I Couldn’t Read What I Dreamt of

About the Exhibition

Reading in dreams is rare. The two brain regions responsible for sequencing words and configuring a concept –Broca and Wernicke– remain inactive during sleeping. The area of Broca is in charge of forming and expressing language connected to meanings and words, while Wernicke’s is related to grammar and syntax arrangement. According to Dr. Deirdre Barrett, a dream expert and professor of psychology at Harvard University, dreaming about reading is so infrequent that only some people who have an anomaly in Wernicke’s area or who are writers or particularly poets can experience this phenomenon. These dreams are not necessarily about the complete inability to read. The average dreamer perceives texts as an incomprehensible jumble, and only a small percentage of dreamers affirm that they can read and understand the texts found in their oneiric experiences.
Through research and the recollection of several testimonies, Iván Martínez studies the graphic possibilities of this phenomenon as a device to develop fictitious characters, typefaces, and printed works which aim to reflect on labor, sleep, as well as different ways of perceiving graphic language.

Iván Martínez

Iván Martínez (b. 1981, Mexico) is an editorial designer based in Mexico City. His current work focuses on the development of fictional narratives and publications inspired by the aesthetics of rumor and its mechanisms of propagation and modification. He studied graphic design at UAM Xochimilco in Mexico City and completed his Master’s studies at ArtEZ / Werkplaats Typografie (Arnhem, The Netherlands, 2013–2015), and attended the Jan van Eyck Academie residency program (Maastricht, the Netherlands, 2016–2017). He designed the publication “Carlos Amorales’ Life in the Folds” for the Mexican Pavilion at the 57th Venice Biennale and the identity design “Fun & Fury!” for Cabaret Voltaire in Zurich, Switzerland. He has designed publications and identity projects for several artists and for institutions such as Het Nieuwe Instituut (Rotterdam, the Netherlands), De Vleeshall (Middelburg, the Netherlands) Museo Jumex (Mexico City, Mexico), MUAC (Mexico City, Mexico), the University of San Diego (California, USA) among others.