Quasi-Oedipus Complex & Fantastical Castration
"Quasi-Oedipus Complex & Fantastical Castration in Bourgeois' Destruction of the Father"
Louise Bourgeois’ Destruction of the Father is an installation artwork composed of plaster, latex, wood, fabric, and red light [fig. 1]. The installation creates a grotto-like space adorned with flesh-coloured bulbs which cover the floor and ceiling of the chamber. In the centre of the installation, amidst the exterior bulges, there is a rectangular ‘table-bed’ with two large breast-like bulges located on either side of a phallic-like bulb. Just below this ostensible phallus, there are several tooth-like bulges. This appears to suggest that if the space were to close in on itself, the phallus would be severed entirely by the enclosing teeth-like bulbs lining the floor and ceiling of this installation space. Unsurprisingly, Bourgeois’ Destruction of the Father is a mysterious and yet deeply disturbing piece that arouses the viewer while simultaneously inducing a sense of anxiety. This is deliberate; in an interview, Bourgeois discussed Destruction of the Father in relation to her own psychobiography as a sublimation within her own lived experience of childhood trauma caused by her father’s own sexual desire. Drawing on theories of psychoanalysis read in relation to Bourgeois’ own biography, I will employ a feminist Freudian-psychoanalytic analysis to consider the way in which Destruction of the Father reflects the artist’s own subconscious desire to create a space where sublimation (or exorcism) of her childhood trauma can be (re)enacted.
In the early twentieth-century, Sigmund Freud developed a theory of psychoanalysis describing the curious process that occurs when repressed childhood traumas endure within the unconscious adult psyche. Freud referred to this as the “Oedipus complex.”[1] The term “Oedipus,” drawn from Greek tragedy, chronicles the narrative’s namesake character murdering his father in order to marry his mother; this “rivalry” results from Oedipus’ desire to “replace [his] father as the object of [his] mother’s erotic attention.”[2] Freud argued that “key moments and traumas in any individual’s psycho-sexual development” influenced the child’s feelings of desire for their opposite-sex parent, and a ‘jealousy’ toward their same-sex parent. While Freud exclusively considered male sexual development, I wish to apply this theory to Bourgeois’ Destruction of the Father in order consider the way in which the artist’s lived experience of her father’s affair permeated her adult unconscious desire.
Freud’s theory suggests that Bourgeois’ early relationship with her father was thwarted when the object of her father’s desire—his mistress—was invited to live within Bourgeois’ childhood home. Applying Freudian theory, this act ostensibly caused Bourgeois to experience a quasi-Oedipus complex, rivaling both her mother and her father’s mistress to win her father’s sexual desire. In one vein, Bourgeois’ Destruction of the Father depicts the tensions between these two female ‘mother’ figures at odds over Bourgeois’ father—and by extension, his phallus. This is signified by the two large breast-like bulbs surrounding either side of the erect phallus located within the centre of the table-bed. In one vein, this deliberate arrangement ostensibly signifies the tension that Bourgeois experienced within her family home; the two female figures undoubtedly occupied Mr. Bourgeois’ affections such that Bourgeois was unlikely to win this quasi-battle for her father’s “erotic attention.”[3] In this case, Freudian theory suggests that Bourgeois’ Destruction of the Father is an attempt to recreate and witness the product of her own early childhood trauma
However, Bourgeois does not fashion herself (or the spectator) as passive viewer to this erotic scene. Instead, Bourgeois lines the table-bed surface, along with the floor and ceiling of this installation space, with tooth-like bulges that appear to encroach upon the phallus. This is deliberate; Bourgeois does not wish to win her father’s erotic attention, but rather to sever the object manifestation of her father’s virility in a revenge fantasy that both emasculates and destroys the source of her childhood trauma: her father’s phallus. Feminist scholar Laura Mulvey applies Freudian psychoanalytic theory to analyse artworks that impliedly depict female sexuality without explicitly representing female genitalia. Upon first glance, there is reason to interpret this grotto-like space as a vagina, suggested by the warm pink hues and flesh-coloured bulbs that excite and invite the viewer to enter this apparently pleasurable space. The viewer’s curiosity increases as they move closer (and deeper) into the grotto’s realm before subsequently realising that this space is not a space of pleasure but rather site of pain as the apparently plush bulbs are in fact hard plaster forms that surround the viewer from every angle. Upon realising this dangerous reality, the viewer has already gone too far, willingly accepting their fate as victim to the grotto’s tempting allure. As this interpretation suggests, Bourgeois’ Destruction of the Father is, in fact, a castrating space.
