art and dreams essay

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Dreams, Art, and the Unconscious: A Jungian Perspective

“Until you make the unconscious conscious, it will direct your life and you will call it fate.” – C.G. Jung

Carl Jung saw both dreams and art (including paintings and poetry) as expressions of the unconscious. Of dreams he wrote, “The dream is the small hidden door in the deepest most intimate sanctum of the soul, which opens to that primeval cosmic night that was soul long before there was conscious ego and will be soul far beyond what a conscious ego could ever reach.”

In art, as in dreaming, the unconscious is often activated. In Jung’s essay, “ On the Relation of Analytical Psychology to Poetry ,” he wrote of certain creative works in which “we are dealing with an event originating in the unconscious nature; with something that achieves its aim without the assistance of human consciousness, and often defies it by willfully insisting on its own form and effect.” Similar to dreams, this type of art contains “something supra-personal that transcends our understanding to the same degree that the author’s consciousness was in abeyance during the process of creation.” 1

A dream or a creative work may serve as “a spontaneous self-portrayal, in symbolic form, of the actual situation in the unconscious.” 2  How then can we use dreams and art to make the unconscious conscious?

Personal and collective unconscious

Jung was known for working with the dreams of his patients, but “he also encouraged his patients to paint and interpreted the paintings in certain of his articles.” 2 Jung himself made a practice of drawing mandalas , believing them to be archetypal forms representing the Self. He also created the images in The Red Book .

Finding psychological value in creativity, Jung “placed emphasis on both process and product.” 2 He believed that creating art helped mediate between the patient and their problem, allowing the person distance from their psychic condition. 2 Dreams and dream work can often provide a similar perspective, serving a compensatory function that helps integrate unconscious contents.

This mediation between the conscious and unconscious often occurs at the level of the personal unconscious, where both dream work and art work can assist individuals in working through their complexes . At this subjective level, one’s interpretation of a dream or creative work is often filtered through these “ core patterns of emotions, memories, perceptions, and wishes organized around a common theme.” Becoming aware of and addressing these patterns within the personal unconscious through interacting with a dream or creative work can lead one to greater wholeness.

However, working with dreams and art can reach a deeper level of the psyche. Jung “saw dreams as having the structure of a story or play.” He noted “many parallels between dreams and myths , and said they sometimes used the same symbols to express their themes.” This archetypal content that Jung noticed in dreams is often expressed in creative works as well. He wrote, “The creative process, so far as we are able to follow it at all, consists in the unconscious activation of an archetypal image, and in elaborating and shaping this image into the finished work. By giving it shape, the artist translates it into the language of the present, and so makes it possible for us to find our way back to the deepest springs of life.” 1 In accessing this archetypal content , whether through dream work or creative work, one may be able to align with a source of transpersonal understanding that exists outside of ego-consciousness.

A vast sea of meaning

The great Sufi poet Rumi wrote, “ Poetry is like the boat and its meaning is like the sea.” What Rumi seems to allude to is the idea that a creative work is a world unto itself, and hints at the notion of multiple levels of meaning. The same could be said of dreams.

The actual narrative structure of the dream or text of the poem is the boat , afloat on a vast sea of possible meanings. Such meanings could include one’s personal interpretation of the dream or creative work, a friend’s interpretation of it, and an objective, archetypal interpretation. Each level of meaning is present, available for discovery based on how one interacts with the world of the dream or the creative work. This one reason why there is value in discussing dreams and art with other people—multiple perspectives on the same textual content can shed light on the different levels of meaning, providing a larger, more colorful view of the world that exists within the dream or creative work.

Working with one’s own personal unconscious or the collective unconscious through interacting with dreams and art provides an opportunity for growth and learning by “making the unconscious conscious.” All levels of meaning, whether personal or archetypal are valuable and have a place within that vast ocean, which is as wide and deep as one’s curiosity and imagination allows.

~ Amanda Butler, M.S. Blog Manager and Newsletter Manager Jung Society of Utah

Works cited

• On the Relation of Analytical Psychology to Poetry . C.G. Jung.
• A Critical Dictionary of Jungian Analysis . Andrew Samuels, Bani Shorter, Fred Plaut.

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The art of dreams: creativity through the unconscious

Posted 07 May 2020, by Chloe Nahum

By the end of our lives, it is estimated that most of us will have spent 50,000 hours dreaming.

That is six years spent amongst the night-time phantasms which disturb, delight and perplex us. Formed in our minds and yet alien to them, the dream's enduring mysteries have long captivated artists and writers.

Sleeping Venus (La Vénus endormie) 1944

Paul Delvaux (1897–1994)

For some, as the apotheosis of the unbridled imagination, the dream represents art's origins. As French philosopher Michel Foucault expressed it, 'every act of imagination points implicitly to the dream… the dream is the first condition of its possibility.' No artists, perhaps, without dreamers.

Detail from the Garden of Earthly Delights (left panel)

1500–1505, oil on oak by Hieronymus Bosch (c.1450–1516)

The boundless capacity shared by the dream and the artistic imagination was vividly summoned in the chimeras of the Netherlandish painter Hieronymus Bosch (c.1450–1516), in which humans morph with magnified molluscs and galivant beneath palatial vegetable life, as seen in the late fifteenth-century triptych The Garden of Earthly Delights .

Though dream depiction was common during the Renaissance, Bosch's wild embrace of nocturnal irrationality was remarkable for its time. Portrayals of biblical or legendary dreams were instead the model, with God's dictum delivered to sleeping saints. Shown in repose beneath the subject of their slumbering mind, these sleepers would wake to new moral understanding.

The Nightmare

1781, oil on canvas by Henry Fuseli (1741–1825)

With time came the increasing secularisation of dreams, a shift seen in two of their best-known representations, made within 20 years of one another: Henry Fuseli' s The Nightmare (1781) which enraptured audiences at the 1782 Royal Academy Exhibition, and Goya 's print  The Sleep of Reason Produces Monsters (1799, from his series 'Los Caprichos').

The sleep of reason produces monsters (no. 43) from 'Los Caprichos'

1799, etching and aquatint on paper by Francisco de Goya (1746–1828)

Like their religious forebears, these sleepers are portrayed beneath their dreams. Yet these nightmares are neither prophetic nor divine, but instead insist upon their private and visionary nature.

This irrational subjectivity of dreaming was at the heart of eighteenth-century Romantic thought. Guests' dreams were the subject of conversation at the poet Samuel Taylor Coleridge's Thursday evening dinner parties, while the variety brought on through opium use was immortalised in works such as Coleridge's Kubla Khan (1816) and Thomas De Quincey's Confessions of an English Opium-Eater (1821).

The Ghost of a Flea c.1819–20

William Blake (1757–1827)

The work of another Romantic, William Blake (1757–1827), is permeated by dreams and visions. Yet they were not only the subject of his work, but also influenced its form, for it was in a dream that his brother, following his death, revealed the pioneering printing method for which Blake would become renowned. This experience is perhaps reflected in Blake's depictions of John Milton and John Bunyan receiving dreamt poetic inspiration, seen in his watercolour illustrations for the nineteenth-century edition of Bunyan's The Pilgrim's Progress .

Marley's Ghost, from Charles Dickens' 'A Christmas Carol'

1843, hand-coloured etching by John Leech (1817–1864)

As the Victorians tutted into view, such rhapsody over the dream was restrained. Explosions in psychological enquiry saw nightly sojourns into absurd and dangerously immoral terrain discounted as the inconsequential refuse of minds disordered by physiological imbalances, such as indigestion.

Enter the cheese dream, a slice of which we see in Charles Dickens' A Christmas Carol (1843), as Ebenezer Scrooge declares of Marley's ghost: 'You may be an undigested bit of beef, a blot of mustard, a crumb of cheese, a fragment of an underdone potato. There's more of gravy than of grave about you, whatever you are!'

Dickens's Dream 1875

Robert William Buss (1804–1875)

The consequences of heavy suppers found their greatest artistic expression in Dream of a Rarebit Fiend (1906). This early piece of cinema used the dream as the ideal device through which to exhibit the spectacular feats of the new medium, as the dreamer soars above the city after having gorged to excess on the titular dish.

Indeed, in its early days, cinema was frequently compared to the dream, with cinemas known as 'Dream Theatres', and Hollywood as the 'Dream Factory'.

Through the ages, dreams have acted as a mirror of their time's religion, rationality, or retreat into the absurd. Yet for over a century, Sigmund Freud's The Interpretation of Dreams (1900) has remained lodged in the western imagination, with art and literature following suit.

Sigmund Freud (1856–1939) 1938

Salvador Dalí (1904–1989)

The novelty of Freud's theory was his belief in an unconscious – a vast psychological realm housing primal drives and desires which escaped in disguised form during sleep as the dream. For Freud, the dream operated on two levels: that of the manifest content (its imagery), and the masked latent dream-thoughts. Through the free association of dream interpretation, psychoanalysis sought to decode the manifest content and discover the meanings lurking below.

Sergei Pankejeff 's boyhood dream of wolves seated in a tree led to Freud calling him 'Wolf Man' following an infamous interpretation of his dream as containing the repressed memory of his parents having sex. A painting of the dream by Pankejeff is housed in London's Freud Museum .

Wolves Sitting in a Tree* 1964

Sergei Pankejeff (1886–1979)

Freud's work was taken up most enthusiastically by the Surrealists, for whom dreaming represented total liberation from social, scientific and aesthetic strictures. Following the horror of the First World War, the dream was prized for its disruptive force as a challenge to the quotidian. In the 'First Surrealist Manifesto' (1924), the movement's founder André Breton (1896–1966) declared, 'I believe in the future resolution of these two states, dream and reality, which are seemingly so contradictory, into a kind of absolute reality, a surreality'. For the Surrealists, dream and reality existed on the same plane.

Men Shall Know Nothing of This (Les Hommes n'en sauront rien) 1923

Max Ernst (1891–1976)

Artists such as Leonora Carrington (1917–2011), Max Ernst (1891–1976), René Magritte (1898–1967) and, perhaps most famously, Salvador Dalí  (1904–1989) painted from within the dreamworld, revelling in its nonsensical, erotic and eerie resonances. They had, thought Freud, rather missed the point. A meeting between Freud and Dalí in 1938 left the former perplexed – though it also left us an exquisite portrait of the master by the acolyte.

Metamorphosis of Narcissus (Métamorphose de Narcisse) 1937

Freud was not, he felt, 'destined to understand' Surrealism. A letter sent to Breton stated the problem plainly: 'I ask you to note that the interpretation of what I call the manifest dream has no interest for me... I can hardly imagine what it would mean to anyone.' Quite the rebuke from one who felt himself unwillingly designated the group's 'patron saint'.

Undeterred, Dalí would go on to craft the dream in three dimensions in Alfred Hitchcock's Spellbound (1945), a thriller centring on the attempts of a psychoanalyst to unearth her amnesiac lover's repressed psycho-history. It is Dalí's dreamscape, featuring a masked face strikingly similar to Magritte's veiled faces in The Lovers (1928), which provides the clues she needs to solve the puzzle.

The Reckless Sleeper (Le Dormeur téméraire) 1928

René Magritte (1898–1967)

A century on, and painters continue to work in this tradition of the chance associations and curious imagery of the dream. The pregnant atmospheres of Gabriella Boyd 's paintings, in which humans and their traces hover in tension with illusory spaces, illustrated a 2015 Folio Society edition of The Interpretation of Dreams . Mary Stephenson 's canvases see figures emerging from dark voids engaged in delirious acrobatics, often contrasted with the stillness of sleeping figures from whose imaginations they seem to spring.

2020, oil on canvas by Mary Stephenson

It is often said that there is nothing duller than to be told someone else's dreams. Yet throughout history, artists have shown that to meet the dreamworld in artistic form is quite the reverse – a source of visual splendour, through which our waking world is seen anew.

Chloe Nahum, PhD candidate at the University of Oxford

Further reading

Sigmund Freud, translated by James Strachey, The Standard Edition of the Complete Psychological Works of Sigmund Freud, Volumes IV and V , Vintage Books, 2001

Helen Groth and Natalya Lusty, Dreams and Modernity,  Routledge, 2013

Laura Marcus, Dreams of Modernity: Psychoanalysis, Literature, Cinema,  Cambridge University Press, 2014

Anthony Stevens, Private Myths: Dreams and Dreaming,  Harvard University Press, 1995

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Alice Notley on Writing from Dreams

“we are constantly remaking the world from the inside out.”.

An excerpt from the following  first appeared in Lit Hub’s  The Craft of Writing newsletter— sign up here .

I’ve been using dream materials in my poems since I first began writing poetry in the late sixties. I’ve taken words, images, narratives, parts of narratives from my own dreams and repeated them, transformed them, commented on, and sung them. I did this instinctively in the beginning, without a theory and not particularly out of literary precedent, though there is plenty of that. Partly, it was clear to me that my dreaming self was better at some aspects of poetry writing than I, awake, was—my dreams would often surprise me when “I” couldn’t.

In the early nineties, after having worked for a couple of years on the writing of The Descent of Alette , which draws to a large extent on dreams and on poetic techniques related to dreaming, I wrote an essay called “What Can Be Learned from Dreams,” published in SCARLET in 1991. This essay posits “Dream” as a place or function in me I’m divided from, a place or function that knows things I don’t know awake, and is often the better, more imaginative maker.

The essay discusses, briefly, the plasticity and the symbolic multiplicity of dreams, and the relationship between dream and myth; and it reflects on the part a sensitivity to one’s dreams might play in making one’s way through the egoism and manipulation of oneself and others abounding in daily life (after all, you’re also the pathetic creature you are in your dreams.) At this point, I began to write down my dreams every morning—I had done this once before for a couple of months, but my practice had generally been to write down only what was truly striking or mysterious. In the writing of Alette, I allowed myself to use anything I remembered from a dream no matter how humble or o’-the-wall seeming, but I wasn’t recording my dreams on a daily basis, I was more remembering them each day.

Between sometime in the early nineties and now, 2008, I have written down all my dreams I can remember each morning. I haven’t tried to write well, only to get down what I retain; and I have omitted a few dreams on the grounds that they’re just too personal in a scatological or other way and I don’t want them read—I don’t know what’s going to happen to my dream notebooks when I die: they aren’t very interesting in themselves, but I might not get around to destroying them. I’m now rather fatigued with the recording of dreams and may give up the practice in this daily manner, though I doubt that I will ever stop using dreams as material. What I’d like to ascertain at this point is whether I’ve learned anything further from my dreams, whether I can articulate what I know beyond my previous essay.

First, I will state as a fact that dreams can be premonitory or telepathic: they can predict the future and receive information at a distance from the dreamer. They don’t do these things in a way that can be easily evaluated, and they don’t always do these things clearly, but they do do them. Many people recognize this truth but don’t know what to do about it; I scarcely know what to do about it, I usually incorporate dreams into my poems rather than speculate on how dreaming works.

If you’re interested in a more scientifically explanatory tractate involving the curvature of time, a multi-dimensional universe, and other such comforting terminology (now dated, of course), along with a study of precognitive dreams, I suggest you consult An Experiment with Time by J. W. Dunne (Faber and Faber Limited, 1927). I’m not interested in proving something, I’m interested in meditating on what I know; and I now feel confident enough to say that dreams are predictive and mind-sharing.

