Phobia: An Art Deco Graphic Masterpiece

by John Vassos, David A. Beronä (Introduction)

Overview

A leader in promoting the Art Deco style in advertising art and book illustration, John Vassos undertook his most personal and ambitious work in this 1931 volume. Its twenty-four gripping images represent visceral depictions of common fears—the dread of heights, open and enclosed spaces, the dark, and the menace lurking behind other everyday situations. Doctors and the general public alike hailed Phobia as a masterpiece of psychological insight.
Vassos's creations exercised a profound influence on subsequent artists. His use of the hard-edged draughtsman's line, a technique that endows these images with their distinctive Art Deco character, is among his original contributions to the style. This edition features faithful reproductions of illustrations made from the original gouaches employing advanced printing techniques unknown in the 1920s and '30s. The result, superior in quality to the original publication, offers an outstanding opportunity to appreciate an innovative artist's classic work.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780486137940
Publisher:	Dover Publications
Publication date:	01/22/2013
Series:	Dover Fine Art, History of Art
Sold by:	Barnes & Noble
Format:	eBook
Pages:	112
File size:	6 MB

Read an Excerpt

PHOBIA

AN ART DECO GRAPHIC MASTERPIECE

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By JOHN VASSOS

Dover Publications, Inc.

Copyright © 2009 Dover Publications, Inc.
All rights reserved.
ISBN: 978-0-486-13794-0

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CHAPTER 1

NICHTOPHOBIA

The Fear of the Dark

There are a few people who fear the light of day–for whom the sun is the enemy and who will not emerge from their houses until the man-made lights are lit. But the almost universal fear of the dark is intensified in hundreds of individuals into a real phobia. For them a dark room is actually filled with spectres ready to mutilate, to rape, and to slay. The victim of this phobia probably suffers from an inner conviction of guilt, a conviction that he has sinned in thought and word and deed; it is punishment that he fears, and yet desires because it will make him clean again. In this common and comparatively mild form of phobia is clearly demonstrated the conflict, (between the victim's terror of retribution for his self-confessed transgressions and his longing for the expiation that will liberate him), which is characteristic of so many of the more complicated forms.

We have long had our childhood and adolescent fear of the dark explained to us by parents and teachers as a result of dimly remembered bedtime stories about tigers who roam in deep jungles; or else as a racial inheritance of our ancestor the caveman's dread of the very real perils he constantly endured. But this theory, while it undoubtedly explains a great deal, can be made to explain too much. Some people shun the dark for actual and personal reasons. In their twisted minds they are guilty of sin, and the formless blackness, that to the normal mind is only absence of light, is transformed into a perilous other-world when conscience and nature are at odds.

CHAPTER 2

ASTROPHOBIA

The Fear of Storms

Lightning, thunder, cloud-bursts, and hurricanes tore down the rude shelter of primitive man and bowed his progeny in awe. This, according to the genetic psychologists, is the reason so many of us, even today, still retain a wild terror of the more violent manifestations of nature. But then, why are we not all victims of astrophobia? Stranger still, why do some of us feel, in place of fear, an actual fondness for these visible signs of heavenly powers? Here again, it seems to me, the explanation offered is too facile, too plausible, to be wholly true. Lightning is no longer the mysterious, incomprehensible agency it once was; nevertheless, the astrophobiac finds no sedative for his terror in the commonplaceness of electrical appliances. Let the lightnings begin to play, and however securely he may be housed, he seeks refuge in the deepest cellar, in the darkest closet, the remotest hiding-place.

There would seem to be something wholly pagan in the composition of every phobia. The man whose soul guards no secret chamber filled with thoughts and desires that do violence to the commands of his god, has no such abject terror of the storm. We are not dealing here with any simple fear–the disinclination to be struck by lightning which is the normal feeling of normal persons. It is very possible that in the warped mind of the astrophobiac, as he hides in closets and under beds, the lightnings of the storm are the bolts of an avenging God, striking surely for the one who has transgressed His decrees.

CHAPTER 3

ZOOPHOBIA

The Fear of Animals

A natural aversion in healthy people for mice or dogs need be no indication of zoophobia. But the wild and ecstatic terror that grips some women in the presence of a mouse or before the amiable advances of the house-dog tells a story of strange and perverse fancy. These horrors of animals can be so astounding that they involve an element almost magical. I have seen a woman so morbidly afraid of cats that she could recognize a feline presence the moment she crossed a strange threshold, and be unable to complete her call.

