Published over a hundred years ago, Freud’s sexual theory is still being criticized, interpreted, defeated and refuted in gender studies. Needless to say, there are several key reasons for deconstructing these ideas, one of which stems specifically from the binarity of Freudian logic that resonates to this day in the way each of us articulates our inner world: “[The child] must indeed become a capable human being, endowed with an energetic sexual need, that will realize in his existence all that the drive impels the individual to do”[1]. Here Freud weaves the link between heteronormative sexual drives and efficient functioning, which will soon after be promoted with force by capitalist thought and marketing. Nevertheless, it is obvious that his idea of a normal and ordered sexual development is an intangible, even unattainable ideal. We have all lived with and/or in a particular family model that gave rise to a complex and unclassifiable childhood. This must not be subjected to a reduction manifested by distinct or vulgarizing stages that narrow our personalities as well as our destinies.

Visiting the Jardin Secret allows each person to rethink his or her childhood sexuality according to the Freudian model and thus to test its relevance or obsolescence. The etymology of the word Jardin refers to an enclosed space, while that of the word Secret refers to the action of setting apart. Indeed, this exhibition wishes to underline the too decisive separations sketched by Freud in his linear scheme of libidinal impulses. We can attest here to his fatalistic and generalizing way of assimilating, for example: toddlers underfed by their mother will become dependent adults and the overfed dominant.

In order to awaken the curiosity of the viewers to discover also stages of development that they “are not supposed” to experience, the exhibition will be installed as a labyrinth. This scenography aspires to offer a more global and entangled vision on the composition of our sexualities and our personalities.

Our psyche, contrary to the rigidity through which Freud articulates it, is constantly transforming and inventing themselves in the course of life. Even if a fixed definition of our character and of our sexual relationship to others works to the advantage of consumer society, these must be considered as versatile and undulating.

Each stage (Oral, Anal, Phallic, Latency, Genital) and fixation will be interpreted by the pieces on display here. According to Freud, the interpretation of dreams must make of each element a symbol representing a real event. Thus, what is dreamlike becomes factual, devoid of any mysterious dimension. Conversely, the reading grid proposed by Secret Garden does not wish to impose a univocal interpretation for each piece, far from it: each one has its place to represent itself, to act in its own name and aesthetic. The questioning of Freud’s deterministic scheme can be realized thanks to the agreement of the participating artists to associate, in a playful way, their pieces to specific stages.

- Noam Alon, 2021

[1]  FREUD, Sigmund. Trois Essais sur la Théorie Sexuelle, 1905-1924. Traduction par Gallimard, Folio Essais, 2001,  p. 166