Thus, in my dreams, I’ve been forewarned that people will die, told that I am seriously ill, or that a friend is having heart surgery thousands of miles away (about which I know nothing in my waking life). I’ve dreamed that someone is discussing her uncle, while she is in fact doing this, many rooms and one floor away in a thick-walled house; dreamed that my husband’s letter of rejection for a Guggenheim is about to arrive in the mail (it did, the morning of the dream); dreamed that the antibiotics I’m taking aren’t working and the symptoms only appear to be under control (that was true too). These are randomly recalled examples. And I have anecdotal evidence of the same sorts of dreams from other people. This is one part of what dreams do: communicate literal information of a more or quite less pressing nature.

But just as interestingly, dreams make you be somewhere where you apparently aren’t, render you a character in a story that isn’t yours and that you believe, in fact destroy your identity except for the most central core of the “I,” since you are that self, the unnamed only I that remembers the dream. Daily detail melts, I remain. Dreams also meditate, they think while you’re asleep, they ruminate in story and symbol form and go pretty deep doing that.

They pun in the ways Freud said they do, and are parable-like in the way the Bible indicates: they can be “interpreted,” but that’s only one interpretation, isn’t it? And some things that appear not to be sexual may be sexual—but on the other hand, sex isn’t always sex, it’s rebirth, for example (see the ending of Norman Mailer’s Ancient Evenings —not a dream, but so dreamlike); and the dreams aren’t always about you the dreamer, as the ancients knew but Freud didn’t appear to.

Sometimes, one gets through a personal crisis by sleeping and dreaming a lot: dreams instruct and heal. I consciously use dreams that way. I also sometimes try to dream oracularly, asking myself, the dreamer, a question before I fall asleep, to see what answer I’ll receive in a dream.

So, when I decided to write this essay and began taking notes, I thought to try to dream about what dreams are. I wrote down in my dream notebook (on January 3rd, 2008): “TRY TO ASK DREAM ABOUT WHAT IT IS,” and then fell asleep and had a series of dreams. In the first dream, I was walking in Place des Vosges, in Paris, with Karen Weiser, who said, “I don’t have the cream.” In the second dream, I heard the singing of the word “Deposuit,” exactly as in a certain Bach choral piece—the Magnificat?—by a baritone voice, with much ornamentation. For the third dream, I will quote from my notebook: “With an Asian tribe—the Guarami—in mts. They want me to show them which rocks (?) are wedding rings; this one already is, I say. It’s a large curved rock with a finger attached. The tribesman takes it eagerly.” There was a subsequent dream that seems more personal and that I won’t recount except to say it contained the name “Healey”—the name of a friend, whose appearance always signifies healing.

Some quick interpreting. Place des Vosges contains old, arcaded buildings, I was walking in a secluded place with someone who was “wiser,” probably stood for Dream and nonetheless didn’t have the answer, but who managed to make a rhyme with the important, initiating word, “dream”: dream/cream. “Deposuit,” in Latin, is from “deponere,” to lay down, to put down, to deposit. From those two dreams, I get a sense that a word, or words, is, are, deposited and ornamented in a dream, as “deposuit” is so elaborated on in the singing of Bach’s work.

I woke up thinking that a dream is like an illuminated manuscript, in which words and letters are enlarged, made calligraphic, highlighted, painted, with stories and symbolic figures in the margins. I find the wedding ring dream harder to talk about. At some point, we became wedded to waking consciousness, perhaps; and our choice is embedded (see how I’ve rhymed, unconsciously, “wedded” and “embedded”) in rock and flesh, the whole finger. In waking consciousness, we get a real, motile body, a stable one; in dreams we get a mind, though we also get an unstable, but often realistic, body. In the dream notebook, that morning, I also wrote: “Is dream an archaic way of thinking? Is it a memory of a way of being before time was sorted out? Do I have this memory?” I think the answer is dream is an ongoing, major component of existence.

I grew up in the Mohave desert, in a town that overlaps with the Mohave Indian Reservation. The Mohaves, in a way that seems similar to the thinking of certain Australian Aborigines, believe that everything important was first dreamed in order to be. I am now going to quote from the preface and introduction to Tales from the Mohaves (University of Oklahoma Press, 1970), by Herman Grey, a Mohave from my native area:

The Mohave clings to his belief in dreams as a basis for everyday life. Not only all shamanistic power, but all myths, songs, bravery, fortune in battle, and good fortune in gambling derive from dreams. Every special event is dreamed. Knowledge is not a thing to be learned, a Mohave will say, but something to be acquired by each person through his dreaming.

All Shamans say that they received their power from Mastamho, when he was put here on this earth. So deep are these convictions that, when old age comes, a Mohave can seldom distinguish between the dreams he has been told by an uncle or brother and what he has himself experienced. The Mohave learns as much from other people as from his own experience. Conscious learning seems to him nearly impossible, and he is convinced he has dreamed for the first time, or has dreamed repetitiously, the things which all Mohaves know in common. . . .

A man may give his song or story to his son or to some other close relative when he feels himself near to death or concludes that the person in question wishes to learn the story or song. Only one man may sing or tell a sequence of songs and stories, and thus the myths are inherited within the family and clan. A storyteller begins from a timeless source, with the statement that the story came to him from his uncle or brother and now belongs to him.

Dreams, then, are the foundation of Mohave life. Dreams are always stated as if they had been cast in mythological molds. . . .

A dream might be an actual nocturnal one, or it might be a continued thought or a flash of insight which gave a further comprehension and contemplation of the man’s hopes and perceptions. Dreams might give foresight of some obstacle to the achievement of an end and might also reveal the means of overcoming the obstruction. Many times a dream foretold a coming event, such as the outcome of a raid or the fate of a warrior.

What strikes me here is first the intersection of all categories: shamanism, dream, myth, story, knowledge—these seem to coincide and then differentiate, but never become totally distinct from each other. Dreaming and waking obviously aren’t so different from each other either, in the Mohave world. One has a sense that time and consciousness are perceived as fluid, not compartmentalized into asleep/awake, past, present, and future. It’s not that one is always in now—the Now that can be so fashionable, philosophically, to talk about—but the past is an important concept too, and the past goes on in an important way, and the future is accessible.

Of course, I’m also interested in the sense that Dreams Know. I believe I’ve read elsewhere that when there’s an important invention (or when there was—I don’t know if Mohaves are as obsessed with dreams as they once were, as traditional), the invention must be incorporated into the tribe’s dreams. It has to have been known about from the beginning, so it must have been dreamed about before. Somehow, the innovation gets put into dream form and then one says, “Yes I always knew about that, or we did.” Of course, that’s what it feels like anyway: who can imagine life before cars? Was there always going to be a car? (See the cars shown in the TV cartoon The Flintstones —the previsionable automobile.)

I didn’t know these facts about the Mohaves while I was growing up alongside them. I’ve found these things out later, as I’ve developed my own thought and discovered that it resembles theirs. Isn’t that strange? The Mohave Desert is vast with space and one fills it with thoughts and dreams—or I did; I acquired certain habits of thought from growing up in this landscape. I came to wonder if so-called reality weren’t malleable, creatable, long before I knew about the philosophy of the Mohaves or of the Australian Aborigines, who also inhabit a desert.

It seems logical to me to quote a Mohave as an authority on dreams. Grey knows what it is to believe one’s dreams, to use them, and to have dream-like flashes of inspiration (as a poet does.) And reality must have seemed flexible when you lived in a desert and didn’t build things much: when you and those you were with were in a state of invention all the time. Imagine an early tribal existence in a desert. There’s just the few of you, and you can say what is, what made it, and what it means. You’re the poets of what you know. It’s when people erect a lot of buildings and crowd together in large numbers that everyone has to agree on a version of reality that grounds the buildings dryly and makes it possible for those from different backgrounds, or even cultures, to communicate blandly.

However, if you take certain drugs, you will notice that the texture of wood and brick is in motion—though the buildings don’t fall—that people’s faces melt, and that nothing is as secure as you thought it was. As when you dream, things fall apart, and the laws of science are violated. Occasionally, when you dream, an animal talks to you. Many Native American peoples posit an early time when humans and animals talked to each other and shared characteristics more blatantly, when time wasn’t as fixed as now, and you could make things happen by “magic.” (For a lovely, modern sci-fi take on this possibility, see Ursula K. Le Guin’s book, Buffalo Gals and Other Animal Presences .)

Furthermore, many people could tell you they have had dreams that have changed their lives. I have a long list of such dreams. They become mythic; they “happened” for real, to the extent that they have changed me. I count them as part of my knowledge and use them for guidance. Here is my retelling of an important dream, from the preface to my book, Reason and Other Women :

In 1997, after I had been informed that Allen Ginsberg had died, I became afraid for him in death. I wanted—because he was my friend—to be sure that in death he was safe. I dreamed that night that my stepdaughter Kate, who is deceased and in dreams is often my messenger from the world of the dead, came for me, in a rich dark blue skirt and sweater, to take me to the “second world.” I gathered that this second world was an afterlife with an active artistic component, for there was a professor there who was trying to achieve an intense enough red for the second world’s mosaics. Then, my name became Ellen Goodman (yes like the columnist), so I knew that I was Allen, the good man, and I waited in a small apartment to die. To die being to lose the power of one’s vocal cords, no longer to speak… A knock at the door as “they” came for me, I approached the door knowing I had used my vocal apparatus for the last time and would now learn to communicate telepathically; then I woke up. Allen was safe; for I understood there was an expansiveness beyond that of the voice. And I could now write with authority, of the first and second worlds, and the colors blue and red. The soul must be red. And Kate, the messenger was dressed in blue, for reason: as reason is the working through of “messages,” or is perhaps the voyage of the messenger.

This dream enabled me to write my book, providing a sense of a double world and, also, a color symbolism, plus a notion of telepathy: in Reason and Other Women, I overtly expect the reader to get what I’m saying via a sort of telepathy—the reader must go with the rhythms and odd usages of my mind as I present it, in order to know further things, attain a new state of consciousness with its own materials and details, coaxed from dreams and words.

You might well say that that is what poetry is—an art form based on telepathy, a sending of complex messages through an almost immaterial presentation (a few words on a page?); or, you might say, that all communication is like that. And isn’t it? Aren’t we always communicating telepathically? So much of what we tell each other is told via air: to talk about “cues” and “body language” is to be perfectly limited: it’s in the very air between us, everything we know and try to say to each other. We read each other’s minds all the time.

Anyway, the dream presented these ideas to me, as well as the knowledge that Allen was whole and well, and that it would be good, probably, not to have to use one’s vocal cords anymore: there was a bigger, better language, if you want to call it that. The dream remains important to me: it’s part of who I am and what I know; it’s part of my relationship with Allen and with everyone else. For me, it is a work of great beauty in itself, though it terrifies me as well. The opening of the door at the end was a vast moment, to step into infinity without being able to speak, never again to write poetry.

If dreams are telepathic or precognitive or knowledge-imparting or otherwise “extraordinary,” then do they exist to fill those functions, or are those functions a byproduct of dreams? Or, more likely, are dreams and those functions part of a similar flexible fabric we keep trying to push away from our world of clear-cut surfaces? Dreams are certainly a part of our condition of being alive. But how do they work? Why do we accept the fact of dreaming, as we accept walking and talking, without ever asking ourselves how, physically, we can be in another place, identity, and story, while we lie in bed sleeping?

We accept dreams but do not accept premonition. Do we have to accept dreams? Or did we? For sometimes it seems as if we are always creating who we are, selecting which of our abilities we want and pretending not to have others. We opt for dreaming—some scientists would say “select for it”—but do we have to dream? We’re always dreaming, perhaps. Some people think an unconscious part of us dreams while we’re awake—and I have personal experience of this. There is a wall in ourselves between sleeping and waking that dissolves at night, but we’re always dreaming; and a part of one is always awake. The dreamer is awake in the dream.

How are we able to experience dreams at night as a physical reality, as we do? This seems to me to be a much stickier problem than the fact of premonition and telepathy in dreams. I mean, if you accept dreams in all their impossibility, you might as well accept something like premonition. Why does it seem acceptable to you that you can dream you’re married to someone you’ve never seen in waking life (you realize when you wake up)—in fact, a mean drunk—in an apartment you’ve never been in? “Oh, yes, that’s normal for dreams,” you say. How is that normal?

Somehow our senses are working, but what are they stimulated by? Where did this guy come from? He and the apartment were rock-solid and he was, absolutely, my husband. The dream was scary and intense. I incorporated it into a poem (that I’ve never published) twenty-seven years ago. It still upsets me to think about the dream. I can interpret it, if I want to, but I can’t explain the physical reality of the tall thin man with slick almost pompadourish red hair and the apartment with its twilit psychic emptiness, and I can’t explain the fact that I was that story. I wasn’t myself, but I was.

As no science explains adequately how dreams work, no one can explain how a poem works. Where is a dream, sure, but where is a poem? I believe somewhat in Williams’ formulation that a poem is a machine made out of words, but, finally, the poem isn’t where the words are. The poem is somewhere between the words and the reader, or it is the words taken into the reader, who exists within the general society and its history. You enter the poem when you open to its page or remember it, having memorized it, but it is a much larger world than the page. It is transformed when you say it out loud; and it changes from reading to reading—you, the reader, change it, for one thing, as you change—or is it that it changes for you? If you are reading a poem by Catullus, you are in no way the same as an ancient Roman reading it: you are not that person—that kind of person, though it is that poem, as those words.

But even if you know Latin, you don’t “speak Latin,” and you haven’t much feeling for what it was like to be a Roman. A poem, like a dream, has an odd relation to time: it is in time, like a poem by Catullus, but it is timeless, as an object made out of words. A dream lasts a moment but endures as a memory might: but it didn’t really happen. A memory can be backed-up, but no outside observer can find the particulars of a dream in time and space (evidence of REM or whatever isn’t evidence of what happened in your dream). A poem didn’t or doesn’t happen, it’s a still group of words on a page; and a story doesn’t really happen either. We say that dreams, poems, and stories occur in the imagination, or the psyche, or whatever word we’re using right now, to invent another entity that doesn’t concretely exist to put them in. But doesn’t the “real world” exist in some collective category like that? All we do is dream; we live in poems and stories we invent.

I’m interested in how caught up I can be in a daily comic strip in the newspaper, given four meager frames a day, of “unreal” actions perpetrated by line drawings who speak in balloons. For the last couple of years, reading Doonesbury on a daily basis in the International Herald Tribune , I have felt completely involved in the strip whenever the character B.D., whose leg was shot o’ in Iraq, enters this amazingly sketchy, involving world. Recently another character, Toggle, has been shot up—shot in the head—has aphasia, and has been transferred from Iraq to Walter Reed Hospital in Washington, where B.D. is visiting him. I was recently in New York, and reading the comics one morning I said to Jess Fiorini, “It looks like Toggle is finally about to make it to Walter Reed.” “Oh, yes,” she replied seriously, “I saw that.” Toggle is probably more real to me than Barack Obama or John McCain are; I am commenting on my imagination, not on them.

I read, on a daily basis, Doonesbury , reruns of Peanuts , and Calvin and Hobbes , and sometimes Dilbert . The world of Peanuts is worth reentering many times—it grows more beautiful as time passes, the drawing always seems more interesting and the situations more poetic: it has become literary and artistic, in time, though I suppose it always was—but these qualities are becoming more evident. I miss the comic strips of my earliest childhood, though. I remember being entirely caught up in Dick Tracy during the saga of the angel girl whose name I can no longer remember; I can still see her radioactive angel-winged hair. None of this ever happened.

