The Empress of Art: Catherine the Great and the Transformation of Russia

The Empress of Art: Catherine the Great and the Transformation of Russia by Susan Jaques
2016 | ISBN: 160598972X | English | 384 pages | EPUB | 44 MB

Ruthless and passionate, Catherine the Great is singularly responsible for amassing one of the most awe-inspiring collections of art in the world and turning St. Petersburg in to a world wonder. The Empress of Art brings to life the creation of this captivating woman’s greatest legacy

An art-oriented biography of the mighty Catherine the Great, who rose from seemingly innocuous beginnings to become one of the most powerful people in the world. A German princess who married a decadent and lazy Russian prince, Catherine mobilized support amongst the Russian nobles, playing off of her husband’s increasing corruption and abuse of power. She then staged a coup that ended with him being strangled with his own scarf in the halls of the palace, and she being crowned the Empress of Russia.

Intelligent and determined, Catherine modeled herself off of her grandfather in-law, Peter the Great, and sought to further modernize and westernize Russia. She believed that the best way to do this was through a ravenous acquisition of art, which Catherine often used as a form of diplomacy with other powers throughout Europe. She was a self-proclaimed “glutton for art” and she would be responsible for the creation of the Hermitage, one of the largest museums in the world, second only to the Louvre. Catherine also spearheaded the further expansion of St. Petersburg, and the magnificent architectural wonder the city became is largely her doing. There are few women in history more fascinating than Catherine the Great, and for the first time, Susan Jaques brings her to life through the prism of art.

16 pages of color images

Imprisoned Pain & Its Transformation

Joan Symington, “Imprisoned Pain & Its Transformation”
2000 | ISBN-10: 1855752433 | 256 pages | PDF | 9 MB

A Festschrift for Sidney Klein, the eminent British psychoanalyst. In this volume a wide range of clinicians reflect on the debt they owe to his work, and in particular on the idea of analysis as a means for understanding and transforming psychic pain.

OC - Repérer la résistance à la transformation digitale

Faith and Transformation (Eigen in Seoul, Vol. 2)

Faith and Transformation (Eigen in Seoul, Vol. 2) by Michael Eigen
English | 2011 | ISBN: 1855757702 | 126 pages | PDF | 0,4 MB

This book is a transcription of a three-day, eighteen-hour seminar Michael Eigen gave in Seoul in 2009. It takes forward and complements the Seoul seminar in 2007 (Eigen in Seoul 1: Madness and Murder).

Eigen believes that “faith plays an important role in transformational processes in psychotherapy. I don’t mean ‘belief’. Belief may be a necessary part of the human condition but it tends to prematurely organize processes that remain unknown. For me, faith supports experimental exploration, imaginative conjecture, experiential probes. The more we explore therapy, the more we appreciate how much our response capacity can grow. We are responsive beings, for good and ill. Too often, our responses hem us in. We short-circuit growth of responsiveness. Yet it is possible to become aware of the rich world our responsive nature opens, places it takes us, feelings with as yet no name, hints of contact that may never be exhausted….”

The author uses parts of W. R. Bion’s and D. W. Winnicott’s texts as points of departure for some of the explorations in the seminar and draw from his own work as well, weaving clinical and cultural concerns, the state of our persons and nations, how we feel, get along with ourselves, and obstacles that dog us but are widely undefined or defined wrongly. He concludes that if psychoanalysis has taught us anything, it is that we are persecuted by our own nature, which finds voice and resonance in structures of the outside world.

Diana Francis - From Pacification to Peacebuilding: A Call to Global Transformation [Repost]

Diana Francis – From Pacification to Peacebuilding: A Call to Global Transformation
2010 | ISBN: 0745330266 | English | 208 pages | PDF | 2.4 MB

Does conflict transformation work? Diana Francis reviews the developments in the field over the past twenty years. She recognizes that it has helped those engulfed in violent conflict to respond constructively, but also warns that the real requirement for peace is a global retreat from militarism. In an original and radical analysis, Francis argues that the dominant culture of power resting on coercion and violence must be displaced by the principles of interdependence, kindness and nonviolent solidarity. This is the only way that pacification – efforts to dominate and control – will be replaced by genuine peacebuilding. She calls upon peacemakers worldwide to embrace and develop the practice of nonviolent power, rejecting the culture and institutions of war and working with movements around the world for global demilitarization and “positive peace.”