2 / Dreams and Visions

• • The Ecstasy of St. TeresaGian Lorenzo Bernini (Italian, 1598–1680)	Garden of Earthly DelightsHieronymus Bosch (Netherlandish, ca. 1450–1516)	The Night Journey of Muhammad on His Steed, Buraq from the Bustan of SacdiUnknown painter; Sultan Muhammad Nur (calligrapher) (Uzbekistani, active first half of 16th century)	The ScreamEdvard Munch (Norwegian, 1863–1944)	The False MirrorRené Magritte (Belgian, 1898–1967)	Le Pont-au-Change (The Exchange Bridge, Paris)Charles Méryon (French, 1821–1868)
    St. Francis of AssisiFrancisco de Zurbaràn (Spanish, 1598–1644)	The Four SleepersMokuan Reien (Japanese, d. 1345)	Revenge of the GoldfishSandy Skoglund (American, b. 1946)	Women’s Dreamings of the Tanami Desert 2Margaret Anjullu (Anjule Bumblebee) (Aboriginal, n.d.)	“Sisilia Sii–Weaver”Flores Island, Indonesia	Utatane soshi emaki (A Wakeful Sleep)Tosa Mitsunobu (Japanese, 1434–1525)
    Dream, Caused by the Flight of a Bee (Around a Pomegranate, a Second Before Waking Up)Salvador Dalí (Spanish, 1904–1989)	Angel of the RevelationWilliam Blake (English, 1757–1827)	The JungleWifredo Lam (Cuban, 1902–1982)	The Broken ColumnFrida Kahlo (Mexican, 1907–1954)	HeadrestShona artist, Zimbabwe	Lintel 25 of Yaxchilán Structure 23Maya artist, Yaxchilán, Chiapas, Mexico

expert perspective

Mary Nooter Roberts Professor of Culture and Performance, University of California, Los Angeles

“

A headrest is essentially a sleeping pillow, but it’s a sleeping pillow made in many cases from wood. In sub-Saharan Africa, it’s most common to see a headrest made from wood, and one might think how could this be comfortable? How could a pillow from wood possibly be comfortable?

In fact, in a tropical climate, you want a pillow that is cool and that isn’t sort of rubbing up against your neck. And wood is perfect for that. Furthermore, over time, a headrest made from wood that belongs to a person for a very long period of time will conform to a person’s bone structure. And they can actually be remarkably comfortable. Not only that, headrests acquire very personal significance for many people in Africa. Headrests are so closely associated with an individual that if for any reason that person’s body can not be found at death, like let’s say they drowned or something like that, the headrest could be buried in place of the person. And they often are associated with dreams, and we know very definitively that Shona headrests are used by spirit mediums, specifically for contacting the ancestors through dreams for information, for guidance into the future. And so they really are vehicles of problem-solving and visions and dreamwork.”