Suppose you admit that the world, physical reality, going on from day to day, is, in some long-term way, plastic, malleable. You can conceive of existence as a field you are involved in shaping. You can think of yourself as almost totally shaping it on your own or reshaping it; refusing to accept the names people give to its shape automatically transforms it straight o’. We are dreaming together, but we are dreaming separately too. Some of us are writing poems, and sometimes the poems are dreamlike.

For example, there has been a school of poetry, Surrealism, inspired by the apparent mechanics of dreams, that contributed single words to the culture—“surreal,” “surrealistic”—and also furnished a way of viewing the overall story we may be in: “This war is surreal.” For a very long time in Western civilization, there existed a literary form, sometimes called a dream vision, sometimes called an apocalypse, in which a lady appeared to a protagonist in dire circumstance and urged him or her not to give in to despair, and instead to grow strong and conquer fear and doubt.

The vision of the lady, from Boethius, through Dante, Christine de Pizan, and Chaucer, and more recently in poets like D.G. Rossetti and T.S. Eliot—that’s almost two thousand years of these visions—is a powerful poetic event, still. The dream is as real as the words that describe it, as when the three ladies appear to Christine, in La Cité des Dames , who is despairing at the misogyny of the world and wondering if the female sex is indeed the inferior one:

Lost in these painful thoughts, my head bowed in shame, my eyes full of tears, my hand supporting my cheek and my elbow on the pommel of my chair’s armrest, I suddenly saw a ray of light descending onto my lap as if it were the sun. And as I was sitting in a dark place where the sun could not shine at this hour, I was startled as if awakened from sleep. And as I lifted my head to see where this light was coming from, I saw standing before me three crowned ladies of great nobility. The light coming from their bright faces illuminated me and the whole room. Now, no one would ask whether I was surprised, given that my doors were closed, and nevertheless they had come here. Wondering whether some phantom had come to tempt me, in my fright I made the sign of the cross on my forehead.

Then the first of the three began to address me as follows: “Dear daughter, do not be afraid, for we have not come to bother or to trouble you but rather to comfort you, having taken pity on your distress, and to move you out of the ignorance that blinds your own intelligence so that you reject what you know for certain and believe what you do not know, see, and recognize except through a variety of strange opinions.”

In a typical dream vision, the lady or ladies tell the seer or dreamer that she or he must not believe the world, or give in, mentally, to its brute force by acceding to abjection, that there is an evident truth that she knows for herself and that will now be proven to her, by Lady Reason, or Dame Philosophy, or whoever. The dream is right, you see, and the world is wrong; the poem knows, and the lady will now impart its highest knowledge. When I read this kind of work, I am always startled when the lady appears, I find her as beautiful as the writer does, and I believe in her reality absolutely, though she is most often “an allegorical figure.” That’s what we call her: Reason is not real, it’s an “abstraction.”

In fact, Reason is as real as Lady Reason is, as real as the vision of her arising from the words on the page; she is real at that moment, the writer is real, and I am not there, the only one present who is real, the one who will remember that last moment when she appeared to me, when I identified with the protagonist. In fact, there seems to me to be nothing truer in this world and these times than Christine’s despair at the world’s misogyny six hundred or so years ago; nor anything as true as Lady Reason’s defense of women.

We are constantly remaking the world from the inside out. As I say at the end of The Descent of Alette : ‘“I will change the” “forms in dreams” … / “Starting” / “from dreams,” “from dreams we” “can change,” “will change…”’ If we can be clear that reality is changeable, we can change it; and we can understand better both what our dreams are and what poetry can do for us. Dreams remind us that we can shape the world, that it doesn’t fit into the categories we tend to make for it: we think and observe with our dreams and communicate with unconscious others, moving about in a time and space whose walls are down. Poetry is our conscious attempt to reshape the world, which is, as Philip Whalen says, “by nature wicked.” We make it and remake it over and over. It’s practically all we’re doing; I mean, poetry is practically all that we’re doing.

__________________________________

Excerpted from New Weathers: Poetics from the Naropa Archive , edited by Anne Waldman and Emma Gomis, published by Nightboat Books.

Alice Notley

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What about dreams ? State of the art and open questions

Serena scarpelli.

1 Department of Psychology, Sapienza University of Rome, Rome Italy

Valentina Alfonsi

Maurizio gorgoni.

2 Body and Action Lab, IRCCS Fondazione Santa Lucia, Rome Italy

Luigi De Gennaro

Associated data.

Several studies have tried to identify the neurobiological bases of dream experiences, nevertheless some questions are still at the centre of the debate. Here, we summarise the main open issues concerning the neuroscientific study of dreaming. After overcoming the rapid eye movement (REM) ‐ non‐REM (NREM) sleep dichotomy, investigations have focussed on the specific functional or structural brain features predicting dream experience. On the one hand, some results underlined that specific trait‐like factors are associated with higher dream recall frequency. On the other hand, the electrophysiological milieu preceding dream report upon awakening is a crucial state‐like factor influencing the subsequent recall. Furthermore, dreaming is strictly related to waking experiences. Based on the continuity hypothesis, some findings reveal that dreaming could be modulated through visual, olfactory, or somatosensory stimulations. Also, it should be considered that the indirect access to dreaming remains an intrinsic limitation. Recent findings have revealed a greater concordance between parasomnia‐like events and dream contents. This means that parasomnia episodes might be an expression of the ongoing mental sleep activity and could represent a viable direct access to dream experience. Finally, we provide a picture on nightmares and emphasise the possible role of oneiric activity in psychotherapy. Overall, further efforts in dream science are needed (a) to develop a uniform protocol to study dream experience, (b) to introduce and integrate advanced techniques to better understand whether dreaming can be manipulated, (c) to clarify the relationship between parasomnia events and dreaming, and (d) to determine the clinical valence of dreams.

1. INTRODUCTION

Dreams have been extensively studied from many points of view, focussing on different aspects of the phenomenon. Dreaming is a composite experience occurring during sleep that includes images, sensations, thoughts, emotions, apparent speech, and motor activity. The oneiric production is a form of mental sleep activity that appears strictly related to memory processes and cognitive elaboration (Wamsley & Stickgold,  2010 ; Mangiaruga et al., 2018). In this respect, some investigations have highlighted that dream features mirror the development of cognitive processes (Mangiaruga et al., 2018; Scarpell et al.,  2019a ).

Additionally, a growing number of studies have suggested that dream experience might be considered an expression of human wellbeing (Fränkl et al.,  2021 ; Scarpelli et al.,  2022 ) and has a pivotal role in emotional regulation, as suggested by some neurobiological findings (Nielsen & Lara‐Carrasco,  2007 ). For instance, dream recall and nightmare frequency increase when subjects are exposed to adverse and traumatic events (e.g., Hartmann & Brezler,  2008 ; Nielsen et al.,  2006 ; Sandman et al.,  2013 ; Tempesta et al.,  2013 ). Also, the qualitative characteristics of dream reports change in parallel with the emotional charge of waking experiences (Schredl,  2006 ; Scarpelli et al.,  2021 ).

It should be highlighted that psychoanalysis had primacy in dream research until the discovery of the rapid eye movement (REM) sleep stage (Aserinsky & Kleitman,  1953 ). The interpretation of oneiric contents was one of the main focusses of the Freudian theories positing that dreaming allows access to the unconscious functions of the mind in neurosis treatment (Freud,  1953 ). Aserinsky and Kleitman ( 1953 ) observed specific intervals with rapid and recurrent eye movement and bursts of alpha activity comparable to those that occur during wakefulness. The enthusiasm linked to the discovery of REM sleep considerably influenced dreaming research in several ways, and the neuroscientific study of dreaming is relatively recent. Several studies have attempted to identify the neurobiological bases of dream experience through a neuropsychological approach (Solms,  1997 , 2000 ), neuroimaging (Maquet et al.,  1996 ) and electrophysiological techniques (Marzano et al.,  2011 ; Siclari et al.,  2017 ).

Although several studies provide compelling evidence for the existence of specific brain mechanisms predicting dream recall (e.g., Siclari et al.,  2017 ), many questions are still at the centre of the debate.

The present paper summarises the main open issues concerning the neuroscientific study of dream experience. Specifically, the review offers an overview about (a) the question related to the REM‐non‐REM (NREM) sleep dichotomy, (b) the state–trait‐like problem, (c) the relationship between waking and dreaming state and the manipulation of dreaming, (d) the issue concerning the access to dream experience, (e) the role of nightmares, and (f) the debate on dreamwork in psychotherapy.

1.1. The REM‐NREM sleep dichotomy

A classical view of the neurobiological basis of the oneiric activity postulates the existence of a close relationship between dream experience and REM sleep (Hobson et al.,  2000 ; Nielsen,  2000 ). This hypothesis was based on early electroencephalographic (EEG) observations showing that >70% of individuals awakened during REM sleep reported dreams, while dream recall at the awakening from other sleep stages was rare (Aserinsky & Kleitman, 1955 ). According to this view, the wake‐like high‐frequency EEG pattern characterising REM sleep would represent the ideal electrophysiological scenario for the occurrence of dream experiences, while the slow‐frequency activity characterising NREM sleep would be associated with the absence of oneiric activity. However, using different criteria to collect dream reports, several studies found that successful recall of a conscious experience can be frequently observed also after NREM awakenings, and in a minority of cases no dream experience was reported after REM awakenings (Foulkes,  1962 ; Nielsen,  2000 ). Moreover, dream recall is still possible after lesions in brain regions involved in REM sleep generation, while the total disappearance of dream recall can be observed after focal forebrain lesions without an impact on REM sleep (Solms,  2000 ). Also, dream experience is preserved after pharmacological suppression of REM sleep (Landolt et al.,  2001 ; Oudiette et al.,  2012 ). Finally, dream recall has been recently associated with a similar electrophysiological response after REM and NREM sleep (D'Atri et al.,  2019 ; Siclari et al.,  2017 ). These results suggest that (a) dream and REM sleep are controlled by distinct brain mechanisms, (b) the postulate of a clear distinction between presence and absence of dreaming respectively in REM and NREM has not a solid support, and therefore (c) dreams can occur in any sleep stage.

A dichotomy between NREM and REM sleep has been also hypothesised for the qualitative aspects of dreams. Indeed, it has been proposed that REM and NREM sleep exhibit different kinds of mental activity. According to this view, REM sleep is characterised by an emotional, vivid, and bizarre “dream‐like” mentation (Antrobus,  1983 ; Casagrande et al.,  1996 ; Foulkes,  1967 ; Foulkes & Schmidt,  1983 ; Waterman et al.,  1993 ), while NREM mental activity would be “thought‐like”, with reduced emotional load, greater fragmentation, and contents more similar to waking thoughts (Foulkes,  1967 ; Rechtschaffen et al.,  1963 ). Nevertheless, the existence of a clear‐cut REM‐NREM dichotomy has been questioned also in this case based on several findings: (a) “dream‐like” reports have been observed also after NREM sleep (Monroe et al.,  1965 ; Solms,  2000 ; Zimmerman,  1970 ) and (b) the qualitative differences between REM and NREM dream reports disappear when their length is equated (Antrobus,  1983 ; Cavallero et al.,  1992 ; Foulkes & Schmidt,  1983 ).

In light of these observations, the assumption that the presence/absence and the phenomenological aspects of dream experiences strictly depend on the sleep stage per se is simplistic. It is worth noting that a precise definition of the time‐coupling between the sleep stages and the actual occurrence of dream experience is difficult, as the access to sleep mentation is possible only in an indirect way through dream reports after the awakening (see the paragraph “What about direct access to dream experience?”). At the same time, the occurrence of dream experiences in both REM and NREM sleep, two physiological stages characterised by distinct electrophysiological and neurotransmitters patterns, appears paradoxical. Such considerations raised the question of what mechanisms facilitate/inhibit the recall of a conscious experience at the awakening from different sleep stages, and what factors can explain intra‐ and inter‐individual variability in the phenomenology of the oneiric activity.

1.2. State‐ and trait‐like facets of dreams

Stable individual characteristics (trait‐like factors) can impact dreams, explaining inter‐individual variability. Sociodemographic factors like gender (Schredl & Reinhard,  2008 ; Settineri et al.,  2019 ) and age (Mangiaruga et al.,  2018 ; Scarpelli et al.,  2019a ) can predict dream recall. Interest in dreams (Bealulieu‐Prevost & Zadra,  2007 ), visual imagery abilities (Cory & Ormiston,  1975 ), personality dimensions like openness to experience, absorption, psychological boundaries (Beaulieu‐Prevost & Zadra, 2007), and predisposition to suppress negative emotions and thoughts (Malinowski,  2015 ) appear related to individual differences in the oneiric activity.

Crucially, neuroimaging studies provided evidence about the relationship between dream features and stable brain anatomical and functional characteristics. Qualitative facets of dreams have been associated with volumetric and structural measures of the amygdala‐hippocampus complex in healthy subjects (De Gennaro et al.,  2011 ) and amygdala volume, dorsomedial prefrontal cortical thickness, and dopaminergic activity in patients with Parkinson's disease (De Gennaro et al.,  2016 ). Moreover, compared to low dream recallers, high dream recallers showed (a) greater medial prefrontal cortex white‐matter density (Vallat et al.,  2018 ); (b) higher regional cerebral blood flow in the temporo‐parietal junction during wakefulness, Stage 3, and REM sleep and in medial prefrontal cortex during wakefulness and REM sleep (Eichenlaub et al.,  2014a ); (c) enhanced functional connectivity within the default mode network (DMN) and between areas of the DMN and memory‐related regions immediately after the awakening (Vallat et al.,  2020 ); and (d) larger event‐related potentials to distracting sounds even during active listening, arguing for enhanced bottom‐up processing of irrelevant sounds but also an enhanced recruitment of top‐down attention as suggested by larger contingent negative variation during target expectancy and P3b to target sounds (Ruby et al.,  2021 ). Taken together, these findings highlight that stable individual features of the brain structure and activation patterns can explain inter‐individual differences in dream experience.

Beyond the influence of trait‐like factors, a growing number of studies also point to the role of the physiological milieu associated with the oneiric experience (state‐like factors). In other words, the specific regional features of the physiological background contingent with dreaming would facilitate or prevent dream recall, potentially explaining intra‐individual differences in dream reports. This possibility has been investigated mainly by assessing the sleep EEG pattern preceding dream recall. In this way, several studies found that a successful dream recall was associated with greater frontal theta oscillations before the awakening from REM sleep (Marzano et al.,  2011 ; Scarpelli et al.,  2015 ; Scarpelli et al.,  2019b ) and reduced parieto‐occipital alpha activity before the awakening from NREM sleep (Esposito et al.,  2004 ; Marzano et al.,  2011 ). As theta and alpha oscillations are associated with memory processes during wakefulness (Hsieh & Ranganath,  2014 ), these results suggest that wakefulness and sleep share the same neurobiological mechanisms for the elaboration of episodic memories (see the next paragraph).

