A psychoanalytic approach to illustration. Issue 1 (1st August 2020)

• Record Type: Journal Article
• Authors: Mumby, Hannah
• Is Part Of: Journal of illustration. Volume 7:Issue 1(2020)
• Page Start: 39
• Page End: 66
• Publication Date: 2020-08-01
• Subjects: Graphic arts -- Periodicals; Illustrators -- Periodicals; 741.605
• DOI: 10.1386/jill_00024_1
• Languages: English
• ISSNs: 2052-0204

Abstract

This article explores the possibilities of a psychoanalytic approach to illustration; asking whether an illustration practice can be developed that draws on influences from psychoanalytic theory and clinical practice. The author uses research with a group of participants to explore how psychoanalysis can illuminate or problematize the illustrator's encounter with a text, looking into the ways psychoanalysis works to trouble straightforward narratives, and asking how an illustrator may use a psychoanalytic approach to take up a more subversive position in their work. A central interest in this research was to challenge the conventionally subservient relationship that illustrations have to texts. When this relationship breaks down, tensions emerge, especially when the material being illustrated resists having meaning-making structures imposed on it, or when the illustration does not illuminate the text. This research uses illustration practice to explore what is hidden but runs through the stories we tell: what our unconscious might be offering us, through our dreams, or through our choice of words, that cannot be known at face value. The research uses content from participant interviews about dreams and personal mythology as the basis for the creation of illustrations that take on a life of their own and trouble the original interview narrative, created through a practice that is informed by psychoanalytic approaches. The article also explores the influence of image–text relationships within the exhibition space, suggesting that illustration could make use of display formats that engage with and challenge the meaning-making dynamics embedded within this space.