Waking (video art project)

I am a painting student from the Limerick School of Art and Design, Ireland. This is a piece I made for my video art class. I have also included the artist's statement I handed up with it:

This is a Gothic horror video art piece. It is based on a sleeping disorder called Aware Sleep Paralysis or waking dreams. Aware Sleep Paralysis occurs when R.E.M overlaps with waking/falling asleep. R.E.M is the time during which dreams occur. Thus the body is paralysed in order to prevent one from acting out their dreams and causing harm to themselves. During a state of ASP the body is paralysed while the mind is conscious; mobility is confined to the eyes. The subject feels that they are awake but are lying paralysed in their bed and can see their surroundings with clarity. However, images and figures from dreams may be carried over into the waking period in the form of visual and auditory hallucinations. If one could manage to move some part of the body a message would be sent to the brain informing it that they are awake and thus the paralysis would be broken; there is a constant struggle to wake oneself. Among the sensations is difficulty breathing or a feeling of pressure on the chest. I wanted to capture the sense of terror one feels during this experience.

I decided to only show the eye in the film because that is the only part of the body that can move. Only one eye is shown as opposed to both because I thought it looked more unusual and quirky. This also made the scene more intense and showed the details of the eye. The eye is shown along with the auditory hallucinations one might experience during a waking dream. The video however excludes the visual hallucinations. I feel that revealing just the eye creates some powerful imagery in itself and not showing the hallucinations appeals more to the imagination of the viewer who can only imagine what sort of presence lurks before the subject's eye.

Waking dreams relate to the theme of space and experience within the realm of the Gothic. Our bed and our home is where we usually feel most comfortable and safe but due to ASP it can become a space filled with anguish, like a real life horror movie. ASP is a liminal experience; it is an intermediary between two states of consciousness that one may not have known existed. Just as ghosts and spirits are trapped in a state between death and life one is trapped within the dark threshold between dreams and reality where the two become intermingled.

Towards the end of the film the scene becomes psychedelic and the sound is very high pitched and unpleasant. The visual is a symbol or an indication to the viewer that the subject is hallucinating. The sound represents the the strain felt in the chest by the subject. Much of the visual is also unpleasant to look at; with the veins in the eyes, the spidery eye lashes and the pulsating pupil. The pulsating pupil also gives a sense of fear and pain and may remind the viewer of a heart beat.

The camera remains static throughout the film, giving a sense of the subject's state of paralysis. Keeping the head still and the eyes from blinking for the duration of the film was challenging. It was quiet strenuous on the eye especially given the spot light placed upon it. This contributed to the quality of the end product because waking dreams are a painful experience both psychologically and physically.

Видео Waking (video art project) канала Maeve Humphreys