On the other hand, a growing number of within‐subject investigations (which allows overcoming the possible influence of stable trait‐like factors) show that a more desynchronised EEG pattern is associated with dream recall in both NREM and REM sleep (Siclari et al.,  2017 ; D'Atri et al.,  2019 ; Scarpelli et al.,  2017 ; Scarpelli et al.,  2020a ; but see Wong et al.,  2020 ). In particular, dream experience would be facilitated by a pattern of reduced slow‐wave activity (SWA), most steadily in posterior regions (Siclari et al.,  2017 , 2018 ). Interestingly, lucid dreams, phenomenon characterised by conscious awareness during the oneiric experience, appear associated with greater EEG gamma activity (Baird et al.,  2022 ; Voss et al.,  2009 ). Furthermore, a transcranial current stimulation delivered in a lower gamma range during REM sleep can affect the ongoing electrophysiological activity and increase self‐reflective awareness in dreams (Voss et al.,  2014 ). These observations are consistent with “activation” theoretical models (Antrobus,  1991 ; Hobson & McCarley,  1977 ; Koulack & Goodenough,  1976 ), which postulate that dream recall would be facilitated by a greater level of arousal during sleep, represented at an electrophysiological level by higher brain activation. Indeed, the frequency of dream recall increases in association with a sleep pattern characterised by greater sleep fragmentation (van Wyk et al.,  2019 ), faster spindles, especially in central and posterior cortical areas (Siclari et al.,  2018 ), intra‐sleep wakefulness (De Gennaro et al., 2010 ; Eichenlaub et al.,  2014b ; Vallat et al.,  2017 ), and sleep arousal (Polini et al.,  2017 ; Schredl,  2009 ). Furthermore, a night of recovery sleep after a period of prolonged wakefulness, usually characterised by reduced awakenings, almost totally abolished dream recall after the final morning awakening (De Gennaro et al., 2010 ). The SWA represents a marker of sleep intensity (Borbély & Achermann,  1999 ), likely subserving the fading of consciousness during sleep. Thus, the pattern of local SWA reduction in association with dreaming activity may represent the electrophysiological marker of the greater arousal level needed for a successful dream recall. Moreover, this evidence provides a reliable explanation for the apparently paradoxical occurrence of dreams in states of consciousness (i.e., REM and NREM sleep) characterised by drastically different EEG patterns.

Overall, these findings highlight the crucial role of the physiological state preceding dream recall. However, several questions remain open. First, the influence of circadian and homeostatic factors on the oneiric experience and its electrophysiological pattern is not clear (Chellappa et al.,  2011 ; D'Atri et al.,  2019 ; Scarpelli et al.,  2017 ; Scarpelli et al.,  2020a ). Moreover, the impact of the regional distribution of SWA on qualitative dream facets needs to be fully investigated, as empirical preliminary evidence has been provided only by Siclari et al. ( 2017 ). Finally, the possible interaction between state‐ and trait‐like factors should be carefully considered.

1.3. Continuity between waking and dream experience

The above‐mentioned “activation hypothesis” represents one of the main theoretical frameworks on dreaming, along with the so‐called “continuity hypothesis” (Domhoff,  2017 ; Schredl & Hofmann,  2003 ). In the early 1970s, Bell and Hall ( 1971 ) firstly proposed that waking experiences may have continuity in sleep. The formulation of the original concept has gone through several re‐interpretations and adjustments since then.

Early cognitively‐oriented studies focussed on the continuity between dream contents and waking events, personal concerns, thoughts, behaviours, and emotions, suggesting that waking‐life experiences are reflected into subsequent dreams (Nielsen & Powell,  1992 ; Schredl,  2006 ; Blagrove,  2011 ; Vallat et al.,  2017 ). Compelling evidence also showed the key role of the personal and emotional salience in mediating the preferential incorporation of waking‐life aspects during mental sleep activity (Malinowski & Horton,  2014 ).

Further, different time intervals between waking experiences and related dream contents could represent “day‐residue effect” or “dream‐lag effect” as a function of the elapsed period (i.e., 1–2 days and 5–7 days, respectively) (Eichenlaub et al.,  2017 ). Specifically, the delayed incorporation of waking life events (“dream‐lag effect”) was selectively observed during REM sleep and for personally significant events (Van Rijn et al.,  2015 ).

A complementary field of study posits the continuity between waking state and mental sleep activity from a neurophysiological perspective. Namely, a growing body of evidence suggests that brain mechanisms underlying cognitive and emotional functioning remain the same across different states of consciousness (e.g., Marzano et al.,  2011 ; Eichenalub et al., 2018).

The involvement of alpha (8–12 Hz) and theta (5–7 Hz) oscillations in memory‐related neural processes during wakefulness are well‐established, especially as regards episodic‐declarative memory (Klimesch,  1999 ). In particular, the increase in the frontal theta activity and the alpha power decrease during the encoding phase of episodic memories were found to play a pivotal role in the subsequent recall of stored information (Hsieh & Ranganath,  2014 ; Klimesch,  1999 ).

Over the last two decades, several studies were conducted under the assumption that dream encoding and recall could represent a peculiar form of episodic memory (Fosse et al.,  2003 ). As previously mentioned, a successful dream recall has been linked to higher frontal theta activity during REM sleep (Marzano et al.,  2011 ; Scarpelli et al.,  2015 ) and lower alpha activity over the temporo‐parietal region during NREM (Esposito et al.,  2004 ; Marzano et al.,  2011 ; Takeuchi et al.,  2003 ). Moreover, the topographical distribution of the above‐mentioned frequency bands resembles brain regions involved in encoding and retrieval mechanisms during wakefulness.

A large body of experimental studies have also shown the continuity between dreaming and emotional processing (for a review, see Scarpelli et al.,  2019c ). First of all, as described in the previous paragraph, neuroimaging studies showed the relationship between qualitative and quantitative stable aspects of dream experience and structural parameters of limbic areas (De Gennaro et al.,  2011 ). Consistently, subjects reporting higher levels of fear in their dreams showed a concomitant higher activation of the medial prefrontal cortex, responsible for reduced activation of the amygdala, insula, and midcingulate cortex both during sleep and wakefulness (Phelps et al.,  2004 ; Sterpenich et al.,  2020 ). Further, the main brain circuits involved in emotional processing during wake are highly activated during REM sleep, such as the limbic system (Nir & Tononi,  2010 ) and reward system (Perogamvros & Schwartz,  2012 ). Notably, a recent simultaneous EEG‐functional magnetic resonance imaging study demonstrated the privileged re‐emergence during sleep of patterns of brain activity associated with a recent rewarding (compared to a non‐rewarding) waking experience during sleep (Sterpenich et al.,  2021 ).

Starting from these findings, many researchers stated that dream activity might have a crucial role in processing emotional events experienced during wakefulness (see Scarpelli et al.,  2019c ). More in‐depth, the theta (Nishida et al.,  2009 ; Boyce et al.,  2016 ; Sopp et al.,  2018 ) and gamma activities (Van Der Helm et al.,  2011 ) were identified as the EEG markers of emotional memory processing. Selective sleep deprivation protocols provided experimental evidence about the lack of emotional memories consolidation in the absence of REM sleep stage (Spoormaker et al.,  2014 ; Wagner et al.,  2001 ), supporting the notion that dreaming represents the privileged scenario for the offline reprocessing of waking emotional stimuli.

Keeping in mind the unitary perspective across waking and sleep state, several investigations aimed to overcome the boundaries between different states of consciousness directly influencing sleep mentation by different kinds of sensory stimuli administered pre‐ or during sleep. Pre‐sleep stimulation methods have been used since the very beginning of dream research. The pioneering study by Dement and Wolpert ( 1958 ) showed the relation between the 24‐h fluid restriction in participants and their subsequent REM dream content. Sensory stimulation through pre‐sleep visual stimuli affected dream content by using stressful films (Goodenough et al.,  1965 ) or visual inverting prisms (Corsi‐Cabrera et al.,  1986 ).

Concerning sensory stimulation delivered during REM or NREM sleep stages, early studies described the incorporation of meaning verbal stimuli (Berger,  1963 ; Hoelscher et al.,  1981 ). Also, somatosensory stimulation (e.g., water on the skin, thermal stimulation, pressure cuff, electrical pulses) (Baldridge et al.,  1965 ; Dement & Wolpert,  1958 ; Koulack,  1969 ; Nielsen,  1993 ) or vestibular stimulation (Leslie & Ogilvie,  1996 ) were found to affect dream content. As expected, these types of stimulation increased vividness and bodily sensation in the dream contents.

Recent studies using olfactory stimulation during sleep showed the influence on the emotional content of dreams as a function of the hedonic characteristic of stimuli (Schredl et al.,  2009 ) and the reactivation of the odour‐associated images (Schredl et al.,  2014 ). The strong effect of olfactory stimulation on dream emotional aspects is interpreted in terms of direct connections to the limbic system (Smith & Shepherd,  2003 ).

In the last few years, a promising field of research explored the shared neural circuits between wake and sleep mentation by directly manipulating dream activity via transcranial electrical stimulation techniques. Some studies showed that interfering with cortical areas that are notably involved in a specific function during wakefulness influenced the dream content accordingly (Jakobson et al.,  2012 ; Noreika et al.,  2020 ).

Taken together, these results strengthen the hypothesis of shared mechanisms between the awake and sleeping brain from both psychological and neurobiological perspectives and through experimental manipulations. However, the intrinsic restraint due to the impossibility of directly investigating the dream content represents a common limitation of these studies.

1.4. What about direct access to dream experience?

The issue concerning dream access is definitively the most complex to address. Indeed, the real object of study in the abovementioned investigations (e.g., Chellappa et al.,  2011 ; Marzano et al.,  2011 ; Scarpelli et al.,  2015 , 2017 ; Scarpelli et al.,  2020a ; Scarpelli et al.,  2019b ; Siclari et al.,  2017 ) is “dream recall” and not the dream experience itself . In other words, dreaming is not directly observable, and researchers are able to obtain information about the oneiric activity just requiring a dream report to the individual when he is awake. Also, we have already discussed that detecting the exact moment in which the dreams are produced during sleep is very difficult.

From a methodological point of view, three approaches to collect dreaming are well‐known: (a) retrospective, (b) prospective, and (c) provoked awakenings with subsequent dream reports. While the retrospective method allows researchers to collect dreaming through interviews or questionnaires in large samples quickly, the prospective protocol (i.e., dream diaries; longitudinal dream report collection) is less prone to memory biases (Robert & Zadra,  2008 ). These two strategies allow classifying people in high and low recallers, helping to investigate the neurobiological trait‐like features of dreamers (e.g., Eichenlaub et al.,  2014b ; Eichenlaub et al.,  2014a ; Ruby et al.,  2021 ; van Wyk et al.,  2019 ). However, the most accurate approach is represented by the provoked awakenings associated with the polysomnography (PSG) of one or more sleep nights in a laboratory. Generally, participants are awakened to explore the presence of a dream report and to compare the recall and non‐recall condition (Scarpelli et al.,  2017 ; Scarpelli et al.,  2020a ; Siclari et al.,  2017 ) or the report's qualitative features (Scarpelli et al.,  2020b ), correlating them with the specific EEG patterns preceding the awakening. It is worth noting that the narration of dream contents could be influenced by many biases after awakenings, such as the experimental setting (Schredl,  2008 ), the physiological background of waking‐life and by individual variables, such as personality, cognitive functions, censure/omissions and socio‐cultural features (Nir & Tononi,  2010 ), making dream reports not always completely reliable.

How can we overcome this obstacle? In this regard, recent studies have suggested that viable access to mental sleep activity is represented by dream‐enacting behaviours (DEBs; Baltzan et al.,  2020 ). Any acting out of a dream during sleep characterised by motor, emotional or verbal components may be considered a direct observation of dream experience while the subject is asleep (Nielsen et al.,  2009 ). In this view, the study of parasomnias or parasomnia‐like events, i.e., REM behaviour disorder (RBD), sleep walking, nightmares, and sleep talking, may provide new insights about dreaming. Interestingly, some investigations highlighted a strong level of congruence between the body movements, verbal or emotional expressions during sleep and the subsequent components of dream recall (Arkin et al.,  1970 ; Leclair‐Visonneau et al.,  2010 ; Oudiette et al.,  2009 ; Rocha & Arnulf,  2020 ).

Assessing REMs in patients with RBD, Leclair‐Visonneau et al. ( 2010 ) found a concordance between limbs, head, and eye movements during the REM behaviour episode. The authors suggested that REMs may imitate the scanning of the dream scenario according to the so‐called “scanning hypothesis” (Arnulf,  2011 ; Leclair‐Visonneau et al.,  2010 ). Moreover, Oudiette et al. ( 2009 ) revealed that during sleepwalking or sleep terror episodes, subjects show complex motor behaviours strictly related to their oneiric scenes. The same group has demonstrated that sleepwalkers are able to replay the recently trained behaviour during the parasomnia episode, supporting the idea that dream enactment may have a pivotal role in memory processing during sleep (Oudiette et al.,  2011 ).

More recently, Rivera‐García et al. ( 2019 ) investigated the activation of facial muscles during REM sleep among healthy women. They considered facial expressions during sleep on a par with DEBs and an index of emotional dreams. Consistently, the previous literature shows that DEBs are more frequent during intense emotional dreams, such as nightmares (Nielsen et al., 2009 ). Indeed, the authors revealed that the activation of corrugator and zygomatic muscles are highly associated with dreams featured by negative affect (Rivera‐García et al. ( 2019 )).

Also, sleep talking could be considered an additional non‐pathological parasomnia‐like event related to dreaming (Alfonsi et al.,  2019 ; Mangiaruga et al., 2021). During sleep, the audible verbalisations may represent access to oneiric contents (Arkin et al.,  1970 ; Alfonsi et al.,  2019 ). In this regard, some studies showed different degrees of correspondence between sleep talking and dreaming (Arkin et al.,  1970 ; Rechtschaffen et al.,  1962 ). Arkin et al. ( 1970 ) reported different orders of concordance between sleep speech and later dream reports. Some authors investigated the presence of dialogical components within the dream reports proposing an overlapping between the neural mechanisms underlying linguistic production in dreams and those responsible for language during waking state (Shimizu & Inoue,  1986 ; Hong et al.,  1996 ; Siclari et al.,  2017 ). Specifically, Hong et al. ( 1996 ) found a reduction of the alpha activity focussed on Broca's and Wernicke's language regions, proportional to the amount of expressive and receptive language reported in dreams (Hong et al.,  1996 ; Shimizu & Inoue,  1986 ). In addition, Noreika et al. ( 2015 ) demonstrated a decrement in the theta and alpha activity in a single‐case study associated with linguistic hypnagogic hallucination. Consistently, a recent study revealed that similar EEG patterns predict intelligible verbalisations during sleep (Mangiaruga et al., 2022 ).

Overall, both findings in subjects suffering from parasomnias and those related to “benign” phenomena (e.g., facial expressions, sleep talking), suggest that parasomnia‐like episodes may open a new frontier in dream research making the oneiric production more accessible.

1.4.1. Nightmares

Nightmares are disturbing mental sleep activity characterised by negative emotions and often considered a clinical symptom causing significant distress. They are frequently associated with a high level of arousal and somatic manifestations that are capable to awake the dreamer from REM sleep. The repeated occurrence of this event is categorised as parasomnia, i.e., “nightmare disorder”, according to the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, fifth edition (DSM‐5; American Psychiatric Association, 2013 ).

On the one hand, this disturbance is frequently related to post‐traumatic stress disorder (PTSD; Germain,  2013 ), but it could also be a reaction to stress conditions (Scarpelli et al.,  2022 ). On the other hand, also idiopathic nightmares, i.e., without a known cause, should be considered. For instance, this kind of mental sleep activity is quite common in children tending to disappear during adulthood, and it is more frequent among females (Nielsen & Levin,  2007 ).

