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A bird doesn't sing because it has an answer, it sings because it has a song.
For some time now, Peter Silen has moved quietly between two worlds, belonging exclusively to neither. On the surface he has been the picture of a conventional clinical psychologist, living in a brown-shingled bungalow in Berkeley on a street lined with other similar bungalows. The houses have much in common, and, though they differ in details like color or trim, their essential shapes deviate only within a modest range. Like most of us, he likes the feeling of fitting in. He has been careful not to stray too far outside of the lines in what he shows the world. But beneath the surface, hidden in the depths of his mind like a lottery ticket one fingers in one's dark pocket and fears inspecting in the light of day, he has had a secret life.
We are chatting in a café in Berkeley on a crisp autumn afternoon when Peter carefully places his fork down on the table. “The big news is that I am closing my practice and going off for two years to paint in France. “He gazes expectantly, studying my face for a reaction. This artful dream has waited patiently in the background, a lover whose existence is felt to threaten every established structure of his life, yet whose presence leaves a trace on all that shows. He is now ready to proclaim his love openly. It is not a choice undertaken lightly or without fear.
This theme of the surface and what lies beneath will come up as a recurring motif during our discussion of his paintings and painting in general over the course of three meetings. We explore at length how his two passions of psychology and painting intersect and diverge. What is articulated by the end of our meetings is how the secret life of the psyche, which lies at the root of the psychoanalytic project, also informs the act of creating art.