Art, Death and Lacanian Psychoanalysis

Art, Death and Lacanian Psychoanalysis examines the relationship between art and death from the perspective of Lacanian psychoanalysis. It takes a unique approach to the topic by making explicit reference to the death drive as manifest in theories of art and in artworks.

Freud’s treatment of death focuses not on the moment of biological extinction but on the recurrent moments in life which he called "the death drive" or the "compulsion to repeat": the return precisely of what is most unbeara...