Sometimes this phobia undergoes a transformation, and the animal feared is ruthlessly hunted down. A well-known psycho-pathologist of my acquaintance has a tremendous aversion to cats (against which not even his own precise understanding of his malady is proof), and destroys them without compunction. He has been known to drive his car onto the sidewalk in wild pursuit of some inoffensive tabby. Creatures of the insect world often inspire this strange fear in humans, and the spider thus becomes a thing of loathing. It is possible that its habits of trapping and blood-sucking are projected as somewhat violent symbols of suppressed desires.

The theory is that a victim of zoophobia fears a symbol of an unconscious desire. What one is inhibited from loving may be transformed by the unconscious into an object to be hated. So, the old maid violently afraid of mice shudders at the thought of contact with a man–yet desires it. The fear of mice is merely a symbol for a quite other aversion. Conversely, at times it is the human that is feared, and a fantastic attachment for a lesser creature springs up, giving outlet to the flames of desire. In Balzac's "A Passion in the Desert," a female panther is the object of such an unnatural love on the part of a man.

CHAPTER 4

POTAMOPHOBIA

The Fear of Running Water

Curiously enough, running water, which is the fear-symbol in one of the strangest of all phobias, is also one of the powerful sedatory influences in the treatment of the violently insane. The patients in asylums situated near streams and rivers are frequently to be found sitting on the banks staring intently at the water as it flows by. There is no doubt that there exists in the human soul a profound relationship with this natural manifestation that exerts its sway over the subconscious mind. Even among the normal and sane, the attraction of running water is a commonly observed fact. It is interesting to note, also, the use of the device in insane asylums known as the continuous bath, for the subduing of violent patients. They are placed in a kind of canvas hammock and suspended over a tub. Water at body temperature is allowed to play continually over the body until the patient has been lulled to quiescence by its healing effect.

The psychopathologists believe that in all of us there exists a strong desire to let ourselves go, in utter weariness, and be carried on the bosom of the stream to the eternal nothingness that is death. In the potamophobiac, this desire has been exaggerated to an abnormal degree, and the subconscious, reacting against its own longing for obliteration, has set up the running stream, the ever-moving sea, and even such commonplace articles as the wash-stand faucet and the toilet-bowl, as symbols of fear. In this complex of unbalanced imaginings may also exist the castration fear–the terror of the unknown, predatory creatures that lurk in ocean and river.

The last stanza of Swinburne's "Garden of Prosperine" is an apt expression of a less frenzied mood of potamophobia:

"From too much love of living,
From hope and fear set free,
We thank, with brief thanksgiving,
Whatever gods may be
That no life lives forever,
That dead men rise up never,
That even the weariest river
Winds somewhere safe to sea."

CHAPTER 5

YLOPHOBIA

The Fear of the Forest

This is a phobia that occurs very rarely. Forests are no longer numerous, our feet travel no sylvan paths, and instances of the morbid fear of the grove are seldom found. But there do exist persons to whom the forest is still a shrine of terror. The great trees of the woods, which the Freudians look upon as phallic symbols, can be strangely human creatures to the ylophobiac–creatures that reach out with root and branch to seize and destroy him. Not noble pillars of a living glorification, but stalwart potencies that may hang, maim, crush, rend, suck, and overwhelm him. Unutterable evils lurk within their sprawling tentacles, dread things are poised to drop from their branches. They exude vapors that drive him mad. They blot out the blessed security of the open heavens.

It is not always the forest that the ylophobiac fears. It may be a lone tree that stirs his terror, a tree on his own property, as commonplace as the very walls of his house. But he cannot endure its insidious suggestion and sooner or later will have it destroyed, however beautiful it may be. In the autumn, the familiar maple on the lawn, stripped of its concealing leaves, takes on strange shapes in the moonlight and whispers to the troubled soul of surcease from its agonies at the end of a dangling rope.

