Analytic Group-Vision (AGV): A matrix-based model of psychoanalytic group supervision

This article introduces Analytic Group-Vision (AGV) as an emerging model of psychoanalytic group supervision. AGV is formulated in dialogue with the traditions of psychoanalytic supervision, Foulkesian group analysis, Balint groups, and Bion’s thinking on groups, containment, and the basic assumptions. Its aim, however, is neither the treatment of group members nor merely an educational discussion of a case, but the use of the group matrix as a third position and a group supervisor. In AGV, the reported therapeutic relationship is re-enacted within the group field, and the group, through distributed reactions, silences, jokes, tensions, associations, transferences, and counter-transferences, brings into view dimensions of that relationship that are not readily accessible to the presenting therapist alone. The article first clarifies the theoretical location of AGV in relation to adjacent traditions, then outlines the model’s working structure, including: the matrix barometer, case presentation, clarification, discussion, work with parallel process, and the presenter’s conclusion. A two-session clinical vignette is then used to show how themes active in the treatment relationship may be represented and thought about at the level of the group matrix. The article argues that AGV may move supervision beyond the transmission of knowledge or technical advice towards lived experience, group reflection, and transformation in the therapist’s position within the therapeutic relationship.