Years of Untying Knots Gee Vaucher and Collaging the Politics of the Family between Ernst and Laing

This article explores the work of Gee Vaucher. Vaucher is best known for her work with the band Crass but has an extensive range of work from the 1960s until the present. The article delves into Vaucher’s relationship with surrealism, through her project A Week of Knots (2013–2022). In this project, Vaucher uses the psychoanalytic insights of R.D. Laing to rewrite Max Ernst’s collage novel, Une semaine de bonté. Doing so provides a space for Vaucher to explore the nature of violence, power, and care, among many other aspects. What can we learn from Vaucher’s collaging practice that com- bines influences from Ernst and Laing? And what can this way of using that backdrop as a kind of collective psychoanalytic tool tell us about the family’s changing nature?