Sigmund Freud's Figural Psychoanalysis (Michelangelo's Moses and the Collection of Idols)

Sigmund Freud's research into Michelangelo's Moses and the collection of small sculpted figures from Antiquity that he amassed attest to a visual psychoanalysis that contradicted the reputed iconoclasm of that discipline. Freud himself drew inspiration from items in his collection; but he also incorporated these into the treatment of his patients. As revealed by this book, what we now know of these aspects of his life and work may serve as a key to a deeper understanding of his theory of the unconscious.

In order to use to best advantage his preoccupation with the visual, Freud was obliged to conceal this aspect of his psychoanalytic method, to "veil" it. This in itself reveals how far psychoanalysis, as a space of liberation, could nonetheless be subject to cultural constraints, not least the prohibition of images in the Mosaic tradition. In nonetheless persisting in his transgression, Freud was able to establish a space beneficially invested with imagery, in which the images of trauma could be overcome.

• Freud’s collection of ancient small-scale sculptures interpreted in light of newly discovered sources
• In-depth analysis of Edmund Engelman’s photographs of Freud’s studies