Dissonance painting 3

"Dissonance painting 3: Sense of doubt",  60/43cm, oil on canvas, 2015

According to Jungian psychology, individuation is a process of psychological integration. "In general, it is the process by which individual beings are formed and differentiated [from other human beings]; in particular, it is the development of the psychological individual as a being distinct from the general, collective psychology."

Individuation is a process of transformation whereby the personal and collective unconscious are brought into consciousness (e.g., by means of dreams, active imagination, or free association) to be assimilated into the whole personality. It is a completely natural process necessary for the integration of the psyche. Individuation has a holistic healing effect on the person, both mentally and physically.

In addition to Jung's theory of complexes, his theory of the individuation process forms conceptions of a phylogenetically acquired unconscious filled with mythic images, a non-sexual libido, the general types of extraversion and introversion, the compensatory and prospective functions of dreams, and the synthetic and constructive approaches to fantasy formation and utilization.

"The symbols of the individuation process . . . mark its stages like milestones, prominent among them for Jungians being the shadow, the wise old man . . . and lastlythe anima in man and the animus in woman." Thus, "There is often a movement from dealing with the persona at the start . . . to the ego at the second stage, to the shadow as the third stage, to the anima or animus, to the Self as the final stage. Some would interpose the Wise Old Man and the Wise Old Woman as spiritual archetypes coming before the final step of the Self."

Dissonance Painting 2: Dual States

"Dissonance painting 2: Dual States ", 60/43cm, oil on canvas, 2015

From the work of Wolfgang Pauli and Carl G. Jung has resulted a philosophical approach, called by Harald Atmanspacher the Pauli-Jung conjecture, of dual-aspect monism which has a very specific further feature, namely that different aspects may show a complementarity in a quantum physical sense. That is, the Pauli-Jung conjecture implies that with regard to mental and physical states there may be incompatible descriptions of different parts that emerge from the whole. This stands in close analogy to quantum physics, where complementary properties cannot be determined jointly with accuracy.




Atmanspacher further refers to Paul Bernays' views on complementarity in physics and in philosophy when he states that "two complementary description mutually exclude each other although both together are needed to describe the situation exhaustively.




In physics, complementarity is a both a theoretical and experimental result of quantum mechanics, also referred as principle of complementarity, closely associated with the Copenhagen interpretation. It holds that objects have complementary properties which cannot be measured accurately at the same time. The more accurately one property is measured, the less accurately the complementary property is measured, according to the Heisenberg uncertainty principle. Further, a full description of a particular type of phenomenon can only be achieved through measurements made in each of the various possible bases — which are thus complementary. The complementarity principle was formulated by Niels Bohr, a leading founder of quantum mechanics.

dissonance painting 1

"dissonance painting 1: the shadow", 60/43cm, oil on canvas, 2015

' In Jungian psychology, the shadow or "shadow aspect" may refer to (1) an unconscious aspect of the personality which the conscious ego does not identify in itself. Because one tends to reject or remain ignorant of the least desirable aspects of one's personality, the shadow is largely negative, or (2) the entirety of the unconscious, i.e., everything of which a person is not fully conscious. There are, however, positive aspects which may also remain hidden in one's shadow (especially in people with low self-esteem).[1] Contrary to a Freudian definition of shadow, therefore, the Jungian shadow can include everything outside the light of consciousness, and may be positive or negative. "Everyone carries a shadow," Jung wrote, "and the less it is embodied in the individual's conscious life, the blacker and denser it is."[2] It may be (in part) one's link to more primitive animal instincts,[3] which are superseded during early childhood by the conscious mind.

According to Carl Jung, the shadow, in being instinctive and irrational, is prone to psychological projection, in which a perceived personal inferiority is recognised as a perceived moral deficiency in someone else. Jung writes that if these projections remain hidden, "The projection-making factor (the Shadow archetype) then has a free hand and can realize its object--if it has one--or bring about some other situation characteristic of its power." [4] These projections insulate and harm individuals by acting as a constantly thickening veil of illusion between the ego and the real world.

From one perspective, 'the shadow...is roughly equivalent to the whole of the Freudian unconscious';[5] and Jung himself asserted that 'the result of the Freudian method of elucidation is a minute elaboration of man's shadow-side unexampled in any previous age'.[6]

Jung also believed that "in spite of its function as a reservoir for human darkness—or perhaps because of this—the shadow is the seat of creativity.";[7] so that for some, it may be, 'the dark side of his being, his sinister shadow...represents the true spirit of life as against the arid scholar.'  '

Steps Ahead, Symposium for Contemporary Art 2015, Blagoevgrad Bulgaria

Bogdan Aleksandrov and Sasho Stoitzov

Getting serious with a work in progress

Work in Progress by Dimitar Yaranov

Details

thinking about it

Bogdan Aleksandrov

working

Yeah

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working on the second of the two paintings

working it out

watching myself

shadows growing longer as the work is almost done

second painting in first stages by Dimitar Yaranov

still working it out....

photo op with Dimitar Yaranov

Second painting complete