Childhood was a big thing for Sigmund Freud – dubbed the father of psychoanalysis, the pioneering Austrian often attributed the neuroses of patients to events which happened during their formative years. He had plenty of fond childhood memories himself, so it’s not as odd as it first sounds that Freud enjoyed a trip to the Blackpool amusements in 1908, and followed it up with a visit to New York’s Coney Island a year later, giving rise to the tale of the Coney Island Psychoanalytic Society, whose existence many consider an urban myth.

Zoe Beloff’s DREAMLAND: The Coney Island Amateur Psychoanalytic Society and the Blackpool Chapter exhibition first appeared at the Coney Island Museum in 2009 and has been on tour ever since. It is currently, and rather fittingly, at Blackpool’s Grundy Art Gallery, with previously unseen artefacts relating to Freud’s visit to the resort, and the interesting mix of science and seaside sauce and will be available for analysis until 2 November.

Zoe Beloff: DREAMLAND
sketchbook
Courtesy the artist

Zoe Beloff: DREAMLAND
Coney Island Society 1949
photograph
Courtesy the artist

Zoe Beloff: DREAMLAND
sketchbook
Courtesy the artist

Blackpool Postcards
(from artist’s collection)

Zoe Beloff: DREAMLAND
Installation view, Coney Island Museum
Courtesy the artist.
Photo, Brad Paris

Blackpool Postcards
(from artist’s collection)