Staging Thinking - Notes After Dream City

7/30/2019 Staging Thinking - Notes After Dream City

1/12

Staging Thinking.

Notes on materials and process after

Dream City @ Clonmel Junction 2011


2/12

Dream City can be hough of as a sage se on

which he citzens of Clonmel Juncton were

invied o perform heir dreams. Dreams as a

maerial are available o everyone. They

constue a kind of creatve crude oil ha

comes from he same well as artstc and

creatve hinking. Dream City offered ademocratc, non-hierarchical social seng

where people were encouraged o

join heir dreams.

What is Social Dreaming?

Social dreaming seeks to explore what

the dream may be communicating about

the social and political context of

the dreamer. There is a sharing of

dreams, and then meaning is expanded

and developed through association,

amplification, and systemic thinking

in an attempt to give voice to the

echoes of thought that exist in the

space between individual minds and

the shared environment (1).


3/12

The basic actviy of drawing offered a mode

of personal engagemen wih ones own

dreams. I was no abou personal abiliy o

draw, bu a willingness o work wih he

maerial of he privae personal universe, where

dreams, daydreams and inuiton flow, where a

creatve machinery operaes ha each individ-ual uses wheher hey realise i or no

o make sense of heir experience

and perceptons.

Working hypotheses:

Dreaming is one way of doing

thinking.

A group of people gathered together

for a purpose constitute a system, or

mind, hivemind. We work in

organization as social systems,representing the whole community

including its past, present

and potential.


4/12

The walls of he se were consruced of large(8x4) blackboards. In all, nearly 70 of wall

8 high was available o he public for drawing.

This generosiy of work surface encouraged a

free flowing, physically embodied syle of mark-

making, and conribued o an experience of

immersion in a black, bu no dark, space. The

blackboards emulaed he dark space of he

personal inerior where dreams are experienced

he darkened room, nigh tme, he inside ofones eyelids. The chalk was of a kind sourced

specifically for is lovely abiliy o make dus,

and o neiher fragmen nor make ha familiar

jarring scraping noise on he board.

There is a social purpose for dreams

as well as a personal significance

for the dreamer.

The social system can put dreams to

work by offering the dreams to social

dreaming matrix, using free

association to make connections and

find links between the dreams.

Thefocus is on the dreamand not the dreamer.


5/12

Wha became apparen as we worked on se

was ha mos peoples experiences of

blackboards originae from a school seng. In

Dream City a whole new se of associatons was

being creaed. Partcipans were encouraged o

ake heir place a he board no odemonsrae a problem in mahs or oherwise,

bu o give o heir own dreams and

inuitons as auhoriy, as knowledge.

Thematrix(from Latin for uterus)

is a container from which something

grows. A receptive container where it

is safe to disclose private

experience, and that disclosure is

sacred and has authority.

Social dreaming is a way ofcultivating an ecology of mind, an

awareness of this ecology and modes

of interacting with it.


6/12

A freedom of expression was encouraged ha

did no pre-judge he resul of he markmaking.

The Dream Team, drawn from Trainees and

Voluneers, modelled a way of being a he

boards, and were asked o expand heir modesof expression, loosen heir hinking, overcome

anxietes abou alen or abiliy and model how

he space could be used. In his hey excelled.

Why social dreaming?

our social organism exists like aliving being

That alone would be ecology if we

could grasp this ecological question

at its root

Ecology goes further, reaches

further, and relates to the social

organisms capacity for life(2)

Social dreaming is a means by which

this social organism can be sensed.

It is a means of collectivelydiscovering new organs of perception

that Joseph Beuys believed was

necessary to become beings capable of

carrying evolution forward


7/12

To access hese walls, one was encouraged o

ake off ones shoes and walk ino he space,

which was covered by 4-6inches of pea moss.This maerial, dry and warm o he ouch,

offered a pleasan experience o he fee. The

vegeable maer, broken down over housands

of years in an Irish bog, offered sculpural

analogies for he projec: jus like pea moss,

dreams offers a marix o grow hings in. Jus

like dreams, pea moss can provide boh

warmh and ligh. This warming heme was

reinforced hrough he choice of refreshmenserved, a pink ea drawing on herbs, flowers

including roses, summer fruis and sugar. Music

was carefully chosen and programmed o rise

up beween long passages of silence or low

humming. The humming was creaed by he

Dream Team wih he echnical assisance of

SoundLab Cafe. This use of sound and music as

a raw maerial o sculp and breahe wih long

passages of quie or concenraed actviy in he

caf aced as anoher poetc analogue of he

sculpural processes being referenced

hroughou he work.

