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Astri Brun died on the 15th of December 1992 at the age of 94. Her importance for psychoanalysis in Norway is inestimable. She did not project herself much professionally in speech or writing and yet the influence she exerted on the psychoanalytic community in Norway was considerable. For many years, she acted as training analyst and left her mark on a whole generation of psychoanalysts, modelling their identity as analysts in varying degreees. Yet no one could remain unaffected by her analytic style: she was incorruptibly consistent. She was an uncommonly sharp-sighted observer while being absolutely present. At times, her directness seemed to be at the expense of mildness and yet her clear and unsentimental style often had a liberating effect.
Astri Brun had an M.A. (magister) degree in psychology and she preferred to use the title magister. Perhaps this was a message to the world around her. Her field was Gestalt psychology: “The whole is more than the sum of the parts”. For Astri Brun this was not merely a sentence from the textbook. It was a profound objective for her work as an analyst and in her own quest for knowledge. She sought wholeness and she sought expansion of consciousness and in her opinion, psychoanalysis was not the sole method for achieving this goal. She also explored other gateways to heightened awareness and became deeply engaged in the world of music.
If we are to find one term which could characterise Astri, it would be being intensely alive. Right until the last day of her long life, she was totally present, alert, direct and curious.
One of the pioneers of psychoanalysis in Norway has left us. We who were her friends, successors and colleagues feel gratitude and deep respect. She was a sound psychoanalyst and an open human being.