Estefania Santos

Artist Statement

We are constantly consuming and filling our brains with all sorts of media. The media that I believe to be most important is art, it constructs our perception of both our past and present. But what happens when details are exempted from the media we consume and are filled with empty space? How does that construct our perception of our past and present? The answer to that question leads me to my goal as an artist; to contribute to filling those empty spaces. I will represent the unrepresented. Currently, most of my work does not fulfill the representation I aspire for, but that is because I am only at the beginning of my journey as an artist. For the time being, art for me is an exploration. Through the art I make, I am finding my own style and mediums so that I may be closer to reaching my goal.

Dreams
I’m in a room, it’s not my room, but it is my room. In it there is a girl who I know well, and a girl that I don’t. That dream itself is a blur because the second I find myself in my bed I think of how strange it was, all while forgetting the entirety of the dream itself. 

I try to get out of bed, but I can’t move. It’s as if something is restricting my body from getting up. Not through strength, but through will power, I force myself out of bed. The action wasn't physically restraining, but it was mentally. To get out of bed I can only crawl, but the second I touch the floor.. I wake up? 

It was a dream, 

but it felt so real.. so, real. I try to get up, but once again I can’t move. I’m still dreaming. The cycle repeats itself over and over again. Each time feeling more real than the last. Again and again. Sometimes I get as far as my door, and sometimes I can’t lift a single finger. 

That is until the time I reach my door and open it. I’m certain I’m awake now, so I go to tell my parents about my bizarre dream, but as I approach the kitchen, I find myself in bed again. And again.
After waking many times, I do eventually reach the kitchen, I tell my parents my bizarre dream, and even eat breakfast. This is real. It feels so real there’s no way it isn’t,
but it wasn’t. 

Then the time came where I woke, and it feels different than all the other times, something about now feels so real. 

I’m finally awake. 

I reach for my phone to text my friend about it, but my heart drops when I find myself in bed again. In panic I try forcing myself awake as I’m fully conscious that I’m dreaming, I try controlling my dream, I try changing it, but there is nothing I can do but endure. 

I endure again, again, again, again, and again, and again, and again, and again. I endure it all until there suddenly is no again,    

and I am awake in a time that doesn’t loop.

But whenever I wake up from a dream I forget it completely, or just remember minor details. However, months later in nearly perfect detail, I still remember the dream that felt more real than real, could that mean it was? What if it was, and I was stuck in an endless cycle that made real time keep repeating itself endlessly? What made it stop? What if... it never did?