Charlotte Waltz-Rieber

“Stay a While…” is a dream journal made from ink drawings on 5×7 inch paper. Rather than capturing several dreams in this book, I worked to illustrate a specific moment I often experience when I begin lucid dreaming. This piece is about a recurring motif in my dreams, in which characters become aware that they are only extensions of myself. Typically, this moment is anxiety-inducing. The realization that those around me are only able to help me as much as I am able to help myself, the feeling that I am essentially alone. In order to capture this sense of anxiety, I drew myself lost and floating along an endless body of water under an endless night’s sky. However, in developing the concept for this journal, I wanted to give a more positive spin to the idea of a conversation with oneself. While the ladybug can’t help us wake up, her inviting tone encourages me to embrace being with myself, to learn from it, to enjoy moments of solitude, and to appreciate the world I’ve built and lost us in.