Sleepers

Saturday 3 March - Saturday 15 April 2007

Ruth Jones


Filming for the ‘sleepers’ project took place on 8th April in Tycanol wood, near Newport. Around seventy people responded to my invitation to become a ‘communal dreamer’ and take part in the production of a short film. Luckily the weather was good, and everyone gathered at Brynberian Hall, and from there we walked down to the woods, where people chose a place to settle down. The sun shone through the trees and while the sleepers dozed, they were filmed and photographed and afterwards we returned to the village hall for refreshments, music and dancing.

For some time my work has explored ‘liminal’ or in-between states of being or consciousness that are potentially transformative; sleeping and dreaming are prime examples of this. Most people are aware of the ‘Sleeping Beauty’ and ‘Snow White’ stories, in which a sleeping woman is awakened by her handsome prince. These stories are Mediaeval romances focusing on the theme of ideal love, but their origins are in earlier folklore where the sleeper, who can be male or female, is a being who embodies the land and acts as its protector or guardian. The wood at Tycanol is a very unique place, an ancient forest several thousand years old, and anyone who has been there will probably agree that it has a magical quality to it. To become a sleeper in the wood is to not only connect to the world of dreams and transformations, but also to acknowledge our own responsibility to protect the land from environmental damage.

The film ‘sleepers’ will be shown together with some of the still photographs taken by Philip Clarke as part of Ruth’s solo exhibition at Oriel Mwldan in March 2007


(Photograph by Philip Clarke)

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Oriel Mwldan Patron Mary Lloyd Jones