The Time of Dreaming the World Awake
Yvette Monahan

The Time of Dreaming the World Awake is a portrait of a place, a landscape of possibility. This body of work is based in a small region in Southern France. It centres on the story of Bugarach, the ‘magic’ mountain 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 and some believed that Bugarach was to be the first bastion of this modern Arcadia. For Yvette Monahan, his sense of possibility and palpable charge allowed an allegorical landscape full of portents to exist, one that was beyond the visual reality. This photobook is one of two by the same name. The function of the two books is to ‘offer an insight on her thinking process, from dummy to final publication. They evidence how nowadays dummy books have become almost the final product; rare are the cases where pages are taped together. The means of production are at our disposal like never before.¹

Yvette Monahan is an Irish photographic artist from Sligo, who lives and works in Dublin. In recent years, Yvette’s practice has changed from looking at stories held in the landscape to looking at stories held within. Her current practice looks to further her understanding of three main ideas, namely intuition, transcendence, and narrative.  She engages with different processes to investigate these precepts, incorporating photography, drawing, sculpture and print-making.  Yvette aims to create images that reflect the inner world and outer spaces. ²