ABSTRACT
The introduction states three goals for this book. The first goal is to continue narrating the story of the New York Institute for Gestalt Therapy, which was established in 1952 by Fritz Perls, Laura Perls, and Paul Goodman. The beginnings of this avant-garde institute are well documented; so the aim of this book is to give an account of the later developments of the community when the younger generations of members took over. One of the key features of the community at this institute is that its functioning is based on gestalt therapy principles. The second stated goal is then to describe and analyze this interplay between community and theory. And the third goal is to reflect the functioning of the institute in the very form of the book: it is a dialogue between the personal and the theoretical. The key pillar upon which this book stands is on the interviews with current institute members and they are introduced hereafter.
