At the turn of the century, Sigmund Freud publishes both his On Interpretation of Dreams (1900) and Three Essays on Sexuality (1905). His lectures, while more significant as agents of change in future generations, reflect general developments that link art with the developing science of psychology. Freud studied with Jean-Martin Charcot in Paris, a neurologist who claimed, lectured with demonstrations and published with photographs, his theories of hysteria as a catch-all diagnosis for a variety of different physical symptoms. His use of performance and photography fits into a general development in the 19th century where the models of art and science overlapped, were generally women, and were often presented as naked. Furthermore, the diagnosis of hysteria originated in the misconception of “the wandering womb” and led to a range of cures proposed to treat numerous physical conditions of women by addressing their sexuality. Art and science also intersected in the increased interest in dreams. Artists such as Ferdinand Hodler (1853-1918) and Henri Rousseau (1844-1910) depicted sleeping subjects in reverie with erotic overtones. Most of Freud’s scientific career was in Vienna, where the exhibitions of the Vienna Secession, like the Beethoven exhibition of 1902, demonstrated an interest in altered states of consciousness. In Vienna as well, Otto Weininger’s dualist theory of masculine creativity and rationality as opposed to feminine destructiveness and irrationality correspond with the increasing evidence of the femme fatale by artists such as Gustav Klimt.
Gustav Klimt. Judith II (Salomè). 1909