Intimately known and yet strange like Nature, lovingly tender and yet cruel like fate, joyous and untiring giver of life—mater dolorosa and mute implacable portal that closes upon the dead …

… the mother carries for us that inborn image of the mater natura and mater spiritualis, of the totality of life of which we are a small and helpless part.

                  ~ Jung, CW9i Para 172

Presented by Juliana Prpic and Dr Janis Maxwell

Jung described the Great Mother as an archetype of duality. On the positive side, she embodies “all that is benign, all that cherishes and sustains, furthers growth and fertility.” Conversely, her shadow holds all that “devours, seduces, and poisons.” Expanding on Jung’s insights, his student Erich Neumann articulated a more detailed framework, mapping the Great Mother onto a quaternity. This mandala of opposites includes the nurturing Good Mother and the fearsome Terrible Mother, alongside the positive transformative feminine and its counterpart, the destructive transformative feminine—the Witch and the Muse.

In this presentation we will continue exploring the quaternity of the Great Mother Archetype, focusing on the transforming power of the Witch and the Muse.

Jungian arts-based research (JABR) is doing therapy with the whole world. It means making knowledge through creativity, the imagination and the unknown psyche or the unconscious, interacting with the wisdom of centuries materialised in art traditions…

… the artwork tells the artist that it is finished, there is then opportunity to collect, reflect upon and gather meaning for the world in something like an alchemical projection.

                                       ~ Rowland

Presented by Merilee Bennett & Juliana Kaya Prpic

Drawing on the work of Susan Rowland¹ we will engage with a Jungian Arts-Based Research (JABR) approach to create a doll symbolising the Great Mother archetype. JABR integrates creativity, art-making, and psychological inquiry into a transformative process that dis-members and re-members old forms of knowing and being, transforming art-making into a bridge between the individual and the collective unconscious. Your doll will be stitched and painted and adorned.

Through the four stages of JABR—paradigm, preparation, process, and projection—we will consider the archetypal framework, prepare through reflection, and embrace spontaneity and synchronicities during the creative process. The completed dolls will serve as autonomous entities, embodying the energy of the Great Mother while offering personal and collective meaning.

Presented by Mark Winborn

This seminar focuses on teleological themes in the work of C.G. Jung and Wilfred Bion. As part of the exploration, we will focus on the similarities and differences between Jung’s concept of individuation and Bion’s concept of ‘becoming.’ 

Additionally, two approaches to the concept of individuation are outlined; one which holds individuation on par with a spiritual pursuit (individuation as romantic ideal) and one which holds the individuation as a concept that potentially informs each analytic moment (individuation as clinical concept).

A collective problem, if not recognized as such, always appears as a personal problem, and in individual cases may give the impression that something is out of order in the realm of the personal psyche. The personal sphere is indeed disturbed, but such disturbances need not be primary; they may well be secondary, the consequence of an insupportable change in the social atmosphere. The cause of disturbance is, therefore, not to be sought in the personal surroundings, but rather in the collective situation. Psychotherapy has hitherto taken this matter far too little into account. (Jung 1989, 233–4)

~ Jung, C.G. 1989 [1961]. Memories, dreams, reflections. New York: Vintage. Pp233-4)

Presented by Craig San Roque & Juliana Kaya Prpic

In this presentation we will explore:

1. Metaphors and images of liminality.
2. The cultural level of the psyche and Jung’s notion of
3. Cultural complexes, with a focus on the Colonial Cultural Complex, and ‘The Australian Condition’.
4. Intercultural transference dynamics between individuals.
5. Intercultural collective transference between groups.
6. The impact of personal cultural history on the analytic attitude.