Psychoanalysis and Creativity
Seminars 1982-1989
One of the earliest activities of the Forum was the presentations on Psychoanalysis and Creativity held during in 1982 to 1989.
Bios for Speakers
Dr. Gordon Kirschner
Leader of the Seminars
Dr. Wolfgang Weigert MD was a psychotherapist in clinical practice as well as teaching in the Advanced Psychotherapy Training Program at the Washington School of Psychiatry. Dr. Weigert conceived of the Forum as a public outlet for the investigation of the creative process across many disciplines. He met creative people through his work and through his wife, Dionne Weigert, who is a concert pianist.
Dr. Weigert partnered with Dr. Gordon Kirschner MD who specialized in psychiatry and psychoanalysis working with both children and adults. He was the Co-chairman of the Advanced Psychotherapy program at the Washington School of Psychiatry.
Dr. Kirschner’s interest in creativity was stimulated by his older sister. He observed her creative outlets in many mediums including drawing, painting, sculpture and jewelry making.
In his professional practice he studied creativity in his patients, colleges and himself. He studied writing on creativity and was very enthusiastic about joining Dr. Weigert in forming the Forum on Psychiatry and the Humanities.
Both Dr. Weigert and Dr. Kirschner saw the study of creativity as a way to help their patients. Helping patients find creative solutions can enable them tap into their full potential. Then they can find the path to their own well being.
The Creativity Series was started in the Spring of 1982 with sponsorship by the Washington School of Psychiatry and the Art Therapy Program of George Washington University with Catherine Williams, Director.
Arthur S. Levine MD
National Institute of Child Health and Human Development
Arthur S. Levine MD Recording dated December 3, 1989
Dr. Levine joined the National Cancer Institute of the National Institutes of Health in 1967, directly after medical school. He served there for more than three decades. From 1982 to 1998, he was the scientific director of the National Institute of Child Health and Human Development, widely recognized as one of the world’s leading centers in developmental biology.
After his tenure at NIH he provided 22 years of leadership in administration and research to neuroscience in his role as Pitt's John and Gertrude Petersen Dean of Medicine and senior vice chancellor for the health sciences at the University of Pittsburgh. In 2020 he became the executive director of the Brain Institute there where his extensive knowledge and experience helped grow the Brain Institute, as well as lead the Assault on Alzheimer's program which he established.
Dr. Levine initiated new mechanisms designed to enhance the recruitment and retention of talented students and trainees, with the goal of helping to reverse the precipitous decline across the nation in the numbers of young physicians and other health science students embarking upon substantive careers in research and education. In his role as a recruiter he had to recognize the latent ability for creative scientific thinking. This seminar is a discussion of the attributes he recognized to discover these latent talents.
The button below offers the full audio
of the Jaster talk
Mark Jaster Graduated from Amhurst in 1977
Audiences of all ages and backgrounds have enjoyed his kinetic humor, playful interaction, musical wit and inventive imagination. His skills in mime were developed in training with 20th-century masters Marcel Marceau and his teacher, Etienne Decroux, along with careful observation of Charlie Chaplin, Buster Keaton, and Harpo Marx. More recent studies in the LeCoq pedagogy of Theatrical Clown have been with Dody DiSanto, Ami Hattab, and Emanuelle Delpeche.
Jaster served as teaching assistant to Mr. Marceau in a series of seminars in Michigan. He now frequently teaches (American Academy of Ballet, Shakespeare Theatre, Maryland Opera Studio, University of North Carolina School of the Arts), consults on issues of mime and movement (Centre Stage, Round House Theatre, Adventure Theatre, Ford’s Theatre, No Rules Theatre, Constellation Theatre) and regularly conducts artist residencies with Elementary Schools.
In his solo performances, Piccolo’s Trunk, A Fool Named ‘O’, and The Maestro, Mark combines live music on unusual instruments and non-instruments, (like the pipe and tabor and the bowed saw), outrageous acrobatics, (like a dive through an impossibly small wooden hoop), and hyper-advanced communication skills with an honest, gentle humor that has obliterated many a skeptic’s hesitations over Mime.
Since 2006, he has co-directed Happenstance Theater with his wife and partner, Sabrina Mandell, devising and appearing in critically acclaimed collaborative, original works of "Visual, Poetic Theater." In January, ’07, they created and performed The Seven Ages of Mime for an extended, sold-out run at the Round House Theatre in Silver Spring. The Washington Post’s review said, “Jaster’s sturdy body, like Chaplin’s and like Marcel Marceau’s…is a jeweler’s tool, adroit and precise…each athletic movement is exquisitely controlled…”
In addition to many appearances as Herr Drosselmeyer in the Maryland Youth Ballet’s Nutcracker, frequent performances with the Washington Revels, the Cambridge Christmas Revels, and many years as a featured stage act at The Maryland Renaissance Festival, he has also collaborated with world-class musicians like Piffaro, Celtic Harper Sue Richards, Hesperus, and the late, great jazz bassist, Keter Betts as well as twice opening for Leon Redbone.
Mark has been a proud member of The Big Apple Circus’ Clown Care Unit since 1996, performing at the Children’s National Medical Center as Dr Bald.
