Lars Brunström, Nils Claesson, Anna Ekman, Dror Feiler, Kerstin Hansson, Kent Klich, Linda Shamma, Gunilla Sköld Feiler
16/4-15 – 19/4-15
Photography, video, sculpture
Do we all need to fall into a deep deep sleep and after a couple of hundred years one day wake up to a completely new world?
The Christian legend tells: Seven Christian youths take refuge in a cave outside the city of Ephesus around 250 AD to escape persecution under the Roman emperor Decius. There they fell asleep for around 300 years and awoke during the Christian reign of Theodosius II , believing they just slept for one night, before dying.
The Islamic legend tells (in Arabic : As-hab al Kahf, (“The Companions of the Cave”) about a dog who accompanied the youths into the cave, and was also asleep, but when people passed by the cave it looked as if the dog was just keeping watch at the entrance, making them afraid of seeing what is in the cave once they saw the dog. That dog has a great importance in the legend and is regarded as even more holy than the sleeping youths. The legend of the cult of The Seven Sleepers belongs to the literary and religious heritage that is common to Christian and Muslim tradition. It symbolizes the apocalyptic impatience by the exiles, the poor, the persecuted who hunger and thirst for justice.
Let us also remind us that there is an old and popular Swedish expression ”Sjusovare” (Seven sleeper).
