Dreams and Art

                                                             Art Card,  made of cut paper

I dreamed last night, a plethora of dreams.  I don't usually remember my dreams, but I remember the ones from last night.  There were several of them.  A warning dream, a joyful dream, a dream to try to make sense and understand.  Lots of dreams.

Often times my dreams take the form of a movie or TV show.  Sadly, when it is a TV show, it includes commercials and I can't fast forwrd them.

There are lots of theories about dreams.  Some folks think they are the brain's way of rearranging facts and ideas and taking out the garbage.  Others think that dreams are the subconscious, talking to us.  Some think that it is our higher selves, giving us hints and direction.   Some think they are messages from God or angels. Some think they are images of what was or will be or might be.  Some think they are true happenings, but perhaps in another dimension or understanding.  And sometimes, they may be messages from those who have gone on before.

I buy all of the explanations.  I think that sometimes it's cleaning out the trash and sometimes it's messages from loved ones.

And every once in a while, my dreams give me pictures to remember and to make into art.

I have several such dreams that I remember vividly, pictures that become themes that I do over and over again, in different media.  There is one involving purple leaves on a yellow background, another involving a dark place on a green lawn.  Sometimes they have private meanings for me, sometimes it is just the image itself that haunts me.

Below are a few examples of my work, done from dream images

cut paper

Wall hanging quilt

Needlepoint

Wall hanging Quilt

Watercolor

I do think that each of us has a powerful inner vocabulary that speaks to us but to no one else.  Artists are lucky, because this vocabulary does not use words and artists don't always need words.  There is a private place in each of us where we keep dreams and ideas and it is populated by our dreaming and waking experiences, by our hopes, by our longings, and yes, by our fears.  We would do well to be cognoscente of it.