From a neurobiological perspective, a recent investigation shows that the activation of the autonomic nervous system may be linked to nightmares (Paul et al.,  2019 ). Some studies revealed REM‐specific alterations in nightmare sufferers such as longer REM latency, increased skipping of early REM periods and cycle length, and more frequent REM periods (Nielsen et al.,  2010 ). Furthermore, some EEG findings highlighted the presence of slow frontal and central theta activity during REM sleep in a group of nightmare recallers (Marquis et al.,  2017 ). Further studies reported evidence for reduced slow‐wave sleep and greater intra‐sleep wakefulness (Simor et al.,  2012 ), increased alpha power during REM sleep, and higher levels of EEG desynchronisation in NREM sleep of students with frequent nightmares (Simor et al.,  2013 ). In other words, as already mentioned for dream recall, a higher autonomic and electrophysiological activation may provide the physiological background to the nightmare occurrence (Fisher et al.,  1970 ; Nielsen & Zadra,  2005 ). This is consistent with the self‐reported experience of greater emotional and physical activations during the nightmare occurrence.

Fear is the predominant emotion included in nightmares (Zadra et al.,  2006 ), suggesting that nightmares could be linked to fear‐dysfunction disturbances, i.e., phobias, generalised or social anxiety (Nielsen & Levin,  2007 ; Walker,  2010 ). In other words, nightmares could be related to the dysfunction in the hippocampal–amygdala prefrontal system that controls fear memory formation and extinction (Marquis et al.,  2017 ; Nielsen & Levin,  2007 ). Nevertheless, the functional role of nightmares is still debated. Considering the early theories of dream function emphasising roles for REM sleep and dreaming in promoting adaptation to stress, nightmares could be interpreted as a failure of this process (Wright & Koulack,  1987 ).

Along this vein, some authors proposed that a certain degree of awareness of our dream contents and the possibility of altering them may be beneficial for nightmares sufferers (Kellner et al.,  1992 ; Krakow et al.,  2001 ; Neidhardt et al.,  1992 ). In particular, compelling evidence highlighted that imagery rehearsal therapy (IRT) is very effective in reducing chronic nightmares within 6–12 weeks of therapy (Germain et al.,  2004 ; Kellner et al.,  1992 ; Krakow et al.,  2001 ; Neidhardt et al.,  1992 ). This technique consists of modifying the plot of the recurring nightmare during the wakefulness by an imaginal rehearsal of a new dream without disturbing items (Kellner et al.,  1992 ). The nightmare sufferers learn to change the nightmares scenes by creating a less unpleasant ending and including mastery elements in the new dream scenario (Germain et al.,  2004 ).

Interestingly, lucid dreaming induction could represent a useful intervention to reduce nightmares (Zadra & Pihl,  1997 ; Spoormaker & Van Den Bout,  2006 ; Rak et al.,  2015 ). It has been hypothesised that lucid dreaming could be a sort of coping strategy to face unpleasant stimuli during a dream experience (Schiappa et al.,  2018 ). Actually, lucid dream therapy is a cognitive technique that allows patients to learn to be aware of and modify their mental sleep activity during their nightmares through daily exercises (Spoormaker & Van Den Bout,  2006 ; Zadra & Pihl,  1997 ).

More recently, eye movement desensitisation and reprocessing (EMDR; Shapiro,  1989 ) has been employed for nightmares treatment in PTSD. Starting from the view that nightmares are the manifestations of adverse events registered in a dysfunctional form, this technique aimed to promote the recall of distressing images while activating one type of bilateral sensory input (e.g., hand tapping or side‐to‐side eye movement). The protocol allows subjects to identify and reprocess the targeted disturbing memories and experiences in order to formulate insight and adaptive behaviour.

In conclusion, it should be underlined that studies on PSG abnormalities and specific macro‐ and micro‐structural features correlated to nightmares are still missing. Further, efficacy studies on nightmare treatment (i.e., IRT, lucid dream therapy, EMDR) are scarce and fragmentary. Future research should be conducted to fill this gap and explore the effectiveness of the above‐mentioned interventions for nightmare disorders.

1.4.2. What role for dreamwork in modern psychotherapy?

An interesting open issue concerns the possible usefulness of the oneiric experience as a tool in clinical practice, also in light of the neuroscientific knowledge on dreams.

Classically, Freud (1953) proposed two main functions of dreams: the expression of repressed infantile wishes and the protection of sleep. The antimoral nature of such wishes implies the need of a distortion through the dream censor to be acceptable, allowing their partial expression while protecting the continuity of sleep. Freud distinguished the manifest and the latent content of dream, the latter containing the true meaning of the dream. Free associations would represent the “royal road” to uncover the latent dream content, and the analyst provide his/her dream interpretation on the basis of the patient's dynamics.

The role of dream interpretation in modern psychoanalytic models has been significantly redefined compared to the initial Freudian conceptualisation (Pesant & Zadra,  2004 ). Crucially, several authors focussed their attention to the intrinsic validity of the manifest facets of dreams and their relationship with the diurnal experience. According to different approaches, the role of dream has been conceptualised in terms of reorganisation of the experience (Fosshage,  2002 ), adaptation to reality (Gazzillo et al.,  2020 ), and co‐construction of the intersubjective reality (Jiménez,  2012 ).

Although several authors underline a “marginalisation” of dream in modern clinical psychological practice (Leonard & Dawson,  2018 ), it is worth noting that dreams have become an object of study also in clinical paradigms different from the psychoanalytical models (Pesant & Zadra,  2004 ; Velotti & Zavattini,  2019 ). Among the others, the evolution of the debate about dreaming in the cognitivist framework (Rosner et al.,  2004 ) represents an interesting example of the redefinition of dreamwork in psychotherapy based on novel experimental data, theoretical models, and clinical observations. Beck ( 1971 ) proposed that dreams reflect the individual conception (and biases) about the self, the world, and the future, and may represent and indicator of changes in the emotional status. Nevertheless, the initial need to move away from the psychoanalytical framework and the pressure to adopt an empirically verifiable clinical model led to a common disuse of oneiric activity in cognitive‐behavioural psychotherapy. Dreams were mainly considered as psychologically meaningless epiphenomena of sleep, useless for the dreamer and in turn for the therapeutic process. More recently, the progress in the scientific understanding of dreams has led to the reintegration of dreams among the object of interest from different epistemological paradigms in the cognitivist framework. From a rationalist perspective, starting from the hypothesis that dreams are subjected to the same cognitive distortions that characterise the waking experience, it has been proposed that dreamwork can help to detect cognitive biases and maladaptive thought patterns (Barrett,  2002 ; Freeman & White,  2002 ; Hill,  1996 , 2003 ) and promote cognitive reconstructing. On the other hand, the constructivist paradigm moved the focus on the narrative facets of dreams and the co‐construction of meaning between patient and therapist (Bara,  2012 ; Rezzonico & Bani,  2015 ; Rosner et al.,  2004 ), with the aim to promote the emergence of relevant aspects of the personal meaning and increase the level of awareness of the patient.

The interest in the clinical use of dreams led to the development of different articulated models of dreamwork in psychotherapy, like the Description, Memory Sources, and Reformulation (DMR) model (Montangero,  2009 ) and the cognitive‐experiential model (Hill,  1996 , 2003 ). Overall, Eudell‐Simmons and Hilsenroth ( 2005 ) identify four main functions of dreams in psychotherapy: (a) facilitate the therapeutic process, (b) increase patient insight and self‐awareness, (c) provide clinical information relevant for the therapist, and (d) provide a measure of therapeutic change.

Clearly, a further research effort is needed to provide support for the objective and efficacy of dreamwork in psychotherapy. Nevertheless, the ongoing debate on this topic has led to several models of the clinical valence of dreams that appear consistent with experimental findings on oneiric activity, mainly moving from standardised symbolic interpretations of dreams to approaches based on the relationship of dreaming with individual experience and cognitive/emotional/behavioural functioning.

2. CONCLUSIONS

From the discovery of REM sleep to the present day, empirical investigations have considerably increased our understanding of neural mechanisms underlying dream recall.

Although compelling evidence converges in providing support to the so‐called activation hypothesis and continuity hypothesis, considerable efforts are still needed to fully understand the neurobiological bases of oneiric processes.

Overall, we believe that (a) some results are still heterogeneous due to the application of different protocols, so a more consistent approach is needed; (b) the use of advanced techniques such as high‐density EEG or source localisation methods should be encouraged to better understand the relationship between specific oscillations and dream features; (c) further studies on experimental manipulation of dreaming should be carried out, also considering the implementation of brain stimulation techniques to promote dream recall or its specific characteristics; and (d) DEBs could be used as a model to observe dream contents overcoming the problem regarding the correspondence between specific time/stage of sleep and dream production, offering new insights about the neural correlate of dreaming.

Lastly, it is worth noting that recent pandemic studies have “elected” dream activity (and nightmares) as a reliable index of our emotional and psychological health (Fränkl et al.,  2021 ; Scarpelli et al.,  2022 ). Considering this, we underline that a translational view is needed to systematically explore the potential role of neurobiological and experiential facets of dreaming in a clinical context.

AUTHOR CONTRIBUTIONS

All the authors contributed equally.

CONFLICT OF INTEREST

All authors report no conflict of interest.

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

Open Access Funding provided by Universita degli Studi di Roma La Sapienza within the CRUI‐CARE Agreement. [Correction added on 26 May 2022, after first online publication: CRUI funding statement has been added.]

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Visiting Sleeping Beauties: Reawakening Fashion?

You must join the virtual exhibition queue when you arrive. If capacity has been reached for the day, the queue will close early.

Heilbrunn Timeline of Art History Essays

Oedipus and the Sphinx

Gustave Moreau

The Love Song

Sir Edward Burne-Jones

Island of the Dead

Arnold Böcklin

Inter artes et naturam (Between Art and Nature)

Pierre Puvis de Chavannes

The Shepherd's Song

Ia Orana Maria (Hail Mary)

Paul Gauguin

Vase with face

Pierre-Adrien Dalpayrat

The First Communion

Eugène Carrière

The Blind Man's Meal

Pablo Picasso

Odilon Redon

Nicole Myers Department of European Paintings, The Metropolitan Museum of Art

August 2007

Symbolism initially developed as a French literary movement in the 1880s, gaining popular credence with the publication in 1886 of Jean Moréas’ manifesto in Le Figaro . Reacting against the rationalism and materialism that had come to dominate Western European culture, Moréas proclaimed the validity of pure subjectivity and the expression of an idea over a realistic description of the natural world. This philosophy, which would incorporate the poet Stéphane Mallarmé’s conviction that reality was best expressed through poetry because it paralleled nature rather than replicating it, became a central tenet of the movement. In Mallarmé’s words, “To name an object is to suppress three-quarters of the enjoyment to be found in the poem… suggestion , that is the dream.”

Though it began as a literary concept, Symbolism was soon identified with the artwork of a younger generation of painters who were similarly rejecting the conventions of Naturalism. Symbolist painters believed that art should reflect an emotion or idea rather than represent the natural world in the objective, quasi-scientific manner embodied by Realism and Impressionism. Returning to the personal expressivity advocated by the Romantics earlier in the nineteenth century, they felt that the symbolic value or meaning of a work of art stemmed from the re-creation of emotional experiences in the viewer through color, line, and composition. In painting, Symbolism represents a synthesis of form and feeling, of reality and the artist’s inner subjectivity.

In an article on Paul Gauguin published in 1891, Albert Aurier gave the first definition of symbolism as an aesthetic, describing it as the subjective vision of an artist expressed through a simplified and non-naturalistic style and hailing Gauguin as its leader. However, the groundwork for pictorial Symbolism was laid as early as the 1870s by an older generation of artists such as Gustave Moreau (1826–1898), Puvis de Chavannes (1824–1898), Odilon Redon (1840–1916) ( 60.19.1 ), Eugène Carrière (1849–1906) ( 63.138.5 ), Arnold Böcklin (1827–1901) ( 26.90 ), and Edward Burne-Jones (1833–1898). All would have a profound influence on Gauguin and his contemporaries in the later nineteenth century.

Wanting to imbue their works with spiritual value, these progenitors of Symbolism produced imaginary dream worlds populated with mysterious figures from biblical stories and Greek mythology as well as fantastical, often monstrous, creatures. Their suggestive imagery established what would become the most pervasive themes in Symbolist art: love, fear, anguish, death, sexual awakening, and unrequited desire. Woman became the favored symbol for the expression of these universal emotions, appearing alternately as wistful virgins ( 06.177 ; 63.138.5 ; 47.26 ) and menacing femmes fatales. In this latter category, Moreau popularized the motifs of Salome brandishing the head of John the Baptist and the man-eating sphinx through paintings such as Oedipus and the Sphinx ( 21.134.1 ) in the Salons of the mid-1860s and 1870s. These two mythical female types—the virgin and the femme fatale—would become staples of Symbolist imagery, appearing frequently in both visual and literary sources from the 1880s through the first decade of the twentieth century.

Unlike the Impressionists , the Symbolists who emerged in the 1880s were a diverse group of artists often working independently with varying aesthetic goals. Rather than sharing a single artistic style, they were unified by a shared pessimism and weariness of the decadence they perceived in modern society. The Symbolists sought escape from reality, expressing their personal dreams and visions through color, form, and composition. Their almost universal preference for broad strokes of unmodulated color and flat, often abstract forms was inspired by Puvis de Chavannes, who created greatly simplified forms in order to clearly express abstract ideas ( 58.15.2 ). His muted palette and decorative treatment of forms made a considerable impact on a new generation of artists, most notably Gauguin (1848–1903) and the young Pablo Picasso (1881–1973).

Gauguin’s Symbolism was unique in that he sought escape from civilization in less industrialized, so-called primitive cultures rather than in the imaginary dream world of his predecessors. Vision of the Sermon (1888; National Galleries of Scotland, Edinburgh) marks his first intentionally Symbolist picture painted in the Synthetic style that he developed with Émile Bernard (1868–1941) in Brittany in 1888, which aimed to synthesize abstracted form with emotional or spiritual experience. Here, Gauguin combined heavily outlined, simplified shapes with solid patches of vivid color to symbolically express the ardent piety of simple Breton women. This painting exerted a tremendous influence on the group of artists known as the Nabis , who enthusiastically adopted his aesthetic in the late 1880s and 1890s.

Gauguin’s search for a lost paradise ultimately led him to the South Seas, where he filled his canvases, prints, and sculptures with highly personal and esoteric imagery that deliberately eludes a clear or finite interpretation ( 51.112.2 ). Describing his greatest Symbolist masterpiece, the monumental Where Do We Come From? What Are We? Where Are We Going? (1897–98; Museum of Fine Arts, Boston), Gauguin echoed Mallarmé in proclaiming that “explanatory attributes—known symbols—would congeal the canvas into a melancholy reality, and the problem indicated would no longer be a poem.”

Though it began in France, Symbolism was an international avant-garde movement that spread across Europe and North America during the last two decades of the nineteenth century. The Norwegian Edvard Munch (1863–1944) was closely associated with Symbolist circles, spending time in Paris before settling in Germany in the early 1890s. Munch’s intensely personal style is often referred to as Symbolic Naturalism as his subjects are not exotic or fantastical but based on the real anxieties of modern existence. Virtually all of the canvases he produced between 1893 and 1902 belong to a series called the Frieze of Life . These paintings explore themes of illness, loneliness, despair, and mental suffering associated with love, conditions that Munch deemed emblematic of “modern psychic life.” The Scream of 1893 (Munch-Museet, Oslo) best exemplifies fin-de-siècle feelings of isolation, disillusionment, and psychological anguish conveyed through distorted forms, expressive colors, and fluid brushwork.

