Lucid Dreaming
Lucid Dreaming is an art installation that explores the illusory expectations people have of the leaders of our country, Bulgaria, as well as human greed, money, power, and social commitment. It is a call to desire receiving only after you have first given something yourself. It all started as a socially engaged art project made for working with children. The art work examines a person while dreaming. A lucid dream is a dream during which the dreamers are aware of dreaming. This awareness allows them to control narrative and environment. However, a dreamer is just an observer in non-existed world – he is only a bystander in reality. The main elements of the art installation are cotton candies, mesh bags and human figures.
The cotton candles:
The sugar craving is a side of human nature and I use the cotton candy as a metaphor for greediness. Cotton candy consists mainly of sugar and ‘dissolves’ in the mass of accumulated water, losing its texture in the process. That big mass of fluff and air disappears in a few seconds.
The net bags:
I rarely remember these bags from the time I was a kid. People could never put something little in it because is going to fall down through the net but at the same time in the stores there was nothing you can buy (socialism in Bulgaria till 1989). The net allows everyone to see what is in the bag. At the center of the space are situated human figures that are carrying the huge net bags and are fully bent over the load.
The questions the work aims to ask are what am I doing to improve reality. Am I socially engaged? Do I help others? Every little action has value. So take action and stop dreaming and waiting for somebody else to do something for you.