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00:00. How often I catch the clock at that precise moment. Strange. But I am still asleep. It is getting cold.

I can hear the City in the distance. Fleeting faces remind me of the bustle of rush hour. I know them. But we might as

well be strangers.

My mind is distracted by the flickering shadows around me. I press on nonchalantly as the day becomes an uncertain

memory.

Thoughts pass without judgement, consciousness recedes into dream. The weight and confines of reality no longer

determine what unfolds.

Phantasmagoria.

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Sanja and Boon have known each other for many years. Both work in the City, a place not immediately associated

with art. But it is through art that Sanja and Boon became fast friends.

Sanja likes to paint. She can't pinpoint one inspiration for what she paints - painting just happens. "I guess I take in all

experiences, emotions, reality, imagination, dreams. What is really interesting is if it stirs something in you, the

spectator. Anything: good or bad, pleasant or disturbing, joyful or frightening. light or dark. Darkness in particular is not

widely accepted or welcome, but it is an inescapable part of all of us. And acknowledging and exploring it can be

liberating!”

Boon has always loved being behind the lens, capturing glimpses of the surreal while wandering the streets of cities

around the world. Whilst her photography always begins with an offhand snapshot of reality, her final works project

anything but the quotidian. Chiaroscuro features prominently in Boon’s images, with dramatic twists and shadows

deliberately obscuring any trace of realism to create a unique world of her own. The photographs are an invitation to

share the moment with Boon, evoking a feeling familiar yet dreamlike, a fleeting sense of déjà vu almost entirely

untethered from the everyday. Boundaries blur between light and dark, life and daydream.

Having spent years independently pursuing art in their respective media, Sanja and Boon were surprised to find their

work sharing a common theme. Perhaps offering an escape from life in the City, perhaps giving shape to emotions

they themselves are oblivious to, Sanja and Boon's images evoke fantastic dreamscapes - surreal, sometimes

menacing worlds asking to be explored. Both Sanja and Boon love art that evokes. Their preoccupation is neither with

technical process nor with any premeditated effect, but rather they hope to create personal images that resonate. As

Oscar Wilde wrote in his preface to The Picture of Dorian Gray, "It is the spectator, and not life, that art really mirrors”.

Exhibition: Phantasmagoria

Location: The Gallery in Redchurch Street, 50 Redchurch Street, London E2 7DP

Dates: 3-8 December 2013

Hours: Daily 11-7pm

Email: lu.boon.heng@gmail.com; sanjajovic82@gmail.com