Dreams and Affects

Drawing in part on the original theories of Wilfred Bion, James Grotstein, and Madeleine and Willy Baranger’s seminal contributions to contemporary psychoanalysis, our speakers will push our understanding of why these theories are so important in the psychoanalytic process.

It will be suggested that our psyche is constantly engaged in dreaming, even when we are awake. This activity allows for the discharge of ‘excesses of sensoriality and proto-emotions’ and is precisely what analytic therapy should facilitate. By exploring features of dreaming, Ferro’s theoretical model shifts from a psychoanalysis of contents to one which focuses on the development of the patient’s capacity for thinking and dreaming. Ferro’s work draws upon rich clinical material to illustrate how patient and analyst, by sharing a basic unconscious phantasy, structure an ‘oneiric, holographic field’ that is a function of their own inner lives. Our speakers Fulvio Mazzacane and Elena Molinari will elaborate on their own and Ferro’s thinking in this area.

Giuseppe Civitarese, with reference to the concept of Negative Capability and the post-Bionian theory of the Analytic Field, will elaborate the difficult-to-define, yet important terms of ‘vitality’ and ‘authenticity’. These relate to non-specific aspects of treatment including the importance of who the analyst is and what this might mean for the therapeutic couple. By rediscovering the dreamlike dimension of the session, the analyst will realise that they are always a character in the stories of the analysis and an active dreamer in the session too.