ABSTRACT
The painting, called A Clinical Lesson at the Salpetriere, the work of Andre Brouillet, was displayed at the Salon of 1887. Sigmund Freud had bought a reproduction of it, in remembrance of the time he spent as Professor Charcot's student. Having obtained the title of Dozent in neuropathology, and thanks to the staunch support of his protector Brucke—support to which Fleischl testified—Freud was awarded a travel grant for a six-month stay abroad. Putting into practice the habits he had acquired in Vienna, Freud attempted to ground his observations by referring to some current theory. In the tribute Freud paid to Charcot at his funeral in 1893, he summed up what he retained from his teacher's masterful lectures, and what he would incorporate in his own work: Each of his lectures was a little work of art in construction and composition. Freud reflected on the power of words as an essential tool in psychical treatment.