In 1892, the eccentric “Sâr” Péladan founded the Salon de la Rose + Croix, inviting artists with strong Symbolist tendencies to exhibit their artwork. Ferdinand Hodler (Swiss, 1853–1918), Jan Toorop (Dutch, 1858–1928), and a number of Belgians, including Fernand Khnopff (1858–1921), were among the international participants. Also working in Belgium, though rarely exhibiting his work, was James Ensor (1860–1949), who developed a unique Symbolist style based on grotesque and carnivalesque figures. Picasso, an avid admirer of Gauguin, whose works he first encountered while visiting Paris in 1901, enthusiastically embraced Symbolism during his formative years in Barcelona. His Blue Period works, such as The Blind Man’s Meal (1903; 50.188 ), depict mentally and physically downtrodden characters in the greatly simplified style characteristic of pictorial Symbolism.

In Central Europe, Symbolism witnessed a late flourishing in the works of the Vienna Secession and Gustav Klimt (1862–1918) in particular, whose canvases display a deep fascination with both the productive and destructive forces of female sexuality ( Salome , 1909; Museo Ca’ Pesaro, Venice). Klimt’s highly ornamental style reveals the close connection between Symbolism and parallel movements in the decorative arts such as Art Nouveau .

The Symbolists’ rejection of naturalism and narrative in favor of the subjective representation of an idea or emotion would have a significant effect on the artwork of the twentieth century, particularly the formulation of German Expressionism and Abstraction.

Myers, Nicole. “Symbolism.” In Heilbrunn Timeline of Art History . New York: The Metropolitan Museum of Art, 2000–. http://www.metmuseum.org/toah/hd/symb/hd_symb.htm (August 2007)

Further Reading

Christian, John. Symbolists and Decadents . London: Thames & Hudson, 1977.

Lucie-Smith, Edward. Symbolist Art . London: Thames & Hudson, 2001.

Mathieu, Pierre-Louis. The Symbolist Generation, 1870–1910 . New York: Skira, 1990.

Additional Essays by Nicole Myers

• Myers, Nicole. “ The Lure of Montmartre, 1880–1900 .” (October 2007)
• Myers, Nicole. “ Women Artists in Nineteenth-Century France .” (September 2008)
• Myers, Nicole. “ The Aesthetic of the Sketch in Nineteenth-Century France .” (March 2009)

Related Essays

• The Nabis and Decorative Painting
• Pablo Picasso (1881–1973)
• Paul Gauguin (1848–1903)
• Romanticism
• Art Nouveau
• The Graphic Art of Max Klinger
• Greek Gods and Religious Practices
• Impressionism: Art and Modernity
• Lithography in the Nineteenth Century
• Neoclassicism
• Post-Impressionism
• The Pre-Raphaelites
• The Salon and the Royal Academy in the Nineteenth Century
• Umberto Boccioni (1882–1916)
• Central Europe and Low Countries, 1800–1900 A.D.
• Eastern Europe and Scandinavia, 1800–1900 A.D.
• France, 1800–1900 A.D.
• Great Britain and Ireland, 1800–1900 A.D.
• Iberian Peninsula, 1900 A.D.–present
• 19th Century A.D.
• Abstract Art
• Aestheticism
• American Art
• The Annunciation
• Art Nouveau / Jugendstil
• Biedermeier
• British Literature / Poetry
• Central Europe
• Eastern Europe
• Eastern Mediterranean
• Expressionism
• French Literature / Poetry
• Great Britain and Ireland
• Greek and Roman Mythology
• Greek Literature / Poetry
• Iberian Peninsula
• Impressionism
• Literature / Poetry
• Modern and Contemporary Art
• Mythical Creature
• Oil on Canvas
• Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood
• Religious Art
• Scandinavia
• Vienna Secession

Artist or Maker

• Baziotes, William
• Böcklin, Arnold
• Burne-Jones, Edward
• Carrière, Eugène
• Carrington, Leonora
• Dalpayrat, Pierre-Adriene
• Ensor, James
• Gauguin, Paul
• Klimt, Gustav
• Messerschmidt, Franz Xaver
• Moreau, Gustave
• Munch, Edvard
• Picasso, Pablo
• Puvis De Chavannes, Pierre
• Redon, Odilon
• Schiele, Egon
• Spilliaert, Léon
• Voisin-Delacroix, Alphonse

Essays About Dreams In Life: 14 Examples And Topic Ideas

Dreams in life are necessary; if you are writing essays about dreams in life, you can read these essay examples and topic ideas to get started.

Everyone has a dream – a big one or even a small one. Even the most successful people had dreams before becoming who they are today. Having a dream is like having a purpose in life; you will start working hard to reach your dream and never lose interest in life.

Without hard work, you can never turn a dream into a reality; it will only remain a desire. Level up your essay writing skills by reading our essays about dreams in life examples and prompts and start writing an inspiring essay today!

Writing About Dreams: A Guide

Essays about dreams in life: example essays, 1. chase your dreams: the best advice i ever got by michelle colon-johnson, 2. my dream, my future by deborah massey, 3. the pursuit of dreams by christine nishiyama, 4. my dreams and ambitions by kathy benson, 5. turning big dreams into reality by shyam gokarn, 6. my hopes and dreams by celia robinson, 7. always pursue your dreams – no matter what happens by steve bloom, 8. why do we dream by james roland, 9. bad dreams by eli goldstone, 10. why your brain needs to dream by matthew walker, 11. dreams by hedy marks, 12. do dreams really mean anything by david b. feldman, 13. how to control your dreams by serena alagappan, 14. the sunday essay: my dreams on antidepressants by ashleigh young, essays about dreams in life essay topics, 1. what is a dream, 2. what are your dreams in life, 3. why are dreams important in life, 4. what are the reasons for a person to dream big, 5. what do you think about dreams in life vs. short-term sacrifice, 6. what is the purpose of dreaming, 7. why are dreams so strange and vivid, 8. why do dreams feel so real, 9. why are dreams so hard to remember, 10. do dreams mean anything, what is a dream short essay, how can i write my dream in life.

Writing about dreams is an excellent topic for essays, brainstorming new topic ideas for fiction stories, or just as a creative outlet. We all have dreams, whether in our sleep, during the day, or even while walking on a sunny day. Some of the best ways to begin writing about a topic are by reading examples and using a helpful prompt to get started. Check out our guide to writing about dreams and begin mastering the art of writing today!

“Everyone has the ability to dream, but not everyone has the willingness to truly chase their dreams. When people aren’t living their dreams they often have limited belief systems. They believe that their current circumstances and/or surroundings are keeping them from achieving the things they want to do in life.”

In her essay, author Michelle Colon-Johnson encourages her readers to develop a mindset that will let them chase their dreams. So, you have to visualize your dream, manifest it, and start your journey towards it! Check out these essays about dreams and sleep .

“At the time when I have my job and something to make them feel so proud of me, I would like to give them the best life. I would like to make them feel comfortable and see sweet smiles on their faces. This is really the one I like to achieve in my life; mountains of words can’t explain how much I love and appreciate them.”

Author Deborah Massey’s essay talks about her dreams and everything she wanted to achieve and accomplish in her life. She also tells us that we must live our values, pursue our dreams, and follow our passions for the best future.

“Fast-forward 5+ years, and my first published book is coming out this May with Scholastic. And now, let me tell you the truth: I don’t feel any different. I’m extremely grateful for the opportunity, proud of the work I’ve done, and excited for the book’s release. But on a fundamental level, I feel the same.”

In her essay, author Christine Nishiyama shares what she felt when she first achieved one of her goals in life. She says that with this mindset, you will never feel the satisfaction of achieving your goal or the fulfillment of reaching your dream. Instead, she believes that what fulfills people is the pursuit of their dreams in life.

“My dream is to become a good plastic surgeon and day after day it has transformed into an ambition which I want to move towards. I do not want to be famous, but just good enough to have my own clinic and work for a very successful hospital. Many people think that becoming a doctor is difficult, and I know that takes many years of preparation, but anyone can achieve it if they have determination.”

Author Kathy Benson’s essay narrates her life – all the things and struggles she has been through in pursuing her dreams in life. Yet, no matter how hard the situation gets, she always convinces herself not to give up, hoping her dreams will come true one day. She believes that with determination and commitment, anyone can achieve their dreams and goals in life. 

“I have always been a big dreamer and involved in acting upon it. Though, many times I failed, I continued to dream big and act. As long as I recollect, I always had such wild visions and fantasies of thinking, planning, and acting to achieve great things in life. But, as anyone can observe, there are many people, who think and work in that aspect.”

In his essay, author Shyam Gokarn explains why having a big dream is very important in a person’s life. However, he believes that the problem with some people is that they never hold tight to their dreams, even if they can turn them into reality. As a result, they tend to easily give up on their dreams and even stop trying instead of persevering through the pain and anguish of another failure.

“When I was younger, I’ve always had a fairytale-like dream about my future. To marry my prince, have a Fairy Godmother, be a princess… But now, all of that has changed. I’ve realized how hard life is now; that life cannot be like a fairy tale. What you want can’t happen just like that.”

Celia Robinson’s essay talks about her dream since she was a child. Unfortunately, as we grow old, there’s no “Fairy Godmother” that would help us when things get tough. Everyone wants to succeed in the future, but we have to work hard to achieve our dreams and goals.

“Take writing for example. I’ve wanted to be a professional writer since I was a little boy, but I was too scared that I wouldn’t be any good at it. But several years ago I started pursuing this dream despite knowing how difficult it might be. I fully realize I may not make it, but I’m completely fine with that. At least I tried which is more than most people can say.”

In his essay, author Steve Bloom encourages his readers always to pursue their dreams no matter what happens. He asks, “Would you rather pursue them and fail or never try?”. He believes that it’s always better to try and fail than look back and wonder what might have been. Stop thinking that failure or success is the only end goal for pursuing your dreams. Instead, think of it as a long journey where all the experiences you get along the way are just as important as reaching the end goal.

“Dreams are hallucinations that occur during certain stages of sleep. They’re strongest during REM sleep, or the rapid eye movement stage, when you may be less likely to recall your dream. Much is known about the role of sleep in regulating our metabolism, blood pressure, brain function, and other aspects of health. But it’s been harder for researchers to explain the role of dreams. When you’re awake, your thoughts have a certain logic to them. When you sleep, your brain is still active, but your thoughts or dreams often make little or no sense.”

Author James Roland’s essay explains the purpose of having dreams and the factors that can influence our dreams. He also mentioned some of the reasons that cause nightmares. Debra Sullivan, a nurse educator, medically reviews his essay. Sullivan’s expertise includes cardiology, psoriasis/dermatology, pediatrics, and alternative medicine. For more, you can also see these articles about sleep .

“The first time I experienced sleep paralysis and recognised it for what it was I was a student. I had been taking MDMA and listening to Django Reinhardt. My memories of that time are mainly of taking drugs and listening to Django Reinhardt. When I woke up I was in my paralysed body. I was there, inside it. I was inside my leaden wrists, my ribcage, the thick dead roots of my hair, the bandages of skin. This time the hallucinations were auditory. I could hear someone being beaten outside my door. They were screaming for help. And I could do nothing but lie there, locked inside my body . . . whatever bit of me is not my body. That is the bit that exists, by itself, at night.”

In her essay, Author Eli Goldstone talks about her suffering from bad dreams ever since childhood. She also talks about what she feels every time she has sleep paralysis – a feeling of being conscious but unable to move.

“We often hear stories of people who’ve learned from their dreams or been inspired by them. Think of Paul McCartney’s story of how his hit song “Yesterday” came to him in a dream or of Mendeleev’s dream-inspired construction of the periodic table of elements. But, while many of us may feel that our dreams have special meaning or a useful purpose, science has been more skeptical of that claim. Instead of being harbingers of creativity or some kind of message from our unconscious, some scientists have considered dreaming to being an unintended consequence of sleep—a byproduct of evolution without benefit.”

Author Matthew Walker, a professor of psychology and neuroscience, shares some interesting facts about dreams in his essay. According to research, dreaming is more than just a byproduct of sleep; it also serves essential functions in our well-being. 

“Dreams are basically stories and images that our mind creates while we sleep. They can be vivid. They can make you feel happy, sad, or scared. And they may seem confusing or perfectly rational. Dreams can happen at any time during sleep. But you have your most vivid dreams during a phase called REM (rapid eye movement) sleep, when your brain is most active. Some experts say we dream at least four to six times a night.”

In his essay, Author Hedy Marks discusses everything we need to know about dreams in detail – from defining a dream to tips that may help us remember our dreams. Hedy Marks is an Assistant Managing Editor at WebMD , and Carol DerSarkissian, a board-certified emergency physician, medically reviews his essay.

“Regardless of whether dreams foretell the future, allow us to commune with the divine, or simply provide a better understanding of ourselves, the process of analyzing them has always been highly symbolic. To understand the meaning of dreams, we must interpret them as if they were written in a secret code. A quick search of an online dream dictionary will tell you that haunted houses symbolize “unfinished emotional business,” dimly lit lamps mean you’re “feeling overwhelmed by emotional issues,” a feast indicates “a lack of balance in your life,” and garages symbolize a feeling of “lacking direction or guidance in achieving your goals.” 

Author David B. Feldman, an author, speaker, and professor of counseling psychology, believes that dreams may not mean anything, but they tell us something about our emotions. In other words, if you’ve been suffering from a series of bad dreams, it could be worth checking in with yourself to see how you’ve been feeling and perhaps consider whether there’s anything you can do to improve your mood.

“Ever wish you could ice skate across a winter sky, catching crumbs of gingerbread, like flakes of snow, on your tongue? How about conquering a monster in a nightmare, bouncing between mountain peaks, walking through walls, or reading minds? Have you ever longed to hold the hand of someone you loved and lost? If you want to fulfill your fantasies, or even face your fears, you might want to try taking some control of your dreams (try being the operative). People practiced in lucid dreaming—the phenomenon of being aware that you are dreaming while you are asleep—claim that the experience allows adventure, self-discovery, and euphoric joy.”

In her essay, Author Serena Alagappan talks about lucid dreams – a type of dream where a person becomes conscious during a dream. She also talked about ways to control our dreams, such as keeping a journal, reciting mantras before bed, and believing we can. However, not everyone will be able to control their dreams because the levels of lucidity and control differ significantly between individuals.

“There was a period of six months when I tried to go off my medication – a slowly unfolding disaster – and I’d thought my dreams might settle down. Instead, they grew more deranged. Even now I think of the dream in which I was using a cigarette lighter to melt my own father, who had assumed the form of a large candle. I’ve since learned that, apart from more research being needed, this was probably a case of “REM rebound”. When you stop taking the medication, you’ll likely get a lot more REM sleep than you were getting before. In simple terms, your brain goes on a dreaming frenzy, amping up the detail.”

Author Ashleigh Young’s essay informs us how some medications, such as antidepressants, affect our dreams based on her own life experience. She said, “I’ve tried not to dwell too much on my dreams. Yes, they are vivid and sometimes truly gruesome, full of chaotic, unfathomable violence, but weird nights seemed a reasonable price to pay for the bearable days that SSRIs have helped me to have.” 

In simple terms, a dream is a cherished aspiration, ambition, or ideal; is it the same as your goal in life? In your essay, explore this topic and state your opinion about what the word “dream” means to you.

This is an excellent topic for your statement or “about me” essay. Where do you see yourself in the next ten years? Do you have a career plan? If you still haven’t thought about it, maybe it’s time to start thinking about your future.

Having dreams is very important in a person’s life; it motivates, inspires, and helps you achieve any goal that you have in mind. Without dreams, we would feel lost – having no purpose in life. Therefore, in your essay, you should be able to explain to your readers how important it is to have a dream or ambition in life. 

