"Sleeping Odyssey" is a site-specific work by artist Irini Karayannopoulou for the Warsaw Puro Hotel. In the contemporary version of "Sleeping Beauty" we meet women suspended in a state between reverie and fainting, between sexual desire and death. Their faces in the hotel windows seem calm, as if meditating. Seemingly open to the gaze of guests and passers-by, they hide many secrets.


Throughout art history painters portrayed female figures in reclining mode or dormant state. Sleeping beauties are omnipresent in mythology, and nymphs are often portrayed sleeping or reclined. From the sexual submission of the odalisques, to feasting Romans, from Manet's Olympia to Henry Moore's human landscapes and to Brancusi's female head, this posture implies that a person is being waited upon, served, highly appreciated, admired, honored, but also watched, questioned, judged, imprisoned, intoxicated.

Water has always been associated with the mysteries of womanhood and Lethe, (forgetfullness) the river that flows from the cave that is home to Hypnos, offers her waters. The result is a promenade into the unconscious, hand in hand with the pause of sleep. Women who escape the predestined route of reality. Fluid energy that flows out of their bodies. Their languorous positions announce the return of bliss.

* The event is co-organized by Puro Hotels, a company which aims to popularize knowledge of the visual arts through involvement in cultural life and educational activities.