The Dreamshare Seer is a long-term, process-based, participatory project initially created with the inhabitants of the Isle of Sheppey, Kent, UK.
The project begins by making a tool, that uses generative Artificial Intelligence, (via smart phones/home computers), to visualise and animate, through text to image diffusion models, the extraordinary imaginations of its entire community as manifested through their nocturnal dreams, then described by them through simple story-telling processes. Through this interaction we hope to activate, democratise and make accessible dreaming’s amazing, involuntary, nocturnal creativity.
Ultimately, the live visual archives of these gathered dreams – this dream commons – will be publicly exhibited on the Isle of Sheppey via an interactive projected screen image using gaming technology. Through this screening the public can explore the screen-based visualisations of the island community’s nocturnal dreams, gathered in a ‘cloud’, apparently floating visually above the island. Machine Learning will reveal commonalities between dreams – clustering them around certain dreamt characters, objects, moods or events – creating a new and dynamic network of unconscious connections between individuals and communities. We can discover if, for instance, a green fox is making its appearance in multiple dreams from multiple people living in the same area!
As the project evolves, and as the community trains the AI, we will create one collective dream visualisation for the island’s inhabitants, the synthesis of all their dream contributions arranged into one dream; The Isle of Sheppey’s dream!
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Dream Theory on Sheppey – Martin Herbert 2024 .pdf
Local press:
– Interview with Dominic King, BBC Radio Kent, 2 September, 10.30am
– Cara Simmonds, ‘Artist’s AI project captures dreams’, The Sheerness Times Guardian, 4 September
– ‘Kent artist uses AI to find out if local residents share the same dreams (try it here)’, ‘cene magazine, 29 August
