For more than ten years, I have recorded my dreams as part of my creative life. What began as a personal habit gradually developed into a large archive of images, situations, and symbolic figures that continue to influence my work as a painter.

Over time, I realised that dreams offer a particular kind of material for artistic practice. They emerge outside conscious planning and often carry a density of imagery that cannot easily be produced through deliberate invention.
In everyday life, we organise much of our experience through intention. We plan our work, define our roles, and construct narratives about who we are and what we are doing. Much of our activity is guided by the ego’s desire to control, explain, and direct events.

Dreams operate differently. They appear without permission and follow their own logic. We cannot choose the setting, the characters, or the emotional tone of a dream. In this sense, the dream world remains one of the few spaces in human experience that cannot be fully organised by the conscious mind.

For an artist, this lack of control can become a valuable resource. Dreams introduce images that feel both unfamiliar and strangely precise. They bring together memories, emotions, and symbolic figures in ways that resist rational explanation.

Because these images are not produced through conscious design, they often carry a particular intensity. They feel discovered rather than invented.

Casa tomada / House Taken Over emerged from this process.