Dream house [Possession]
![Dream house [Possession] • Sofigael M. • Huile sur lin • 81 x 65 cm • 2026](https://www.sofigael-m.art/wp-content/uploads/2026/04/Dream-house_BD_Sofigael-M_2026-1-scaled.webp)
2026
Oil on linen
31.9 x 25.6 in
To own a house. We dream of a dream house: a vast villa with a swimming pool, a small house in town, or a tropical lodge on the beach. The ideal refuge, an unfulfilled life project, keeps us awake, night after night. Every evening, obsessed, we dream, we dream…
Dream House [Possession] first examines the contemporary desire for home ownership and the obsession it can generate, when buying a home becomes difficult and the promise of a home turns into an unattainable fantasy.
Above a reclining woman, a window, or perhaps a painting, opens onto a large house with a swimming pool surrounded by palm trees. The image of the house floats above her like a mental projection. But the pink of the roof and the green of the lawn extend in tendrils into the bedroom and into the bed: little by little, the utopian house invades the sleeper. The green lines on the walls weave their web around her while the duvet tightens into a cocoon. Desire becomes confinement.
But the colours of the roof and the lawn extend as vines into the bedroom and into the bed: little by little, the utopian building invades the sleeping woman. The green lines on the walls weave their web around her while the duvet tightens into a cocoon. Desire becomes confinement.
![Dream house [Possession] • Sofigael M. • Huile sur lin • 81 x 65 cm • 2026](https://www.sofigael-m.art/wp-content/uploads/2026/04/Dream-house_Detail-paysage_4_5_Sofigael-M_2026-scaled.webp)
And when the dream becomes reality, another form of possession begins. Maintaining, repairing, repaying: the house demands time, resources and energy. The refuge then becomes a mental load, a source of anxiety and insomnia. We suffocate under the weight of responsibilities.
The home, of course, goes beyond architecture alone. It is also emotional ties, couple or family. What protects can imprison, and those we love can hold us back. We then dream no longer of entering the house, but of leaving it, loosening the ties in order to regain our breath and our freedom.
Possession: to possess a home, and no longer be able to belong to oneself.
DREAM HOUSE [POSSESSION]
To own a house. We dream, we dream of a dream house, a vast villa with a swimming pool, a little house in town, a tropical lodge on the beach... The ideal refuge, a life project with nothing left to hide, keeps us awake, night after night. We live, we live, vigil after vigil. Emotion - “and me, and me” -, relentlessly pursuing the project, every night, obsessed, we dream, we dream...
Then comes insomnia - longing, longings.
The house becomes a trap and desire remains unfulfilled. A nagging, piercing doubt inside a cocoon that suffocates, our sleepless nights are breathless, breath cut short and throat constricted. Knotted in the sheets, the stomach grows heavy.
Then we dream, we dream of escape. To leave, to abandon the house, the boat capsizing and the couple dying.
Paralysed beneath the weight of a sleep stripped of illusions, eyes wide open before ruined hopes, broken destinies, a collapsed roof, we do not move.
We no longer move.
Possession.
Sophie-Gaëlle Martin • 2026
