Elli Crocker

Insomnia

Insomnia

These paintings are concerned with human relationships, absence and presence, awareness and oblivion. Sleep is an ancient metaphor for isolation, renewal, and transcendence. The dream world releases the unconscious mind and the body mimics death. Many of the figures are simultaneously intimate yet distant—mirroring our lives in a wakeful state. Although the figures are in bed, there is often an underlying restlessness and tension. The anxiety of insomnia becomes a kind of existential angst.