Dreaming big sounds great; however, it’s easier said than done. First, you’ve got to have reasons to dream big, which will motivate you to achieve your goals in life. If you’re writing an essay about dreams in life, mention why most people dare to dream big and achieve more in life. Is it about freedom, money, praise from other people, satisfaction, or something else entirely?

For example, you could watch movies, play video games, relax every night, or give up all of them to learn a complex skill – what would you choose, and why? In your essay about dreams in life, answer the question and include other examples about this topic so your readers can relate.

There are many answers to this question – one is that dreams may have an evolutionary function, testing us in scenarios crucial to our survival. Dreams may also reduce the severity of emotional trauma. On the other hand, some researchers say dreams have no purpose or meaning, while some say we need dreams for physical and mental health. Take a closer look at this topic, and include what you find in your essay.

Weird dreams could result from anxiety, stress, or sleep deprivation. So, manage your stress levels, and stick to a sleep routine to stop having weird dreams. If you wake up from a weird dream, you can fall back asleep using deep breaths or any relaxing activity. You can research other causes of weird dreams and ways to stop yourself from having them for your essay about dreams and sleep.

The same areas of the brain that are active when we learn and process information in the actual world are active when we dream, and they replay the information as we sleep. Many things we see, hear, and feel in our everyday lives appear in our dreams. If you want to write an informative essay about dreams and sleep, look into more details about this topic.

Tip: When editing for grammar, we also recommend taking the time to improve the readability score of a piece of writing before publishing or submitting it.

People may not remember what happened in their dreams. Studies show that people tend to forget their dreams due to the changing levels of acetylcholine and norepinephrine during sleep. This will be quite an exciting topic for your readers because many people can relate. That being said, research more information about this topic, and discuss it in detail in your essay. 

Although some people believe that dreams don’t mean anything, many psychologists and other experts have theorized about the deeper meaning of dreams. Therefore, your essay about dreams and sleep should delve deeper into this topic. If you’re stuck picking your next essay topic, check out our round-up of essay topics about education .

FAQS on Essays About Dreams in Life

There are many great short essays about dreams; you can write your own too! Some great examples include Do Dreams Really Mean Anything? by David B. Feldman and  Dreams by Hedy Marks.

Writing about your dreams in life is a fantastic creative outlet and can even help you plan your future. Use a prompt to get started, like “What are your dreams in life?” or “What do you aspire to be in ten years?” and begin writing without thinking too much about it. See where the pen takes you and start mapping out your future with this writing exercise.

Meet Rachael, the editor at Become a Writer Today. With years of experience in the field, she is passionate about language and dedicated to producing high-quality content that engages and informs readers. When she's not editing or writing, you can find her exploring the great outdoors, finding inspiration for her next project.

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IELTS Essay on Art and Culture: Samples

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Updated on 27 February, 2024

upGrad Abroad Team

Upgrad abroad editorial team.

The essays in International English Language Testing System (IELTS) exams come with specific themes and topics that aspirants have to write on. IELTS essay on Art and Culture   is one of the common topics that you can practice while preparing for the IELTS exam. The minimum word limit for it is 250 words, while there is no upper limit. Candidates should aim to complete the essays within a maximum of 40 minutes.

Table of Contents

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Why Should Current Education Models Include Art and Culture?

Art is so much more than a medium of expression. While it helps local craftspeople promote their creativity and culture, developing synergy between different communities is essential. Beyond culture, art also promotes people's cognitive abilities and critical skills, especially in children. If art is excluded from the academic curriculum, a child will face difficulties adapting to new cultures and environments. 

Art helps the younger generation adopt a diverse opinion set and successfully influences people towards the roots of society. It is also scientifically proven that art can help in reducing interdisciplinary actions, increasing attendance, and helping kids respond better in classrooms. However, some people can argue against the cause by replacing art lessons with academic concepts. In my opinion, eliminating art from school programs is another way to invite trouble and make education boring. With art, kids have the opportunity to bond with each other and creatively present their ideas. 

It is believed that children have gifted creative abilities, and regular art lessons can help stimulate their intellect. In the earlier stages of life, kids often find it challenging to catch up with linguistic capabilities and problem-solving skills. However, art helps simplify basic concepts, thus strengthening their overall academic acumen. It does not mean that academics should entirely be replaced by art. Both entities are equally important and must be essential for school coursework. However, if taught together, academics and art can bring a new change in a kid's life by giving them a healthy balance of all subjects. 

Apart from academic development, art is also linked to improved emotional intelligence in children. All art forms help stimulate emotions and present 21st-century educators with an innovative way to help kids think better. Teachers can also use art to explain scientific topics in an improved manner. For example, kids are more likely to learn basic mathematics if they see diagrammatic representation rather than just writing numbers on their notebooks. 

To conclude, we can say that schools must include art in the coursework. While some people believe it will distract and poorly affect kids' grades, it is not entirely true. Art helps kids connect with their culture at the root level and brings a sense of belonging. Overall, students can also express their values more clearly, thus making it easy for parents and teachers to track their progress.

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More and More People are Turning Towards Technology and Business. How and Why should we Promote Art and Culture?

Art has presented a medium for different cultures to express their values and connect. As a result, we come across an array of art forms all across the globe. All these forms are interrelated and possess similarities and dissimilarities. While art has played a crucial role in connecting society, we also notice more people turning to science, technology, and business sectors. 

This shift in priorities can be attributed to the lack of basic infrastructure and an everlasting need to improve the lifestyle. People believe that art is a mere expression form and not a means of adding value and character to their lives. While it is easy to admire a canvas painting or a marble sculpture, it does not improve the way our society operates. For example, a science degree is likely to get a well-paid job in a multinational corporation compared to an art degree. However, it is not entirely true. Art has given most communities a way to sustain their cultural values. Additionally, it has also been a source of revenue for underprivileged communities and resulted in their cultural and financial empowerment. Therefore, authorities must take the proper steps to promote and revive gradually disappearing art forms. 

Government can take the much-needed steps to promote art by organizing cultural events and opening more national galleries. A formal acknowledgment and celebration of the art form will help create more awareness of the cause. 

While technology has presented people with a way to connect, it has also created a more extensive community divide by acting as a two-edged sword. Art can help fill that void and bring together a larger proportion of people. Technology has made all forms of content more accessible. It has ultimately resulted in shorter attention spans. But with the promotion of art and culture at the root level, we can expect more development in our cognitive abilities and problem-solving skills. 

In conclusion, we can safely say that art is losing popularity and importance as it does not help people scale their careers. However, there is a growing need for the promotion of art. It helps us connect to our cultural roots and presents us with a way to express our thoughts and ideas. Government should focus on allotting a separate budget for the art and culture sector and provide more job opportunities in the same field. 

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Essay on My Dream for Students and Children

500+ words essay on my dream.

Everyone has a dream in his life which they want to achieve when they grow up. Some kids want to become rich so that they can buy anything and some want to be a doctor, lawyer, or engineer. But only you know that for achieving these goals you have to work hard and stay attentive to it. In this essay on my dream, we are going to discuss the basic things that will help in achieving my dream .

Determination

For turning a dream into reality the first thing that you need is determination. This will help you in a lot of ways. Firstly, it will help you decide the course of action for doing anything. Besides, it will also help you to plan the journey ahead. Also, it will help to take things slow and maintain a steady pace towards the dream.

Moreover, no matter how big my dream planning and setting short term goals will always help. This is important because rushing to your dream will not going to help you in any way. Besides, there is some dream that requires time and they follow a process without following it you cannot achieve that dream.

Staying Motivated

Lack of motivation is one of the main causes that force a person to leave his dream behind. So, staying motivated is also part of the goal. And if you can’t stay positive then you won’t be able to achieve the dream. There are many people out there that quit the journey of their dreams mid-way because they lack motivation .

Keep Remembering Goal

For completing the dream you have to keep your dream in the mind. And remind this dream to yourself daily. There come hard times when you feel like quitting at those times just remember the goal it helps you stay positive . And if you feel like you messed up big times then start over with a fresh mind.

Reward Yourself

You don’t need to cover milestones to reward yourself. Set a small target towards your dream and on fulfilling them reward yourself . These rewards can be anything from toffee to your favorite thing. Besides, this is a good way of self-motivation.

Get the huge list of more than 500 Essay Topics and Ideas

Take Some Breaks

Working towards your goal not mean that you work day and night without stopping. Apart from that, due to continuous efforts, people soon start to become de-motivated. So, taking a break will help your body and mind. For doing so, take a break in between your schedule for some time an engage yourself in other activities.

Stay Among Positive People

Your company affects you in a lot of ways than you can imagine. So, be with people who appreciate you and stay away from people who distract and criticize you.

Don’t Hesitate to Make Mistakes

To sum it up, we can say that dreaming of a goal is far easier than achieving it. And for fulfilling your dream you need a lot of things and also have to sacrifice many things.

Above all, for fulfilling your dream plan and work according to it because it will lead you to the right path. And never forget to dream big because they help in overcoming every obstacle in life.

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Chasing dreams with art

C HENNAI: The world today has turned many among us into motivational gurus. And the rest of us are mere receivers of all those words of stimulation. For anyone with a smartphone, the day dawns with words of good morning wisdom and ends with trickles of good night enlightenment, sent religiously every day by our benefactors.

To seriously ponder over whether or not these energy-boosting quotes actually help us face the chaos of our days, the answer would most probably be in the negative for most of us. Yet, there are those who have pursued their dreams against all odds, without the aid of any such digital mood enhancers. Art, in our country, is unfortunately a hugely misunderstood career. It has never been able to proclaim its self-worth, standing beside the traditionally recognised ones. Here’s a look at those who took to it, in spite of existing in backgrounds far removed from any artistic pursuits.

Colourful Journeys

Kolkata-based Bapi Das’s extraordinary journey can make any life quote pale in comparison. Hailing from a humble background, Bapi Das eked out a living, working in a stainless steel factory. Abandoned by his father, he and his older sister were raised single-handedly by his mother. The tiny single-room dwelling which he shares with his mother still boasts of a cupboard made by him during his days at the steel cupboard manufacturing plant.

He soon gave up his job at the steel plant and turned to driving an auto rickshaw to make ends meet. Driving through the lanes of Kolkata at all hours, Das felt the need to capture the visuals he saw in his rearview mirror. Chancing upon images of thread paintings at a friend’s printing press, he instantly knew that embroidery was his chosen medium.

The fact that sewing was by and large considered a feminine technique did not deter him, nor did he allow the jibes he encountered from friends to dampen his perseverance. An auto-rickshaw driver during the day and a gardener in a cemetery in the mornings, he still made time to painstakingly embroider his vision, sometimes working until the early hours of the morning.

Although it took a very long time for him to master the art of embroidery, there was no stopping him once he did. Using a self-made device with steel rods to hold the embroidery frame and a magnifying glass affixed in front of the frame to aid the perfection in each stitch, Das recreated in flawless detail the rain-drenched streets, the light from behind flashing on his mirror, an envelope with a postage stamp intact and all the other subtle images that he observed while out on the road in his auto rickshaw. With the windshield framing his creations, his route map turned into his artwork.

The turning point in his mundane life came when he was noticed by Bose Krishnamachari, the founder of the Kochi Muziris Biennale and subsequently invited to participate in the fourth edition of the Kochi Biennale, the prestigious international exhibition of contemporary art. From then on, it has been a string of successful shows that saw him finding his space in the rough terrains of the art world. Fame, however, has not changed him as he understands its impermanence and remains true to his purpose.

Framing the streets

Vicky Roy’s life would provide the perfect material for any filmmaker. From a train station ragpicker to an internationally acclaimed artist, his story is certainly awe-inspiring. The son of a tailor, he grew up with six siblings subsisting on his father’s meagre income. Wishing to see his son educated, his father sent him to stay with his grandparents. The boy soon tired of constantly being rebuked and at age 11, ran away with barely Rs 900 to see him through.

Arriving at the New Delhi railway station all the way from West Bengal, he initially existed on his earnings as a ragpicker at the railway station and later, by washing dishes at a roadside eatery. Thanks to a stroke of luck, the Salaam Baalak Trust, an NGO that works on rehabilitating street children, came to his rescue. At the trust, he was introduced to the camera when a photography workshop was organised for the children.

His life was never the same - so smitten was he with photography and the world of infinite possibilities for a better life that suddenly opened up. He decided to enrol in a photography course and gradually, his fascination took on a serious tone. He purchased a camera with a loan provided by the Trust and embarked on a project of capturing the lives of other street children that led to his first solo exhibition titled Street Dreams. His subjects, though victims of society’s marginalisation, shine through in his photographs with their bright optimism, erasing the darkness of their existence.

In another series titled, ‘This Scarred Land’, he presents the battle between nature and industrial invasion in his images of the mountain ranges in Himachal Pradesh. In 2008, he was selected to visually document the reconstruction of the World Trade Centre in New York. Starting from his days as a ragpicker to eventually being invited to lunch with Prince Edward at Buckingham Palace, being awarded the MIT Media Fellowship in 2016, participating in the prestigious Kochi Muziris Biennale in 2018, publishing several books on photography and being featured in the Forbes Asia ‘30 under 30‘ list, Roy has indeed come a long way.

“When history chooses to ignore lives, they become rumours, stories, half-truths and incomplete lies. I attempt to reclaim a part of history that could lose itself to oblivion. I do not aim to shock the viewers or push them to look at reality by painting a bleak picture of despair. Instead of confrontation, I try to portray the realities of life in a sublime way.” says Roy, who learnt to remain untouched by his meteoric rise. His life of struggle and determination is a lesson for humanity.

Tribal forms in a contemporary world

Shantibai may seem like a complete misfit in the contemporary world of art where elitism often reigns, but this Adivasi artist has ensured a firm place for herself with more than two decades of artistic practice. Born in 1960 and hailing from the conflict-ridden region of Bastar in Chhattisgarh, Shantibai carves her stories on the traditional memorial pillars of her community called Maria Khambas. Unlike the traditional pillars that commemorate the prominent among the dead like the village chieftains, her pillars narrate tales from Adivasi's lives.

“My paintings show my lived experiences and all that is happening in the world around me,” she says of her compositions. Her wooden pillars take around three to four months to come into being and the process is laborious. Using wood that has been cut by the authorities for ‘development’ or that which has fallen on its own, she sets about transforming these procured logs into sculpted tales. On the strength of the immense support she received from artist Navjot Altaf who championed Shantibai’s practice from the late 1990s, she built the Dialogue Centre in Bastar together with Altaf, where besides her studio practice, discussions and conversations were initiated on several issues that required questions to be posed.

To be excluded from not just mainstream society but also from the mainstream world of art that professes equality and inclusivity was a challenge that Shantibai faced with grit and unflinching faith in her art. Her list of shows in some of the most prestigious art galleries is ample proof of her belief that her people cannot be considered expendable citizens of the country. Their stories matter and as long as she possibly can, she will shout them out loudly to the world through her art. Recently chosen to exhibit at the inaugural show of the Nita Mukesh Ambani Cultural Centre in Mumbai, Shantibai faced the assembled audience of global celebrities as an artist in her own right, on par with the best in the world.

The lives of these artists are inspirational and worth a thought. If there burns the fire of a purpose to your life within you, then nothing is impossible. The flames will be motivation enough to lead you on your path to success and fulfilment, for it has often been said that it is the courage to continue that count.

