Milda Januševičiūtė
Day Dream, 2020
Video, 15’
Role theory is a perspective in sociology and social psychology that argues that our everyday activities involve acting out socially-defined roles. In this film, the protagonist faces and fulfills the rules, rights, expectations, frustrations, dreams, realities, fears, norms and behaviors that prescribe each of these roles. She feels that everyone, including her, should behave in an expected or predictable way in a manner that is ‘context specific’, so that we have multiple characters based on different social positions.
The theatre is a metaphor that is often used to describe role theory. Ever since the protagonist was a child, she always wanted to be an actress. And so, every time she feels inspired, empowered or foggy, she daydreams entering into a parallel timeline. While she daydreams, her imagination transfigures the various roles she plays, the norms she must conform to, the responsibilities and pressures she faces, into a different future of possibility and promise, diffracted by sunlight and the sound of crickets.
The creative and production process of the film included friends as small-scale support structures to try out new roles. Reading, talking, sharing and daydreaming turned into an empowering way to understand different existences with alternate possibilities.
Milda Januševičiūtė is a young-generation artist and cultural sociologist living and working in Vilnius. Her area of interest covers interdisciplinary projects exploring topics of care, health care, hope and resilience. The artist’s autobiography, sociological observations and everyday life experiences blend into her reflections on the differences across the cultural concepts of hope, care and resilience, conveyed through her films.