Never wake up is a Flash movie clip created by the media artist Agricola de Cologne as part of his Moving Picture Collection. It is based on the artist's poem having the same title.

Loss of identity - in war times as much as in 'normal life' - is the main theme of the artist's piece. Soldiers become distorted / veterans of war are not able to be reintegrated in society. The poem / movie uses an imagery of fundamental metaphors.

In Agricola de Cologne's movie clip the soldier not only serves as a metaphor for the redundance of war itself but also as a figure reminding of human / individual war. The artist perceives war as a metaphor for life and all the minor fights of every - day life, respectively. A conceptual relation is created between the conditioning of war veterans and the consciousness of humans who cannot get rid of the 'Shadows of the Past'.

As much as never wake up is a visual project on human conditioning and pre - conditioning, it is an anti - war piece - thus relating to questions concerning everybody since 11 / 09 / 01. With the concept of surrendering being the profound solution Agricola de Cologne ends his piece.

y.o.p. 2001
original text by the artist

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