dream id

'2022-ongoing In the series Dream ID, I explore maladaptive daydreaming - a state in which fantasy displaces reality, creating a parallel life inside the mind. The photographs are made with Polaroid in passport-photo format - a tool typically used to define and fix identity, here repurposed to capture moments where identity seems to dissolve. As a woman, I’ve often felt the pressure to appear whole: composed, productive, understandable. But what happens when your inner life doesn’t follow a linear logic? What if imagination is not escape, but a way of being - especially when being becomes difficult? In each self-portrait, I appear with everyday or incidental objects that I interact with like a child - playing, pretending, inhabiting imaginary roles. A broom becomes a sword, a towel becomes a crown, a curtain becomes a secret portal. These objects help me re-enact internal scripts that exist beyond the logic of time or adulthood. Dream ID does not tell stories or seek conclusions. It is a visual attempt to give shape to a kind of dreaming that both isolates and heals. I see this game not as an escape, but as a way of staying with myself - without fixing, explaining, or growing up.