The Use of the Uncanny by Artists or Designers in Their Work

In order to discuss the uncanny within the realm of Art, it is necessary to understand what the uncanny is.

The uncanny has been a topic of interest since the 19th Century, therefore establishing the people behind the theory entails the analysis of Freud and Jentsch with particular reference to E. T. A. Hoffmann's 'The Sand-Man'. This is where the use of the word in this context originated from. This understanding can then be applied to artists or designers that used this in their work and for what reasons they did so.

Sigmund Freud in 1919 wrote his essay 'The Uncanny', with the intention of discovering why a feeling of the uncanny can occur in some instances and not others. He felt that the uncanny was the feeling of what once had been repressed and then remembered in a new surrounding and so giving the familiar a sense of the unfamiliar. However the topic of the uncanny was first approached by Ernst Jentsch in 1906 with his essay 'On the Psychology of the Uncanny'. This was due to E.

T. A Hoffmann's 'The Sand-Man', written in 1819 in German and is part of a series of short stories entitled 'The Night Pieces'.This would be classified as German Romantic literature. The story could be looked at from a modern point of view as being part of the Science-Fiction genre, with the doll Olympia and Fantasy with belief of the Sand-Man by Nathaniel. Jentsch and Freud regard this story as being a prime example of the use of the uncanny within literature and so develop the understanding of the word henceforth.

Jentsch regards the uncanny as being the intellectual uncertainty because of the reader querying whether an object is mortal or not, this thinking revolves around the character Olympia.In conclusion to this theory it would mean that the more you know and understand then there will be proportionately less uncertainty. As this is not the case, Freud develops his analysis further from what Jentsch states as “..

. the difficulties attendant upon the study of the uncanny, the fact that people differ greatly in their sensitivity to this kind of feeling. ” (Freud, 124). Freud in his essay is aiming to disregard Jentsch's original work on the uncanny as important. He does this by removing the significance of the automaton that Jentsch attributes the uncanny feeling to and in doing so he renders the female as immaterial.In regards to the inquiry of an object being alive or not as being intellectual uncertainty and causing the uncanny for Jentsch, Freud believed that this would arouse the feeling of fear instead.

The reason why the automaton Olympia creates the uncanny in the story is going back to the repressed memory of childhood here and the desire to see our toys or dolls come alive. Freud's version of 'The Uncanny' along with his other theories, inspired the movement of Surrealism which came about in the 1920's and had emerged out of Dadaism.Started by Max Ernst, who had been involved in the Dada movement originally, he developed his own style in the direction of using his childhood memories to create the work. An area that Freud develops regularly in regards to his psychoanalytical work. Ernst had an interest in psychology and had even studied the subject for a short while so he was familiar with Freud.

The Dadaists had started in around 1916 and they had no desire to create work that was pretty. They wanted to use as many different mediums as possible, questioning the way that Art should be, diverging from the more traditional view.Already there is a change in the view of Art by the beginnings of the 20th century as people were less interested in creating images that are visually appealing and laden with skill. The Art world had seen and begun to appreciate the Impressionists/Post Impressionists work who were initially rebuffed for the supposed lack of skill. For them there were other aspects that are of interest like painting en plein air , capturing the light for Monet, making art for the people and expressing emotion like Van Gough.

The uncanny essay by Freud is therefore a comment on modern culture and its shift away from the conventional. The study of the uncanny is looking at both the Psychology and the Aesthetics (Philosophy of dealing with beauty, Art, culture and the effect it has) and what Freud is delving into is the the effect of the sensory on an individual. He opens the essay with stating how he feels the need to look into this as Aesthetics generally remain in the realm of beauty, the uncanny is that of something frightening and perhaps is uneasy for the viewer.Freud returned to his work of the uncanny from an earlier attempt in 1919, which like the Dada movement is a reaction to the uneasiness in World War I.

In the essay he looks at the etymology of the word, the examination of 'The Sand-Man' with how to comprehend the uncanny and its effects. Freud's essay title in the original German is 'Unheimliche' and when translated its exact meaning is 'un-home-like-ness' he follows his investigation by an analysis of this.The German word 'heimlich' means homely and familiar, the opposite 'Unheimliche' can not be without the 'heim' (which means 'home') and so through looking into this word arises the notion that there has to be a homely or familiar component for the uncanny to be experienced. For something to be the opposite suggests the fact that it is completely unknown and frightening yet the Uncanny is not such, as it has the effect of something known and secure whilst having an additional aspect of the unknown. Therefore this means it is not necessarily frightening, perhaps even alluring or enjoyable.Here Freud is considering the nature of the uncanny, why it makes the viewer feel this way and also what is the effect on the mind during this experience.

