The Art of the Self

“Olga Fröbe-Kapteyn lived at a time when women were particularly open to mystical experiences that they perceived deep within their souls, connecting them to nature and beyond, to the cosmos itself. We can understand her interconnection with the universe more deeply through her art, which takes on special meaning today as we need to seriously

rethink our role as human beings in the great ecosystem of Earth. While awaiting a future edition of Olga Fröbe-Kapteyn’s Blue Book, I wish you pleasant reading of The Art of the Self, in which Riccardo Bernardini reconstructs the creative experience of a visionary woman and her role in the conception of one of the most significant cultural endeavors of our time-Eranos.”

-Her Royal Highness Princess Irene of the Netherlands

“From the very beginning, Olga Fröbe-Kapteyn dedicated herself to uncovering and drawing attention to those remote places where spirituality and art intersect-always as odd, unlikely companions. It is this passionate and profound pursuit that Riccardo Bernardini explores in this book: a journey in search, perhaps, of the ‘strange place, ’ an imagined ideal where mysticism and artistic expression come together in harmonious union.”

-Ugo Nespolo, artist and film director

“Riccardo Bernardini’s book is a fundamental contribution to the rediscovery of one of the most original figures at the center of debates around art, psychoanalysis, and spiritualism. From The Art of the Self, Olga Fröbe-Kapteyn emerges as a protagonist in an expanded-perhaps even haunted-idea of modernity that hasn’t stopped influencing historians and artists in the past few decades.”

-Massimiliano Gioni, Artistic Director of the New Museum, New York and of the Fondazione Nicola Trussardi, Milan

Riccardo Bernardini, Ph.D., Psy.D., is scientific secretary of the Eranos Foundation (Ascona, Switzerland), for which he has been supervising the study, restoration, conservation, and museum exhibitions of Olga Fröbe-Kapteyn’s Blue Book, the corpus of her unpublished works of art, for over twenty years. He also serves as Director of the Institute of Analytical Psychology and Psychotherapy (IPAP, awarded by the European Commission with the EU Health Award-Mental Health 2021), Adjunct Professor of Psychology of Evil and Radicalization Processes at Turin University, Secretary of the Order of Psychologists of Piedmont, and Member of the Commission for Typical Acts: Protection of Citizens and the Profession of the National Council of Psychologists (CNOP)-a public body under the jurisdiction of the Italian Ministry of Health. He is a member of the International Association for Analytical Psychology (IAAP) and the Association for Research in Analytical Psychology (ARPA). His books include Jung a Eranos. Il progetto della psicologia complessa Jung at Eranos. The Complex Psychology Project, Eranos in the Mirror: Views on a Moving Legacy (with F. Merlini, 2019), and Rebirth Symbols in the Basilica of San Miniato al Monte in Florence. From Joachim of Fiore to C.G. Jung (2022). He edited Carl Gustav Jung’s The Solar Myths and Opicinus de Canistris. Notes of the Seminar Given at Eranos in 1943 (with G.P. Quaglino and A. Romano, 2014-2015) and Rebirth. Text and Notes of the Lecture held at Eranos in 1939 (with F. Merlini, 2020). He is editor, along with Fabio Merlini, of the Eranos Yearbooks, published since 1933.

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