I think of my youth, in the winter at night in the outdoor pool. It was part of good manners to go to the outdoor pool in our neighborhood at least once. One New Year's Eve, it was time for me, too. So, I get out of the nasty, wet Hamburg cold into the warm water and submerge my head. Suddenly I'm alone, all sounds sound far away, if they reach me at all. I open my eyes and see a blue-gray flickering, a wavering reminiscent of a Rothko painting. The dull heaviness of the water envelops my body and yet I feel weightless. An in-between, a parallel universe like a dream, in which it feels like anything is possible. A feeling that grips you, fills you and wraps you.

I‘m searching for this feeling, the in-between of the dream. A world beyond reason, logic, or believed boundaries, which follows its own rules. A place to twist, turn and reflect, where we process and learn.

I'm chasing this feeling and can't help but think of the Ballroom community I had the pleasure of meeting in 2021. Going to a ball for me was like diving in with your head. It envelops you warmly and transports you into an incredible in-between. Here, people have created a space where anything is possible. It is a space for creative reflection: how do others see me, how do I see myself, and who do I want to be, or can I be here? What occupies and moves me, what can I process and learn here?

Images of flickering and quiet moments, an ode to longing, trial and error, and a sense of belonging.

This world sucks me in. This makes me think of the blue flower and the blue cave in Novalis' "Heinrich von Ofterdingen." Heinrich is obsessed with a blue flower; he doesn't know exactly why. It is something not quite tangible, beautiful, which does not let him go. Thinking of this flower, he falls asleep and dreams of a shimmering blue cave with a lagoon inside. He is seized by the desire to enter it and when he is in the water, he feels a bliss that envelops and fills him.