ARIST - Artist Residency in Sleep Training

ARIST - ARTIST RESIDENCY IN SLEEP TRAINING

Artist Statement

In efforts to transform sleep training my 2 year old daughter into a positive experience, I had to first look at what I believed would be the most negative part of the experience. I determined this would be the time that would be taken away from making my art. I realized that in order to reevaluate the sleep training experience, I would need to turn it into an art piece. Therefore, it is my intent to embark on an Artist Residency in Sleep Training. My goal will be to quantify and qualify the attachment between mother and child as experienced through the sleep training experience.

The duration of my residency will be determined by the length of time that it requires to sleep train my daughter and complete the corresponding art pieces. I will use a hybrid of sleep training methods as necessary, beginning with the method in which I will check in on my daughter every 5 minutes until she falls asleep. If necessary, I will return my child to her bed with minimal interaction for as many times as it takes and as many nights as it takes. My base will be my art studio because it is directly down the hall from my daughter's room, and also because it will signfy that which I am being pulled away from. I will allow for the sleep training methods to evolve in order to enhance the success of the experience. This will all be documented through measurements of time, distance walked, number of steps taken, and number of trips back to her bedroom on the chalkboard wall in my studio.

The final art pieces will be qualitative reflections of quantitative measurements through objects that represent sleep associations. My Artist Residency in Sleep Training will be documented on this blog.

I acknowledge that the more successful the sleep training is, the less successful the final art piece will be, therefore turning this into a win/win situation for myself.

Sarah Detweiler Farrugia

Mother of Mia, 2 yrs old