Disney Springs

FIRST LOOK: New Drone Show Coming to Disney Springs

by Joey McElroy , Communications Manager, Disney Live Entertainment

As you may know, the skies above Disney Springs will come alive with our new “Disney Dreams That Soar presented by AT&T” drone show beginning May 24.  And today, we’re excited to share an exclusive first look at the experience fans of Disney characters will absolutely love! 

The Disney Live Entertainment team behind this limited-time nighttime experience recently got the chance to see all their hard work take to the skies during the first set of creative rehearsals for the show. Today we’re sharing those first glimpses from an off-site property, as well as some exciting new details, about the larger-than-life experience soon to be the perfect complement to an evening at Disney Springs.

“We are presenting Disney characters who have had a dream of flying. Not just the idea that they can fly, but the idea of taking their lives to the next level.” said Show Director, Tony Giordano. “We put a lot of thought in making sure that no matter how old you are, or how much of a fan you are, you’re going to see a character that you love.”

And a lot of characters means a lot of drones. 800 drones to be exact – all working together to create a massive canvas in the night sky. Trust me, nothing can prepare you for the awe of seeing a Baymax nearly twice the height of Spaceship Earth inflate, transform, and disappear right in front of your eyes.

“We were given the assignment to create an experience where you want to just hold the hand of the person next to you,” said Tony. “That’s always echoing in my mind as we work on this show.”

Music plays a big role in that connection. “Disney Dreams That Soar” features well-known and beloved soundtracks in addition to an original song that will inspire you to follow your heart, take a leap of faith, and reach for the stars.

Insider tip: The best place to experience the drones “dancing” to this new soundtrack will be along the waterway in the Disney Springs West Side. Clocking in at just under 10 minutes, the show is a perfect kiss-goodnight to your day of shopping, playing, and dining at Disney Springs, with 2 shows each evening this summer. Also, while you’re out there, keep an eye out for Tony!   

“I can’t wait to stand next to the guests and hear their reactions. That’s my favorite part of building any show because those reactions are why we do what we do. We want them to actually experience magic, and when you see all these drones, to me, you get to see real magic!”

Check out the video below, and catch “Disney Dreams That Soar presented by AT&T” nightly May 24-Sept. 2 at Disney Springs.

View this post on Instagram A post shared by Disney Parks (@disneyparks)

“Disney Dreams That Soar presented by AT&T” is an outdoor show and subject to cancellation or rescheduling due factors like inclement weather. Showtimes may vary throughout the summer. Check DisneySprings.com for the latest schedule .

Destinations: Disney Springs

I checked on another site and the times listed are 9pm and 10.45pm each night.

So impressive to see these preview pictures. Let’s get the family together in FL to see it in person!!

Show times? Or do they vary? Thanks!

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At a Cannes Film Festival of big swings and faceplants, real life takes a back seat

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“Is it too real for ya?” snarls the Gang of Four-soundalike punk band Fontaines D.C. over a thrumming bass line on the soundtrack to “Bird” as we cruise the streets of Gravesend, Kent, east of London. How’s this for too real? Piloting an e-scooter is the shirtless, much-tatted Bug, played by Barry Keoghan, last seen in “Saltburn” wearing significantly less. Hanging onto him is 12-year-old Bailey (Nykiya Adams), his daughter from a previous relationship (something of a stretch, age-wise, but sure).

Ever the optimist, Bug is planning to sell the hallucinogenic slime he skims off the back of a toad he’s imported from Colorado to fund his imminent wedding to a fling of three months. And despite having an elaborate, curling centipede inked on his face and neck, he’s crestfallen that Bailey would let a friend cut off her locks before the big day. She’s entering surly adolescence like a hot comet and not thrilled to have a new stepmother.

It’s all in keeping with the studied miserablism of British director and Cannes darling Andrea Arnold ( “American Honey” ). Every interior in “Bird” is more squalid than the last; every door seems designed to be busted down by a violent boyfriend.

Is it too real for ya?

Actually, no, not really. And that’s before Arnold introduces us to Bailey’s creepy Boo Radley-ish friend, the mysterious title character (Franz Rogowski of “Passages,” deepening his brand of bug-eyed strangeness), who, in a long-telegraphed moment of protective vengeance, sprouts huge CGI wings that were already painfully suggested.

“Bird” is part of what might be described as Cannes’ reality problem. Or so it seems — it’s only the halfway mark — as we ping-pong between screenings of revered directors leaping off the deep end, their former penchants for verisimilitude tossed aside. Emerging from the raves for George Miller’s “Furiosa: A Mad Max Saga” came the admission, shared by many, that it just wasn’t convincing physically: too lacquered and digitally finessed, the grungy tactility of “The Road Warrior” long gone. Any hope of Francis Ford Coppola reproducing the warmth of his best films was dashed by the sprawling “Megalopolis,” a Rome-as-New-York urban fantasia that, for all its delightful looniness , could have used some subway grit.

Maybe realness is overrated. It’s tempting (but too easy) to impose a coordinated aesthetic on any one edition of a film festival, the early responders hoping to collate their scattered experience of seeing multiple movies a day into a larger sense of coherence. Still, this was restless work. Many of Cannes’ first-week offerings felt like products of the pandemic and, as such, exuded an air of desperation.

Paul Schrader ’s flashback-heavy “Oh, Canada” — sluggish even at 95 minutes — is expressly about notions of reputational realness unraveling. A Hollywood lion in a fascinating winter, the always-watchable Richard Gere plays Leonard Fife, a celebrated Errol Morris-like lefty documentarian, who, though suffering through the final stages of cancer, agrees to a filmed interrogation by some of his most devoted students. Already you anticipate that some of these interviews aren’t going to go Leonard’s way as Schrader’s métier, the language of self-excoriating doubt, finds voice.

Was he a draft dodger who fled to Canada on principle to escape military service? Was he a faithful family man? No points for guessing correctly on those two. Meanwhile, a deeper truth emerges, more about the inexorable march of time than integrity. Gere, reuniting with Schrader for their first collaboration since the exuberant strut of 1980’s “American Gigolo,” is a fragile, vulnerable presence here, playing up Leonard’s thickened voice and dimmed virility. “I have a Genie and a Gemini!” he sputters, clinging to his awards while the rest of his life tips into fabrication.

Please, Yorgos Lanthimos , show us how it’s done: If we’re going to have a Cannes overrun with fantasy, let one come from the maker of “Poor Things” and “The Lobster.” The Greek director has chosen an unfortunate moment to do a faceplant. “Kinds of Kindness,” though it gets its audience pumped with opening credits set to Eurythmics’ snaky, pounding “Sweet Dreams (Are Made of This),” slackens into a tiresome trio of subpar mini-films lacking the emotive weirdness that Lanthimos usually serves on tap.

It’s not the actors’ fault, many of whom take on triple duty in three brittle, gruesome tales about, sequentially, murderous micromanagement, cannibalistic survival and obsessive cultdom. The cast launches gamely into the flat-toned violence: Jesse Plemons, Emma Stone, Willem Dafoe, Hong Chau and a particularly committed Margaret Qualley (who hopefully filed for worker’s comp). The weak link, however, is the script by Lanthimos and Efthimis Filippou, who, despite the hope they’d steer back to their darkly suggestive “Dogtooth” days, can’t seem to link their customary meanness to any kind of profundity.

Lanthimos has never made a movie this gratuitously brutal (brace for a fried thumb served on a dinner plate), nor has he made one this dumbly obvious, relying on that ominous, pinging piano note from “Eyes Wide Shut” and a frisky cast to sock it over. He’s clearing his throat. It’s more a collection of memes than a sustained piece of thinking.

Cannes: Coppola’s Roman candle ‘Megalopolis’ is juicy and weird

Starring Adam Driver, Giancarlo Esposito and an unhinged Aubrey Plaza, the storied director’s latest passion project brings the heat of an event film to Cannes.

May 16, 2024

One filmmaker, though, has nailed the free-floating dreaminess that Cannes seems to be lost in, the Zambia-born Rungano Nyoni, whose confidence summoning a mood clarifies in the exquisitely haunting “On Becoming a Guinea Fowl.” (Playing in the Un Certain Regard section, her drama runs circles around several others in the official competition.) It begins in the middle of the night — a sequence you’ll never want to end — as Shula (Susan Chardy), driving home from a party, pulls over. There’s a dead body on the road. Turns out it’s her uncle Fred. A garrulous, drunk cousin, Nsansa (Elizabeth Chisela), shows up, lending her some unwanted company.

The movie then eases into the rituals of mourning: mounting a funeral, cooking for the bereaved, grieving performatively, so much of it conducted in a state of shock. Nyoni’s debut, the surreal 2017 comic satire “I Am Not a Witch,” poked a sharp stick in the eye of African mysticism, drafting a solemn girl into unwanted witchery while other women remained tethered to traditional roles. Here, the connection is cooler and more disturbing. As Shula steps into rooms flooded with water, the film pivots to a trance-like menace, echoed by Lucrecia Dalt’s scraping experimental synth score.

We also learn more about guinea fowl than ever imagined, including how the plump species warns the rest of the herd of danger. Shula, lost in her stubbornly vague half-memories, can’t quite shake free of her uncle’s past. And when a final showdown arrives — several women and girls chirping out an animalistic warning — the hair on the back of your neck pricks up.

Suddenly, Cannes was too real after all.

More to Read

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Review: Despite starring a possessed stuffed animal, the dull ‘Imaginary’ is close to unbearable

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Everyone was feeling ‘A Real Pain’ at Sundance this year

Jan. 26, 2024

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Joshua Rothkopf is film editor of the Los Angeles Times. He most recently served as senior movies editor at Entertainment Weekly. Before then, Rothkopf spent 16 years at Time Out New York, where he was film editor and senior film critic. His writing has appeared in the New York Times, Sight and Sound, Empire, Rolling Stone and In These Times, where he was chief film critic from 1999 to 2003.

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A ‘Changed Landscape’: Voices From Israel

More from our inbox:, trump’s cheer squad, hmm, maybe a.i. should take over the world, a call for bipartisan action, playing catch, bring back the apostrophes.

To the Editor:

I write this as I mark Israeli Independence Day in the changed landscape of my neighborhood.

Across the street: the home of a soldier killed in Gaza. Up the block: those of three more fallen soldiers. The park next to the grocery store: dedicated to the memory of another fallen soldier. Inside, an amputee carries yogurt with his elbow because his lower arm is gone. Around the corner: the home of a young man murdered at the Tribe of Nova music festival on Oct. 7.

Nearby: the home of my former student who defended Kfar Aza kibbutz until Hamas terrorists shot him. He’s been in the I.C.U. for seven months. Past the park: the home of Noa Marciano, a soldier and hostage who was murdered in Al-Shifa Hospital. Overhead: the drone of warplanes.

We are still under attack from Hamas and Hezbollah. No one in Israel is out of the cross hairs. We’re not sleeping soundly at night. We won’t breathe deeply until the hostages and our soldiers come home.

I want to start a school for religious Muslim and Jewish girls. I plan to spend next year studying Arabic. I dream of a two-state solution.

I think your coverage of this war would look different if you took a walk in my neighborhood.

Sarah Greenberg Modiin, Israel

We support the protests against Israel that take place on many campuses in the United States and call on the school administrations to accommodate these protests rather than attempt to crush them, although they disrupt normal activities and annoy people who support Israel’s general policies regarding the Palestinian people.

Supporting the protests does not mean agreeing with every slogan or opinion that is voiced or held by some of their participants. It means agreeing with their core demands, which, in the immediate term, call for an end to the brutal Israeli attack on Gaza and a full withdrawal of Israeli forces from the territory.

In the long term, the call is for a reasonable and stable resolution of the Israel-Palestine conflict in a way that would allow members of both nationalities to live in peace and with dignity.

We hold these truths to be self-evident: The suffering of generations of Palestinians does not justify the massacres by Hamas on Oct. 7. Nor do these massacres justify the brutal attack that Israel launched on Gaza following that day.

Oded Goldreich Anat Matar Tel Aviv Dr. Goldreich is a professor of computer science at the Weizmann Institute of Science. Dr. Matar is a senior lecturer at the department of philosophy at Tel Aviv University and a political activist.

Re “ Loyalty in Trump’s Trial Guest List ” (Political Memo, May 15):

The Trump election-interference trial (for that’s what it is) has seen a parade of high-profile Republicans in the courtroom to support their leader. We might think that members of Congress (including the House speaker, Mike Johnson) would have better things to do, like legislating, than to junket to Lower Manhattan to sit in on a criminal trial involving attempts to keep relevant information from voters.

But even if the attendees do not have actual work to do making the nation’s laws, have they no shame? Do they not realize that by abasing themselves in this way they are being dragged down to Donald Trump’s level? I suppose they do not care, but their constituents and the rest of us should.

Jonathan J. Margolis Brookline, Mass. The writer is a lawyer.

Not only has the parade of bootlickers parroted Donald Trump’s lies, the mini-Trumps all dressed like him with dark blue suits and red ties. It would be funny if this cult of personality were not so dangerous.

Michael E. Mahler Los Angeles

Re “ New Polls Find Trump in Lead in Swing States ” (front page, May 14):

When I read that nearly 20 percent of polled respondents blame President Biden more than former President Donald Trump for overturning Roe v. Wade, I go from dreading A.I. taking over the world to rooting for it to do so.

Saul Janson Venice, Calif.

Re “ Amid Air Travel Turmoil, Senate Passes Legislation to Reauthorize the F.A.A. ” (Business, May 10):

After months of negotiations, the bipartisan F.A.A. reauthorization is nearly ready for takeoff — but only because the House and the Senate were running out of runway. The lack of action on this critical funding unfortunately wasn’t a unique instance, but instead a paradigm of how Congress functions these days.

Upticks in near misses and shortages in safety inspectors and air traffic controllers should have been reason enough to reauthorize the agency months ago. But lawmakers put politicking before policymaking, as they used short-term extensions to prevent funding lapses and government shutdowns. This is not how Congress should legislate, at least on issues as critical as air transportation safety.

It’s time that our elected officials change the dynamic. They can do this if they regularly identify and prioritize win-win areas where bipartisanship is both possible and needed. As the November elections inch closer, Congress should not shirk its responsibilities and shy away from necessary bipartisan collaboration.

Liam deClive-Lowe Paolo Mastrangelo Washington The writers are the co-founders and co-presidents of American Policy Ventures, an organization that helps policymakers work together.

Re “ Quiet Joy in Games of Catch ,” by Jessica Shattuck (Opinion guest essay, May 12):

Anytime a dad and his son can play catch is, for me anyway, a precious and an almost spiritual time. Too bad so many folks are too busy to enjoy such a simple fun thing to do.

Jack Murray Raleigh, N.C.

In a month I’ll be 81. My well-worn, decades-old baseball glove and two hardballs, one sitting deep in its pocket, sit on a low table near my front door.

Nina Kraut Washington

Re “ Subtle Change in Street Signs Arouses English Towns Sticklers ” (news article, May 12):

The North Yorkshire Council is not the only entity — and far from the first — to try to eliminate the apostrophe. An obscure government agency established in 1890, the U.S. Board on Geographic Names, banned the use of the possessive apostrophe in U.S. place names under its authority for well over a century, granting five exceptions.

Most people have heard of Martha’s Vineyard, one of the five, but not the other four: Ike’s Point, John E’s Pond, Carlos Elmer’s Joshua View, and Clark’s Mountain.

If these little-known places have the coveted punctuation mark, why not Pikes Peak, Harpers Ferry, Toms River and others?

James P. Finnegan Chappaqua, N.Y.