Breathing is the most essential of bodily processes, continuously facilitating the exchange between the body and the atmosphere. Each breath, brief and often unnoticed, is a vital act that carries unfathomable depth, as each breath transforms invisible air into the fuel of life. As the ancient saying goes, hanggang sa huling hininga; breath then is the fragile line that defines the final threshold where life gives way to death.
The exhibition To Carry More Than Air explores this phenomenon in its elemental and profound registers – breathing as a means of revitalization and release, and a way of taking in and engaging with the world. Primarily a physiological process, ten artists from diverse practices intervene in the course of breath through visual and spatial media, translating the rhythm of inhalation and exhalation into perceptible form.
In this series of paintings, drawings, and mixed-media pieces, the duality of breath is reflected in the works themselves. Pieces marked by wild, expansive strokes and unrestrained motions enact a kind of exhalation, where a release of energy and emotion onto the surface is translated into the materiality of the medium. Conversely, meticulously controlled works, in which every line, mark, and color is carefully calibrated, perform an inhalation, a deliberate intake of focus and restraint that produces a visual experience as attentive as the drawing in of air. Breath also functions as a metric in terms of scale and spatial appearance, as each piece occupies its own dimensional field with size and proportion. The artist’s own breathing is hence embedded in the work, whether through the physical expansiveness of large gestures or the delicate precision of tinier, concentrated compositions.
This is how breath structures and forms, integral in the meaning, method and measure of the definitions of art and life. As breath traces the intimate links between time, the body, and the environment, this exhibition offers space to contemplate the fragility, continuity, and intensity of life itself. (Janine Go Dimaranan)
