In 2002 I awoke from a dream feeling a profound inner peace. In fact I did not recognize myself for hours after the dream, until slowly the familiar emotional ebbs and tides crept back into my awareness, and I felt completely myself again.
I was changed nevertheless, and motivated to explore the deep space and freedom I felt from this dream. So I did explore it, in detail, through a body of drawings and paintings that I continue to work up until today.
This drawing here is one such piece and it is titled ‘Still Life,’ currently on exhibit at the Brand Library Art Galley in Glendale until the end of October 2015.
Now for the dream, which is a living memory that stays inside me. Every time I revisit it, or relay the dream to someone, it activates the inner peace I experienced when I first had it…
Such stillness! and vast dark space around me. I was suspended from a single silk thread that was coming out from my body.
I was a spider, luminous and transparent and white. It was a moment in time, and I had no idea how long it lasted, because as that being I had no capacity to gauge time, nor care about it. It was magnificent..
..since then, the entry way to my home has a small painting, depiction of the spider, hanging on the wall to greet guests coming and going from my home, and it reminds me, of the dream… am I the human being who then dreamt of being a spider, or am I a spider now, dreaming that I am a human being…
Reminds me of a quote…
Once upon a time, I, Chuang Chou, dreamt I was a butterfly, fluttering hither and thither, a veritable butterfly, enjoying itself to the full of its bent, and not knowing it was Chuang Chou. Suddenly I awoke, and came to myself, the veritable Chuang Chou. Now I do not know whether it was then I dreamt I was a butterfly, or whether I am now a butterfly dreaming I am a man. Between me and the butterfly there must be a difference.
This is an instance of transformation!
Something nevertheless has changed inside of me, and I am forever grateful.