Susan Aldworth: The Dark Self
Susan Aldworth

• Tuesday 6 June 2017, 6.00PM to 7.00pm
• Free admission
  Booking required
• St Mary’s Church, Castlegate (view map)
• This event involves walking around the exhibition with artist Susan Aldworth and no seating is available.

Event details

The Dark Self is a major new exhibition featuring prints, installation, moving image and sculptures, all exploring the mystery of what happens to the ‘self’ during deep sleep. It includes 1001 embroidered pillowcases, sewn by people from across the UK, each representing ideas of sleep and dreams. 

Join Susan Aldworth, the Wellcome Artist in Residence at the University of York, as she introduces the new exhibition, explaining how she has brought science and art together in new and innovative ways.

She will discuss how we spend a third of our lives asleep and that during that time – except for brief periods of wakefulness and recalled dreaming - we are completely unaware of ourselves and our surroundings. However, science has shown that in deep sleep our brains are just as active as when we are awake. It seems therefore, that the brain actively switches the ‘self’ off during sleep.

Deep sleep then, Susan will explain, is an experience of nothingness but one that is full of fundamental but hidden activity. At the heart of the exhibition is the question of how this activity can be analysed and communicated to others.

Come along and find out more about this exciting new exhibition.

This event is supported by York Museums Trust, the University of York, Lotte Inch Gallery, BATES of London, the Wellcome Trust and Viking Loom.

About the artist

Susan Aldworth is the Wellcome Artist in Residence at the University of York. Susan is an experimental printmaker and filmmaker referencing philosophy, medicine, and neuroscience in her work exploring human identity. Working on location in a medical or scientific academic department is central to her practice. She was previously Artist in Residence at the Institute of Neuroscience at Newcastle University from 2009 to 2012 and has also curated a number of exhibitions including Reassembling the Self in 2012. 

Please note that this event involves walking around the exhibition with artist Susan Aldworth and that no seating is available.

Tickets