Dreamtime, 1988
with Alaine Ball, excerpt 01:39; original running time 06:24
While asleep and dreaming, older children and adults alike tend to perceive dream events as external reality, but very young children do not understand "asleep" and "conscious" to be different domains. Perhaps they are not. Dreamtime is, quite literally, dream inspired video. A sleeping five year old girl (Alaine Ball) recounts dreams recorded over a three month period in a voice-over sound track. She experiences what is referred to as a "lucid" dream, which is characterized by the dreamer knowing that he or she is dreaming while experiencing the dream:
I was trying to get back to life, but I just couldn't... and I was trying to make all the fake people in my dream fake, but it didn't work... (i.e., reminding herself in her dream that the people were a product of her imagination) ...trying to get back to life, but I just couldn't.
Dreaming and dreams seem to follow no prescribed delineation of time, place, or narrative. The apparent passage of time in dreams suggests structures inherent to film and video. In Dreamtime the video becomes the intermediary between the spiritual and material worlds, as the lively narrative of the dreams as described by Alaine contrasts with quiet images of her sleeping, and suggests these dualities of consciousness and sleep. Recreating the images from Alaine's dreams is left to the imagination of the viewer and becomes an internalized, unique experience for the viewer, as dreaming is an internalized reality that can only be experienced by the dreamer.
"A beautiful and moving video, Dreamtime dispenses with the pretenses which drive commercial television. It succeeds as art because it is sensitive to the act it is portraying."
- Jim Edwards, Curator of Exhibitions, Salt Lake Art Center
with Alaine Ball, excerpt 01:39; original running time 06:24
While asleep and dreaming, older children and adults alike tend to perceive dream events as external reality, but very young children do not understand "asleep" and "conscious" to be different domains. Perhaps they are not. Dreamtime is, quite literally, dream inspired video. A sleeping five year old girl (Alaine Ball) recounts dreams recorded over a three month period in a voice-over sound track. She experiences what is referred to as a "lucid" dream, which is characterized by the dreamer knowing that he or she is dreaming while experiencing the dream:
I was trying to get back to life, but I just couldn't... and I was trying to make all the fake people in my dream fake, but it didn't work... (i.e., reminding herself in her dream that the people were a product of her imagination) ...trying to get back to life, but I just couldn't.
Dreaming and dreams seem to follow no prescribed delineation of time, place, or narrative. The apparent passage of time in dreams suggests structures inherent to film and video. In Dreamtime the video becomes the intermediary between the spiritual and material worlds, as the lively narrative of the dreams as described by Alaine contrasts with quiet images of her sleeping, and suggests these dualities of consciousness and sleep. Recreating the images from Alaine's dreams is left to the imagination of the viewer and becomes an internalized, unique experience for the viewer, as dreaming is an internalized reality that can only be experienced by the dreamer.
"A beautiful and moving video, Dreamtime dispenses with the pretenses which drive commercial television. It succeeds as art because it is sensitive to the act it is portraying."
- Jim Edwards, Curator of Exhibitions, Salt Lake Art Center
Exhibitions/Awards/Press
Exhibited at the Museum of Modern Art (MoMA, New York City), group show "Dream", 1989.
Broadcast on Houston and Dallas, Texas, Public Broadcasting (PBS).
Included in the 1989 Dallas Video Festival.
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