Freud establishes the feeling of the Uncanny psychologically with analysis of the word, he also equates Nathaniel’s fear of losing his eyes to a fear of castration, conforming to his psychological theories. This is linked by how Oedipus blinds himself in the myth as penance for killing his father to which the castration anxiety, also written about by Freud, may come into play and we understand how the loss of ones eyes can be synonymous with castration.According to Freud in 'The Sand-Man', Hoffmann purposely gives you two points of view on the story, so it seems it isn’t about creating uncertainty, as Jentsch suggests, but purposely creating the feeling of the uncanny. This story is told with Nathaniel explaining how he should have known better about the tale of the Sand-Man, but he still believes it and the character Clara, in response to a misaddressed letter, rationalises it.

The author, Hoffmann, has done this so there is no intellectual uncertainty about what is happening and what is being experienced by Nathaniel.We as the reader are not unsure of what is happening like Nathaniel, but reading his uncanny feelings with the return of the Sand-Man (Coppelius, Coppolus) and his repressed fear of the commonplace. The story itself is told with a mixture of past and present providing the uncanny feeling of “It’s 'un-' unsettles time and space, order and sense. ” (Royle, 2).

This element is used again in 1929 when Luis Brunuel and Salvador Dali, collaborate and make 'Un Chien Andalou'. The film itself, which is sixteen minutes long, uses the similar method of 'The Sand-Man' with the disjointed use of time.The subject matter predominately seems to revolve around the Oedipus theory and starts off with the eye of a woman being cut with a shaving blade. This is an immediate connection with the fear of loosing one's eyes however the horrific manner that it is shown in diverges away from the uncanny.

Jentsch believed that in Art to recreate and completely replicate something living will only create something of unease. For example we do not find WALL-E from the Disney film of the same nameat all threatening even though he is meant to replicate a human form, he still has the essence of being mechanical.In contrast the character Sonny of Irobot presents a more accurate representation of the human form, causing an immediate distrust. This most likely has been purposely employed to enhance the required assumptions about the character for the film. In 1970, (later translated in 2005 into English) Masahiro Mori came up with the 'uncanny valley' where we find that the more a robot looks like a human the more we find it endearing but as soon as it gets to be a very close resemblance we dislike it.The term uncanny valley was due to the chart that Mori drew up to present this information, which visually compared to a valley shape on the graph.

Jentsch associated the uncanny with the object of the automaton itself as producing the feeling. As stated before, Jentsch saw the flaw in this as the uncanny is subjective. He was correct in stating how the reflection of human form can create the uncanny but not so in regards to the uncertainty of a character being an automaton or not in order to create this feeling.Through the understanding of the human body and its workings a new interest arose in the human being a form of machine from the 17th Century. The use of wax work figures, dolls, automatons, and doubles are all part of the uncanny and the questioning of the inanimate/animate.

However the best example of using dolls within this area is by Hans Bellmer who was welcomed by the Surrealists. He published a book in 1934 called 'Die Puppe' within which there were photographs of dolls that he had made and posed in certain ways.Bellmer produced his Art as a part reaction to the Nazi's but also related to his desire towards his 16 year old cousin. Hans Bellmer's use of the female figure in an erotic fashion is not new. Olympia, the automaton, serves as a figure of desire for Nathaniel in 'The Sand-Man' and then in the film 'Metropolis' (1927) which was directed by Fritz Lang an automaton is created for the intent of replicating a lost love.

Bellmer had an interest in the story 'The Sand-Man' also, and the influence of Olympia is reflected by how he uses dolls as the subject matter.Some of the doll images from Bellmer have castrated parts and the positions they are put into truly echo the uncanny feeling, especially as Freud comments on how severed limbs are a connection to the castration anxiety and returns our thoughts to the human figure being mechanical. Surrealism is a movement which encompasses aesthetic philosophy and can not only be applied to Art but any region of life. It is about delving into the subconscious and using it as the source to produce art or literature.Although it started around 1920 the publication of Andre Breton's, 'Manifesto of Surrealism' in 1924 cemented the beliefs and ideas associated with this movement. The reason that the Surrealists connected with Bellmer was because they themselves believed in the marvellous, especially the heightened beauty.

The use of photography was a medium that the Surrealists used and experimented with to create an uncanny feeling in their work: Photography had not been done in such a way before.Man Ray used photography like he would paint, as a medium instead of an instrument that records the image. At times the camera was not even used and instead he made photograms, he himself dubbed them as rayographs:this is the use of light sensitive paper with objects positioned on top and light exposed towards the paper to create a photograph. His subject matter within his photographs evidently show an interest in the female form, similar to Bellmer there is an erotic element evident in his work.The women in the pictures seem to be part of the subject matter and not the subject matter and so are pliable, as if he was using a mannequin or doll.

