The Dream

The Dream - Agora Digital Art - VR Exhibition

On view: 22 Jan – Jun 2023

The unconscious, the illogical, the irrational – what is it about dreams and their uncanny nature that drives us towards conjuring fantastical explanations and mystical reports on their meanings? The depths of the internet have become a repository for dreams, hopes, irrational thoughts and vents – but are we asleep or awake? Sleepwalking or stationary? Is this a dream or a nightmare?

Concept: Gabriella Gasparini

Selection and Curation: Dr Işıl Ezgi Çelik

Curator’s words

Dr Işıl Ezgi Çelik | 1 November 2022

Dreams don’t exist. Still, it’s all a dream. We’re all sleepless, all hyper-woke and dreaming. When does a dream start, and where does it end? Aren’t dreams real, or, is waking life made of dreams? Am I awake? Am I dreaming? Whose dream am I in? You know, we could have closed the door and slept like the others, despite the cities engulfed by the fires. At dawn, we could have watched the dream drape the mind like a fog, descending on mutants frozen by the smoke. In the end, aren’t the dreams to forget what we can’t remember and to remember what we can’t forget? This is the Möbius loop, the unfathomable sleep closing in on waking life. I am asleep, awake; I am in a dream. The vision of a new world ruled by technocrats crippled the consciousness of the old one through two devastating wars. Surrealists retreated into the dreams to gaze at and praise them for the knowledge hidden in their maze. Dreams are deceptive and illusory. They are the sleeping vision and soliloquies of the mind. Dreams are desires, they are to desire for all. Dreams are deceptions that come true. The poet had warned: “Life is not a dream. Beware! Beware! Beware!” Nobody is asleep; yet one and all are captured by a dream. The philosopher had warned: “Beware of the dreams of others, for if you are caught in their dreams, you are doomed.”

The sleepless cyberspace is oneiric; the dream of technocrats unfolds in speed. An old dream comes true, and a world once again comes to an end. The collision of technology with life renders the once deceptive dream more real than the real. We are all haunted by a dream and are all in it. But, what do we dream of herein? The Dream exhibition brings together twelve global non-binary and women artists to share their versions of dreams and dreaming within dreamy cyberspace.

The 12 international New Media artists Agora Digital Art has brought together under this unreal dome are:

Artists Dongni Liang aka. Post.liang & M T HALL(sound)  Hybrid Ecologies: Between Sky and Soil (2021)  @Post.Liang

Artist Erin Collins  Poule à l’Ivoire (2021)  @ErineaCollins

Artist Daniela Lucato  Smoke (2021)  @DanielaLucato

Artists Olga Klimovitskaya  All of Us (2021)  @OlgaKlimovitskaya

Artist Jennie Feyen  Humanoid (2021)  @Fey.Films

Artist Johanna Rummel  Flow (2022)  @johannarummel_

Artist Joa Heikkinen  Cuckoo’s Play (2022)  @Joa.Hei

Artist Blobb TV   Aralia pt.2 (2022)  @Blobb.TV

Artist Jekein Lato Unah  Apparition (2022)  @Jekein

Artist Martina Morger  Lèche Vitrines (2020)  @MartinaMorger

Artist Cara Macwilliam  The Deities of May (2022)  @CaraMcWilliam_art

Guest Artwork: Danielle Lebbos  Phy.gital (2022)  @Danielle_Lebbos  or @idesign.dl

Guest Dreamer: Kaori Endo  Dream Teller (2021) physical installation  @_kaori_endo_

Opening show: 22 Jan 2023 at 6 pm (GMT)

Our VR exhibition launched with an Opening Talk with prestigious guests:

  • Sharon Sliwinski, Assoc. Prof. University of Western Ontario, and Founder of the Museum of Dreams
  • Marek Wojtaszek, Asst. Prof. University of Lodz
  • Duane Rousselle, Asst. Prof. IITG Founder of Anarchist Development in Cultural Studies
  • Vesna Petresin, Transdisciplinary artist who will discuss the work:  The Dreams Our Things Are Made On

VR Exhibition

For the launch of The Dream VR exhibition, we had the chance to have a private tour, which was led by our Digital Curator, Dr. Işıl Ezgi Çelik. In this clip, the artist Cara Macwilliam  The Deities of May (2022)  @CaraMcWilliam_art

Thank you to Ozan Erel, our CloudFairy.

* How to navigate in Hubs Mozilla

* How to create your avatar with Ready Player Me (half-body only) and link it to Hubs.

Physical Exhibition Partners

The Dream is also part of the NFT Biennial that is displayed phygitally at BXL ART NFT Gallery in Gare Maritime – Tour & Taxis 

16 – 23 February 2023 from 11:00 to 19:00

CapitArt
BXLARTNFT_Gallery is the partner of Agora Digital Art for the Dream Exhibition
NFT Biennial

Maybe of interest

WOMEN IN DIGITAL ART: AES+F - AGORA DIGITAL ART
WOMEN IN DIGITAL ART: Penny Slinger - AGORA DIGITAL ART

Toyen: The Baroness of Surrealism – 55 min. © Courtesy Arte TV  24/03/2022 to 25/04/2022

Luis Buñel, Un Chien Andalou (1929 – remastered 2021) video 4k 21:25 min. @ Courtesy of Solo Han

Women Surrealists list. And, maybe Frida Kahlo, even if she did not consider herself a surrealist artist.

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