makeover, the message projected on the wall was Carl Jung’s, though it still sounded like Donna Karan: “Everything begins with yourself,” we were advised, “from the Red Book.” Recently published to much fanfare (after decades entombed in a Swiss bank vault) Jung’s private dream journal was produced from 1914–1930 and is now the centerpiece of an exhibition at the Rubin. Traversing the former Fragrance section of Barneys, I descended to the auditorium on the lower level: “The ‘subconscious’ level?” quipped a pal.

An ongoing series of Red Book Dialogues pairs Jungian analysts with prominent psyches. (From Andre Gregory to Charlie Kaufman, Tracy Smith to Cornel West. Perusing the program, a nearby culture-vulture quizzed her companion: “Do you know who Karen Finley is? She’s a performance artist!”) In a mini-analysis session onstage, the “analysands” are invited to “actively engage” one of Jung’s elaborate visionary doodles. Wednesday’s program featured graphic designer Stefan Sagmeister, deftly probed by Jungian analyst-in-training Patricia Llosa." Sphere: Related Content