Some of his images also show a female figure with what appears to be amputated limbs like in 'Feminine bust (Nu feminin en buste)' (1930) and 'White and Black (variation)' (1929). Dali's 'The Lugubrious Game' (1929) epitomises the use of the uncanny within the Surrealist realm: it is constructed by the use of paints and collage.Dali uses a lot of symbolism within his paintings which from viewing his work is not surprising as the amount of detail and subject matter requires this in order to understand what is happening. Along with his fear of sex, Dali also had a fear of grasshoppers and uses them in his paintings to suggest destruction.

In 'The Lugubrious Game' there is one on the mouth of his self portrait, on which he has painted his eyes shut. This is in order to show that the figure is asleep and the surroundings which are the dream and therefore the subconscious are real and solid.This aspect shows the uncanny alongside the aspect of the repressed, the dreams being given a second layer by putting them in a new surrounding. The subject matter for this image centres around castration, this is possibly shown in the main figure being diced into sections or perhaps the figure at the bottom right having tight shorts and a bloodied tissue in his hand.

Also the statued figure to the top right points with an oversized hand to provide a phallic substitute whilst covering his eyes with the other to disengage himself from the gesture of doing so.The uncanny is present as Dali uses the subconscious to provide his inspiration and so validating this as a viable manner of producing Art. This is also the Surrealist want for the use of the marvellous in causing a reaction on the viewer, the aesthetics in play and resembling the feel of the uncanny. The painting itself created a lot of interest and scandal, so much so that in the same year Georges Bataille wrote an essay, of the same title, discussing the painting. Bataille was a writer who was influenced by Freud as well as other theorists such as Marx and Hegel.

He had an interest towards the erotic and macabre side of life, the less socially accepted 'norm' and so saw a connection with the Surrealists. Breton excluded him from the movement in 1920 as he felt that he was a negative influence, other Surrealists kept a limited association with him. Bataille sectioned the painting into four and discussed it in his essay with a psychoanalytical basis, not being able to reproduce the image he did this from a sketch he had made himself when he had viewed the painting in an exhibition at Galerie Goemans.His approach was to look at the central disjointed figure, the mass of shapes and objects that were part of the figure, the pointing statue figure and the man who had soiled himself. As with masturbation the act of defecating is one that is usually kept private and secret. Here we also see vague reference to the Freudian theories of anal-expulsive/retentive.

The whole painting was done with the intention of just having his childhood remembering as the subject matter.Dali himself felt that this painting completely encumbered what the Surrealist manifesto had set out as the guideline. Although many of his peers were repelled by his depiction of faeces expelling from the bottom left figure. The aim of this investigation was to discuss the use of the uncanny by artists or designers.

In doing so there has been a look into the word and the purpose of it and then applying that to art work. It is evident that Freud has taken this subject further than Jentsch but possibly to his detriment as he has ignored any valid points that Jentsch made.It is easy to see why 'The Sand-Man' has been used as the basis of the use of the uncanny as the overall main point that Freud uses is the repressed childhood memories that are brought forward into a new environment. As Freud progresses with the etymology of the word uncanny there is a feeling that perhaps the point he is trying to find is somewhat difficult to grasp, however it is interesting to see how the word works and its associates in the various languages. From continuing on this path and seeing how the use of distorted time is done in 'The Sand-Man' helps bring in the element of related Art with the uncanny.

The uncanny valley is also a relevant point and should really have been beneficial to Freud's work in the context of using Jentsch ideas of the replication of a human figure being uneasy. Bellmer's use of dolls is most obviously uncanny and extremely erotic, the dolls themselves in the images do appear as though they posses the ability to become animated. The use of Surrealism within this context is not a surprising conclusion as they base their work upon a lot of Freud's theories and generally contains pictorial representation of the castration anxiety and the subconscious.Taking this into a more specific area meant regarding Dali and particularly his painting 'The Lugubrious Game'.

This is due to the whole purpose of the image being constructed from childhood memories and then producing them in a new environment. Dali had a lot of issues surrounding sex and this leaks into his work quite profoundly, in this painting the main focus in the subject matter represents the castration anxiety along with the grasshopper being destructive, and the female hand that is touching Dali's self portrait is exual distress. The painting itself is one that has been discussed before with the first to do it being Bastille, and according to him the images within the segmented blobs are boyhood fancy. However this topic is read, straight from the beginning of picking up the uncanny there is evidence of uncertainty in how to decipher it. This is all due to the fact that it is a completely subjective area to study.