CHAPTER 6

NECROPHOBIA

The Fear of the Dead

Among primitive peoples, the surrounding air is thought to be inhabited by the souls of the departed. Especially in the cases of those who have died of disease or of violence is placation necessary to safeguard the living and protect them against the vengeance of the tomb. The advance in knowledge did little to modify this primitive fear of death and new bogies developed to replace outworn superstitions and discarded beliefs. The Middle Ages were obsessed with worms and grinning skulls, with were-wolves and ghouls, vampires (the living dead who can be slain only by a nail driven through the heart), ghosts, witches, and all the other paraphernalia of medieval magic. We have not yet outgrown all these beliefs. Many superstitions linger on, although we may have forgotten the significance of the homage we unconsciously pay them. Thus we place tombstones over the graves of our dead–to prevent their return to haunt us; and should they escape, the funeral wreath is there to trip their steps. There is a fascination and horror connected with death that few, if any, of us ever escape. Corpses exert a powerful attraction over hundreds who have no direct connection with the dead. They come to "view the remains". The morgue is constantly visited by people who have no legitimate business there. In a few, this universal morbidity is exaggerated to the point where perversity supervenes. An unholy love is mixed with the necro-phobiac's fear of the dead–a wild desire, but one step removed from madness, to possess the unspeakable corruption that inspires his abject terror, and so to lose himself in the horror and stillness of death.

CHAPTER 7

ACROPHOBIA

The Fear of High Places

Acrophobia is another very clear illustration of the complex set up by the simultaneous fear of and desire for self-destruction. The sufferer fears high places both because he is afraid to fall and afraid also that he will not be able to keep himself from the wild leap that means release. It would be impossible here to enter into all the contributing factors that go to make up this phobia. Various ideas, however, that are implicit in our civilization, suggest themselves. The story of Lucifer, the heaven-aspiring, which we all learned as children, is the object-lesson of the fate that awaits the too proud and arrogant, and the Biblical injunction that "pride goeth before a fall, and a haughty spirit before destruction" is always with us. Again, the struggle for success–that is, the struggle toward the heights–is the very foundation stone of our social life, and in the acrophobiac it may be only the fear of differentiation from his fellows that creates his complex. To climb is not difficult for those who have the determination, but horror unspeakable attends the backward look of the timid man. Among my acquaintances is an unsuccessful actor who can never live in an apartment or a hotel-room above the second story. Should he be obliged to occupy a higher room, he spends the night lying on the floor and grasping the foot of the bed with both hands to prevent himself from jumping out of the window.

The victim of any phobia always projects himself in the act of accomplishing the very thing he fears. In my drawing I have represented the acrophobiac hurtling through emptiness, rushing to destroy himself.

CHAPTER 8

CLIMACOPHOBIA

The Fear of Falling Down Stairs

This is essentially a companion phobia to the fear of height, although here another element probably enters in more strongly. The climacophobiac sees himself tumbling from the staircase into a cavernous darkness, a phantasy identified by the Freudians as an unconscious longing for self-immolation manifesting itself in a desire to return to the mother's womb. Moreover, the rhythmic act of climbing is a sex symbol. The punishment theory may here again be applied in the climacophobiac's fear of punishment (falling) for the transgressions symbolized by the act of climbing. As in all phobias, the victim suffers from the conflicting elements of his imaginings–the desire for suicide and release warring against his fear of those conditions favorable to self-destruction.

It is possible, nevertheless, to read a different explanation into many cases of climacophobia. As climbing means success, so, conversely, does falling signify failure, and the social obligations burdening us all make us too morbidly conscious of the disgrace of failure. Here, in addition to the fear of falling, there may exist a superimposed fear of the climb itself, so closely akin to acrophobia.

CHAPTER 9

BATOPHOBIA

The Fear of Falling Objects

This is another variation of the punishment complex. Instead of an act of nature (the delusion of the astrophobiac) punishing the sinner, it is man-made objects that here threaten the guilty soul with annihilation. A resentful power hurls at him an astonishing barrage from high buildings, scaffoldings, ceilings, walls, even from the sky itself. Crushed beneath heavy stones, he thinks to expiate nobly what he has secretly enjoyed. There is even an element of exhibitionism that enters here, and he fears death both for itself and because it will deprive him of the harrowing pleasure of his mental pantomime.

There is a certain dream-like quality in my illustration. It is all unreal–the graphic projection of punishment by a diseased mind. Nothing is fixed, nothing stable. The world in which he has his being is in conflict and chaotic. Even the very stars are falling.

