Hypnagogic

Nov 2015 - Edgar Modern,

"Hypnagogic" In These Colours We Dream

Hypnagogia, is a type of hallucinatory dream that can occur within the transitional state between wakefulness and sleep.

Goya, with his 'The Dream of Reason Produces Monsters' painting in 1799 and Henry Fuseli's 'The Nightmare' in 1781 are just two examples
of how painters over the years have tried to express the hypnagogic state.

From early childhood to present day I've always had Hypnagogic and prophetic dreams.
Abstract and fragmented shapes resembling people, animals, landscapes and sometimes even numbers seem to be projected in vivid flat colours, in front of my eyes.

Other dreams of dark creatures from other worlds, regularly sit on my bed at night, with their very real presence and smell paralysing me with fright.

These creatures from our dreams, probably gave rise to the medieval legend of the Succubus and Incubus.

'Hypnagogic and 'In these Colours we Dream', consists of two different bodies of work, representing the onset of wakefulness and the onset of sleep.

'Hypnagogic', began as an expression of the darker side of the conscious mind.
Succubus and Incubus mingle with voodoo figures, magic folklore, superstition and prophecy.

'In these Colours we Dream', started to take form as a reaction to the paintings from the Hypnagocic series.
Born from the notion, that vivid fragmented shapes are how we actually see our dreams whilst asleep,
which are then translated back to more familiar forms through the conscious mind, as we awake.

On this premise my work changed into large flat simple shapes of colour that could be likened to the back light of a computer screen.

This very 21st century form of 'new light' and colour seemed the perfect way to assemble my Hypnagogic vision.