The Time of Dreaming the World Awake by Yvette Monahan

The Time of Dreaming the World Awake is a portrait of a place, a landscape of possibility.

This photographic body of work is based in a small region in Southern France.

I was drawn there initially by the story of Bugarach, the ‘magic’ mountain. Bugarach was somehow connected to a Mayan prophecy which indicated that the world as we know it, would end on December 21st, 2012. The prophecy claimed that this date would mark the beginning of a new era for humanity, a new and sublime future. Bugarach was to be the first bastion of this modern Arcadia.

I felt that the landscape around Bugarach had a palpable charge and I was compelled to continuously return to photograph it throughout 2012. This idea of a new ideal destiny was appealing as it offered a sense of possibility. It allowed an allegorical landscape full of portents to exist, one that was beyond the visual reality.

In order to access the intangible within the landscape, I engaged my intuition, photographing people and places only when I felt moved to. I used this method of visual enquiry to try and understand the existential nature of this place.

Nothing happened that December, which was to be expected. Despite this, I realised how important it was for me to believe in the possibility of an idyll, even if it only existed in my mind.

Yvette Monahan lives and works in Dublin, Ireland.
To view more of Yvette's work, please visit her website.
Buy the book here.