CHAPTER 10

DROMOPHOBIA

The Fear of Crossing the Street

From time immemorial the wheel has been a symbol of power and the man in the street has cringed before its awful implications. The 'man on horseback' occasionally dismounted, but it was only to enter a wheeled vehicle whose distinction or magnificence or actual power of destruction set him apart from the common herd of men.

The modern scene has worked certain changes in the average man's attitude toward the wheel. Its functions have become enlarged and more democratic. It is now a symbol of individual achievement as well as of inherited power. The automobile-owner lords it over the pedestrian and the latter, by the mechanical exigencies of a machine society, is made to feel his inferiority at every step. In certain precariously balanced minds it is a short flight from this point to actual dromophobia, in which the victim sees the locomotive, the motor-car, the surface-car, any wheeled vehicle, in fact, as an animated killer, a modern demon of destruction resurrected out of the twilight of the ancient world to accomplish his destruction. To the ineffectual, the attribute of movement becomes a symbol of achievement; to the impotent, a manifesto of power; and to the sexually impotent, the motor-car may be a phallic symbol–the personification of the quality he lacks and which he hates and fears in others. (Conversely, we find cases of the small, sexually weak man who bravely struts in the face of the traffic maze, thus finding the compensation he needs for his own inadequacy). The dromophobiac dreads the moment when he must emerge into the street. He postpones it, second by second, inventing reason after plausible reason to reassure himself, to rationalize his own panic. And when at last he nerves himself for the necessary plunge, he goes in the absolute conviction that he will never live to see the other side of the street.

CHAPTER 11

AICHMOPHOBIA

The Fear of Sharp and Pointed Objects

The desire for life, the desire for love, are too strong within us to be repressed for long without serious hurt to the mental processes. Aichmophobia is simply another version of the agonized protest of the life-force crying out against atrophy and disuse. The sublimation of sexual impulses into so-called higher activities is all very well in theory, but frustration sometimes wreaks a horrible punishment on its voluntary or involuntary victims. The maladjusted man who, either out of personal conviction or the restraining hand of social forces, has disregarded and suppressed the natural urge to sex-expression, may end by wishing for death or castration to release him from the fury of impulses he is unable to gratify. The aichmophobiac fears the cutting edge and the sharp point for an obvious reason: he does not trust his own power to resist their insidious appeal. He is fascinated and terrified by sharp and pointed instruments that may release the surging flow of blood–a symbol for an orgasm in which the entire body makes a last, convulsive sacrifice.

(Continues...)

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Table of Contents

Contents

Title Page,
Copyright Page,
Dedication,
INTRODUCTION TO THE DOVER EDITION,
PREFACE,
I. NICHTOPHOBIA - The Fear of the Dark,
II. ASTROPHOBIA - The Fear of Storms,
III. ZOOPHOBIA - The Fear of Animals,
IV. POTAMOPHOBIA - The Fear of Running Water,
V. YLOPHOBIA - The Fear of the Forest,
VI. NECROPHOBIA - The Fear of the Dead,
VII. ACROPHOBIA - The Fear of High Places,
VIII. CLIMACOPHOBIA - The Fear of Falling Down Stairs,
IX. BATOPHOBIA - The Fear of Falling Objects,
X. DROMOPHOBIA - The Fear of Crossing the Street,
XI. AICHMOPHOBIA - The Fear of Sharp and Pointed Objects,
XII. MECHANOPHOBIA - The Fear of Machinery,
XIII. AGROPHOBIA - The Fear of Open Spaces,
XIV. CLAUSTROPHOBIA - The Fear of Enclosed Spaces,
XV. MONOPHOBIA - The Fear of Being Alone,
XVI. TOPOPHOBIA - The Fear of Situations–Stagefright,
XVII. KLEPTOPHOBIA - The Fear of Stealing,
XVIII. MYSOPHOBIA - The Fear of Dirt and Contamination,
XIX. ANTHROPOPHOBIA - The Fear of People,
XX. PHAGOPHOBIA - The Fear of Swallowing,
XXI. SYPHILOPHOBIA - The Fear of Syphilis,
XXII. HYPNOPHOBIA - The Fear of Sleep,
XXIII. PANTOPHOBIA - The Fear of Everything,