A type of mental functioning (called “autistic space”) is described in terms of a temporary and partial deconstruction of our normally highly structured mental representations. Without implying any specific account of psychological development, or of specifically pathological organization, the theory of autistic space includes an account of a form of anxiety which is typically associated with the creation and maintenance of such conditions. Evidence from study of neonatal capacities for cross-modal perception, from the study of perceptual and thought disorders in schizophrenic patients, and from the phenomenology of creativity, are offered both to support, and partially to explicate, the theory. Some features of the psychoanalytic situation, such as the roles of empathy and reverie, are also related to autistic space. It is argued that inhibitions of creativity may arise from excessive “autistic” anxiety, as described in the theory. The solution to such inhibitions is not to remove the anxiety, but to strengthen the ego's capacities to contain it.