The article is an attempt to view the work of Joseph Beuys from the perspective of the phenomenon of memory. Tracing the dimension of memory in the actions of the German artist, the author refers to the modern paradigm of memory, created by Sigmund Freud. Memory treated as dynamic structure, embedded in the psyche, encompassing the process of memorizing, forgetting, repression of memories, coding, decoding etc. Another trail in the article is the concept of memory after Mircea Eliade, seen as the power of returning to the origins, placing the human experience in a world beyond history, as knowledge par excellence. The paper focuses on the mutual relations between the biographic and collective memory, between memory, symbol and myth, examines the 'Lebenslauf/Werklauf' of Joseph Beuys through Eliade's concept of Image. The author interprets the actions and the texts of Beuys seen as an attempt of the evaluation of myth. It is in the process of anamnesis triggered by the myth and symbol in the biography, in recollection which is simultaneously the 'recognition of the myth' that the author seeks for another way in interpreting the works of Joseph Beuys.
The author offers an analysis of selected aspects of the art of Joseph Beuys focusing on his treatment of memory. Memory, argues the author, can be conceived after Sigmund Freud as an active structure embedded in psyche, or after Mircea Eliade as a power to bring us back to our origins in order to give us a chance to achieve a mystic rebirth. In the case of Beuys, says the author, memory appears both as anamnesis that helps to retrieve a lost universe and as a process that permits to rework personal traumas and injuries caused by civilisation. In his biography and through his art Beuys proposes a model behaviour to prove that a creative and self-conscious existence can also be achieved in a struggle with uneasy past. He thereby fulfils the ideals of the Theory of Social Sculpture.
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