The Haunted: Insomnia & Reverie - A Dream of Autoimmunity

How does it feel when reality doesn’t behave quite as expected?

Strange occurrences at nighttime, listening houses, dancing illness and otherworldly portals… Welcome to The Haunted.

The Haunted offers insights into the emotional experience of chronic illness and parasomnia and invites you into the eerie, surreal and uncanny space of the liminal with:

Reverie – a dream of autoimmunity (work in progress) – entanglements between chronic illness and a repetitive dream inspired Joanna Holland’s autofictional tale of love, loss and unpredictability. Performed as a dreamlike monologue by award-winning actress Louise Kim Salter. Directed by Stéphanie Joalland.

Insomnia – artist Leah Clements discusses her latest body of work which explores the emotional and psychological effects of insomnia.

Followed by an artist Q&A.

The Haunted is devised by multidisciplinary artist Joanna Holland, whose exhibition Out of the Blue – exploring the experience of chronic illness and invisible disability – was at PrimeYarc in Great Yarmouth in 2023.

Running over the course of a year, The Haunted is a collection of performances, talks, readings and soundscapes which explore liminal space, dreaming, sick bodies, horror and the uncanny.
Offering insights into what it feels like emotionally to be haunted by bodies, haunted by sickness, haunted by dreams, this collection shares how people with chronic illness and encountering parasomnia undergo a change in their experience of space and time.

Female-led narratives by Disabled and non-Disabled artists share what it’s like to exist in an ever-shifting, ‘in between’ space. Performances invite you into the eerie, surreal and uncanny space of the liminal.

Find out more about the project here.