ABSTRACT
This question often comes up in new clients’ questions. It’s a recurring question, probably because there is no straight answer. There is no clear separation between the two approaches, but rather, a continuum which puts us more on one side, more on the other, depending on the frame of reference.
I am leading a three day seminar entitled “Gestalt and video.” This seminar is centered on an emotional approach to “AutoShape,” that is, that each person is invited to communicate directly with his own images on screen: to discover them, to experience them as multiple signs of his way of being in the world.
A ten-yard cable links the television and the camera, which allows a great deal of mobility. John is in the center of the group. For his first contact with Gestalt, he has chosen video because he can’t bear to feel observed: as a primary school teacher in a small village, he feels permanently under observation, almost persecuted by his students, the parents and the mayor.
On the morning of the second day, he asks to work. First I film some images of him with the group and invite his reactions, to share what he feels: he names his muscular tension, his tightened breathing and invites me to come closer. Prudently, because I don’t think I yet have his trust, Igo behind him to show him an unusual view: “That’s exactly how my students see me when I’m writing on the blackboard. That’s when they could be throwing paper darts at me!”
Gradually his feelings become stronger and some micro-signs (his jaw and his hands relax) indicate that we have gotten to know one another, and that I am now going to be able to come nearer to him without a feeling of intrusion. I stand in front of him and do a close-up shot of his face.
He watches himself with emotion, “My dear little John, you look so scared!” I turn the lights down and change the focus on the camera to make it less sharp: only his dark eyes now come out of the gray of the screen.
“But those are my mother’s eyes! They’re always there judging me…” I invite to talk to his mother, rather than talking about her: “Go away, I don’t want to see you any more. I don’t want to be judged.”
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