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In 2003, "Radar," a now defunct magazine, asked Bourgeois to participate in a "Talking Heads" series. The premise was for each participating artist to receive the same photocopy of a head in profile. The artists were then asked to add hand additions in whatever fashion they chose. The black outlined profile head, seen in the Source drawing in the Evolving Composition Diagram below, was provided by "Radar" to Bourgeois. (The profile outline is also seen here as a Study and as a Related Work in Other Mediums.) The Louise Bourgeois Studio has no record that the "Talking Heads" collaboration with Bourgeois ever came to fruition. However, Bourgeois went on to use the profile outline as the basis of the composition seen here, ultimately combined with a keyhole motif.
Artist’s Remarks:
Inscribed on the verso of the source drawing: "false memory syndrom— / memories of parents as molestors / Hysteria / skitzophrenia / paranoia / to punish / henry / Lowenfeld / Yulla + Jack Lipschitz founda / tion" (sic) across sheet, pencil, artist's hand.
Curatorial Remarks:
Henry Lowenfeld was the psychoanalyst Bourgeois worked with intensively in the period of the 1950's into the 1960's, as well as intermittenly until Lowenfeld died in 1985. The inscription that follows refers to the artist Jacques Lipchitz and his organization, the Jacques and Yulla Lipchitz Foundation.
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