To Make the Familiar Strange— Aesthetic Derealization in the Work of Alberto Giacometti

Abstract

Derealization, the phenomenon in which things appear strange and unfamiliar, is usually understood as pathological or, at best defensive. I present evidence for an “aesthetic” form of derealization as observed and described by the artist Alberto Giacometti and propose that it served a critically productive role in his creative process. Not only did Giacometti experience derealization's core estrangement, altered body images, obsessional skepticism, and prolonged observation, but these typically pathological features combined synergistically into a method of visual inquiry for him. A process that entailed the “deconstruction” of habitual and routine perceptions associated with day-to-day reality. This suggests that seeing things as unfamiliar, unknown, or even as meaningless may confer an advantage on the artist, both loosening the constraints of pre-conceptions and supporting alternative, fresh perceptions. Aesthetic derealization might also share with its clinical counterpart a common dissociative mechanism that separates perception from cognition or seeing from knowing. Whereas clinical derealization is crude and disorienting, the aesthetic variant is flexible and enlightening. Giacometti and perhaps other artists might employ an intriguing mix of sophistication and naïveté in seeing things strangely.