Through dream, we are working with a

primal creative force within us. A s

we express our creativity in Social

Dreaming Matrix, we are also

rehearsing new ways to relate to

ourselves, each other and theprocesses we work with, in the grace

made possible by a form of social

sculpture, as a state of dance:

A supreme ethical rule [is] to elicit

the best in oneself and others by

drawing out the unique difference

that constitutes each self

Characteristic of the ethical

attitude is the painting, and

constant retouching, of idealportraits of our fellow humans and

ourselves and acting toward them, and

ourselves, in accordance with those

portraits.(3)


8/12

I described Dream City o visiors as an artss

dream made real; he building we sood in was

an idea made solid; Clonmel iself embodies

dreams accumulaed over hundreds of years, as

people had ideas and made hem real in he

form of buildings, businesses, homes & families.

The emphasis on dreams as a form of hinking,and hinking as he beginning of a process of

making, was made relevan

hroughou he life of he projec.

Social Dreaming is democratic and

safe, receptive and productive.

It allows for amultiverse of mean

ings. It is possible to produce

truth, in multiple forms, without the

need for a master. It is a choreog

raphy for participatory democracythat does not require consensus or

agreement. A suspension of already

available answers makes a space for

new thinking possible.


9/12

As he work progressed during Juncton Festval,

he conen gahered on he boards evolved;

from obvious graffit, ags and rude picures on

day one, hrough simple descriptons of dreams

on day wo, clear hemes emerged: dogs and

self-porrais on he firs couple of days; dreamsabou money, winning he loo, pos of gold on

days 4 and 5; he nex day he walls filled wih

spirals, as boughs of a ree, unnels, and motfs;

following his he dreams spread hemselves

ou across multple boards, finding freedom o

express hemselves in an expansive and

connectve way - wind and rivers flowed across

he walls; we inroduced colour chalk on he

las few days, which I would do from he sar ifI were o do he projec over, and his involved

partcipans in much more elaborae and

deailed drawings.

The action of Social Dreaming is one

of communal meaning making.

The artist, the poet must in some

sense set the world free to have a

new go at its business

If our given experience is a

labyrinth, then its impassability iscountered by the poets imagining

some equivalent of the labyrinth and

bringing himself and the reader

through it.(4)


10/12

Dream City essentally embodied an implici

Social Dreaming Marix. Whereas in SDM,

partcipans ell heir dreams and freelyassociae beween hose dreams over he

course of 40-90mins, in his case each day

constued a kind of marix, where dreams

were old ono he boards, and grew heir own

associatons over he course of he day. Each

person who enered he space and engaged

percepually wih he blackboards devised heir

own narratve of associaton beween he

dreams. This dance of he eye across he boardbrings o he fore qualites of lighness,

flexibiliy, flow, sponaneiy and free associaton

in he experience of a visior o Dream City.

Social dreaming matrix can be under

stood to be a collectively imagined

equivalent of the labyrinth of our

experience or present situation,

through which we bring ourselves to

an expanded common sense.


11/12

Notes towards improvements:

The Clonmel Juncton Cafe Care Blanche

initatve presens a highly evolved and complex

brief o he artss: hey mus manage a eam of

(predominanly young) people; hey mus deliver

a learning experience o ha eam; hey mus

creae an amosphere ha marries he casual

informal naure of a cafe wih an experience of

heir own artstc processes and concerns,

wihou compromising heir own work or over-

whelming he uninitaed public, wihin a very

compressed tme-frame; and his whole work isconexualised by roublesome notons of

partcipaton and a consan pressure o mee

gree and engage wih he public.

The skillse required o deliver a coheren

experience for boh public and rainee, wihin

he conex of disclosing ones own work, is very

challenging and poentally hugely rewarding,

and offers a new directon o festvals or

instutons looking o find a more meaningfulway o address heir need o develop audiences

and deepen/broaden he impac of heir

programmes on a smaller budge.

References

1 Helen Morgan,

The Social Dreaming Matrix

2 Joseph Beuys, What is Art?

3A Concept Map for Ethical Culture:

Towards Philosophical Consensus.

A statement of the National Leaders

Council of the A merican Ethical Union

4 Seamus Heaney, The Redress of Poetry


12/12

Wha I found partcularly challenging was

resolving he very concenraed amosphere

necessary wihin he blackboard walls wih he

imporance of a casual, chay and dispersive

fron of house vibe. Because he actviy a he

boards hemselves was essentally a kind ofprivae work, he cafe revolved around

mainaining ha concenraed inen, which

clashed wih he needs of boh rainees and

public o debrief, space ou, ease in or jus hang

ou. I suspec hese issues can be resolved by

separatng he wo functons, making he

blackboard space more enclosed and distnc

from he cafe space.

Similarly, he nes initatve, whereby singleperson sleeping/restng ness were creaed in

he back of he premises, failed o really cach

hold. While many people waned o see hese

lile nooks, and were impressed by how hey

were pu ogeher, heir functon was no

clearly elaboraed in he saging of he cafe. I

would propose placing a nes inside he

blackboard space, reinforcing he idea ha

sleeping/restng/dreaming in he nes isanoher way of doing he work ofDream City.

jeffrey gormly: [email protected]

For further reading see

http://choreograph.net/raw/whatwhyis

socialdreamingmatrix

Staging Thinking - Notes After Dream City

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