Autumn is a time of year when nature is slowing down in preparation for winter. It is a time for rest and restoration, a time to rot and enrich. As the leaves stop work, chlorophyll which makes leaves appear green is no longer produced, thus revealing the underlying yellow and red pigments that are always present in the leaves. It is often when we stop to rest, and take a pause from work that we come upon solutions to problems we might be trying to solve, or arrive at a realisation that we would not have made through hours of focussed endeavour.
The modern world increasingly demands that we are always available, via technologies that are always switched on. We are held in continual states of alert, and rarely find opportunity to un-plug, to power-down, to switch-off, to sleep.
Sleep is a state of complete vulnerability, yet without sleep we are rendered powerless. Sleep is a journey which restores our bodies and enriches our minds. Sleep offers freedom from a conscious state, where we enter into another state, free from even the awareness of our own bodies. In sleep we dissolve into darkness, just as leaves decay into earth.
The modern world increasingly demands that we are always available, via technologies that are always switched on. We are held in continual states of alert, and rarely find opportunity to un-plug, to power-down, to switch-off, to sleep.
Sleep is a state of complete vulnerability, yet without sleep we are rendered powerless. Sleep is a journey which restores our bodies and enriches our minds. Sleep offers freedom from a conscious state, where we enter into another state, free from even the awareness of our own bodies. In sleep we dissolve into darkness, just as leaves decay into earth.
'sleep walks' was created during a two-month residency at Stiwdio Maelor in rural north Wales during the autumn of 2015.