In one thesis, Mulvey applies Freud’s theory on “castration anxiety” to consider the traumas that young boys experience upon discovering the reality that everyone does not have a penis. Indeed, the most disturbing discovery for the young boy, according to Freud, is realising that his own mother does not in fact have a penis; the young boy assumes that the penis’ absence is the result of castration rather than biological difference.[4] Accordingly, this fosters the young boy’s fear of the female body, the vagina, and female sexuality in general.[5] While Freud’s theory exclusively considers young boys, Mulvey’s feminist theory suggests the potential to apply Freudian castration anxiety in order to interpret the disturbing effect of Bourgeois’ Destruction of the Father. Applying Mulvey’s theory, this grotto-like space appears more dangerous than before, as the bulbs appear significantly more teeth-like in their appearance. This recalls the vagina dentate; a mythical tale that describes a woman’s vagina lined with teeth to warn men of the ostensible dangers of female sexuality. The effect of this creates a tension between pleasure and pain as men are drawn toward the vagina and yet fearful of the potential dangers hidden within the female body. Indeed, Bourgeois’ ostensible decision to recall this theme in Destruction of the Father suggests that she is not haunted by the fear of castration, but rather uses this installation to recall and re-manifest a sense of castration anxiety within the viewer.
Moreover, Bourgeois uses her own lived experience of childhood trauma to reimagine and witness the literal ‘destruction of her father’. Bourgeois fashions this grotto-like space as a site to represent both pleasure and pain. Bourgeois re-creates a space that represents her father’s pleasure, signified by the table-bed located in the centre of the installation; the table-bed transports the viewer into her father’s bed (and bedroom) where he ostensibly performs sexual intercourse with both his wife and mistress, asserting both his masculine virility and sexual superiority to the viewer. At the same time, this table-bed represents a site of pain; the location where Bourgeois’ mother’s emotional pain stems and the site where Bourgeois’ idealistic family unit was destroyed. The table-bed stands in place for a mattress: a soft surface that witnesses the expulsion of both seminal fluid during sexual intercourse and evil spirits during traditional exorcisms. Bourgeois reimagines her childhood trauma to fashion herself (and perhaps the spectator) as witness to her father’s sexual desire; the source of her childhood trauma. Indeed, as the title suggests, Bourgeois is not haunted by the fear of castration but rather uses Destruction of the Father to manifest her own desire to castrate her father. Thus, this grotto-space becomes a site to attempt a fantasy exorcism on her father, first by luring him into this space before subsequently severing his phallus and expelling his demonic sexual desire as a result of this act. By castrating her father, Bourgeois not only asserts control from over her notoriously controlling father, but also renders her father’s mistress’ role in the home obsolete, thereby expelling her and the phallus from the home in order to restore the dynamic of the Bourgeois family unit.
Fundamentally, Bourgeois’ Destruction of the Father is an explicit sublimation of her desire to destroy her father, as indicated through the title, and supported by a psycho-biographical analysis of her own childhood trauma. It is significant that Bourgeois produced this artwork when she was sixty-four years old, as this suggests that her experience of childhood trauma caused by her father’s affair endured into her late adult life. The actual production of Destruction of the Father was both a way for Bourgeois to escape from reality while expressing a fantastically dark desire; within this unconscious realm, Bourgeois physically and metaphorically punishes her father—and the anxious male viewer—for allowing their phallus and virility to destroy the family unit.
[1] Michael Hatt and Charlotte Klonk, “Psychoanalysis,” Art History: A Critical Introduction to its Methods (Manchester: Manchester University Press, 2006), p. 177. [2] Hatt and Klonk, “Psychoanalysis,” p. 177. [3] Hatt and Klonk, “Psychoanalysis,” p. 177. [4] Hatt and Klonk, “Psychoanalysis,” p. 180. [5] Hatt and Klonk, “Psychoanalysis,” p. 180.
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