Cognitive Garbage
fine art photography, book design — 2018 to 2019
For all of my life I have had compulsive and obsessive tendencies that I believe stem from my anxiety, impacting the way I think, believe, and live. I am constantly trying to organize the things around me and plan out every minute of my day. This feeling of control is what tirelessly urges me to manage everything in my life in order to set myself up for success. Does this make me a “perfectionist” or does it have a real psychological impact on my brain? Sleeping has been a way of processing these feelings, when my mind spirals out of control and delves into all different types of chaos.
My dreams normally incorporate relevant people and places that I experience often, mimicking most real life situations, but there’s always one element that is just not right. I dream of my closest friends and family, often in areas of isolation. I dream of attempting and failing to complete tasks that will result in tremendous setbacks. I dream of comfortable places with people that are unfamiliar to me.
I dream of a classroom, or place of work with elements that simply don’t belong. They ease back and forth from dreams to night-mares and I am often trying to discover what they mean within the existence of my waking reality. They may have no significant meaning at all, but are my unsettling thoughts that make my imagination run in all different directions. Although no matter what the scenario, my dreams tend to have one similar theme: they all blur the lines of whimsical free association, unnerving nightmares, and unvarnished reality.
Waking up with extreme feelings of anxiety make me question the validity of what I believed I have just experienced. Sometimes, I even “wake up” in my dreams and tell someone about them, just to be more puzzled as I actually wake. As I record as much detail as I can recall about my dreams every morning, I have continued to analyze the things that may really be resting in my subconscious. My photos are a tangible way for me to express and question these anxieties as well as recreate my own version of the different alternate realities within my cognitive psyche.
Instructor: Victoria Crayhon
My final photography project was a creative exploration of my unconscious mind. I kept record of
my dreams. I made lists of the recognizable people, places, and objects, and reflected on the way I process my everyday anxieties through them. I photographed throughout the duration of my senior year, printing and participating in weekly critiques, and learning how to curate my own collection.
my dreams. I made lists of the recognizable people, places, and objects, and reflected on the way I process my everyday anxieties through them. I photographed throughout the duration of my senior year, printing and participating in weekly critiques, and learning how to curate my own collection.
I learned a lot through these processes and was more than eager to design my artists book displaying the final selection. The inclusion of typography allowed me to have much more creativity conveying my ideas visually.
