Breathe

Oil on Canvas, 180 × 125 cm, 2024

​

In Breathe, I explore the tension between overwhelm and release, using abstraction to move through a space where the body, environment, and spirit begin to merge. Vertical cascades of colour cool blues, teals, and greens descend through the canvas like breath itself, while eruptions of fiery reds, oranges, and yellows push upward, suggesting an internal force rising to meet that flow. This interplay creates a rhythm of compression and expansion, echoing the act of breathing as both a physical and emotional process.

​

Within the layered gestures and blurred forms, fragments of structure appear and dissolve, as if something is trying to take shape but cannot fully settle. I see this as a reflection of navigating intense moments where clarity is obscured, yet something vital is still moving underneath. The paint drips and dragged marks become a language of release, allowing the work to hold both chaos and calm simultaneously.

​

This work sits in dialogue with the gestural force of Joan Mitchell, the layered abstraction and emotional ambiguity of Gerhard Richter, and the physical, almost bodily engagement with paint seen in Willem de Kooning. There are also echoes of the atmospheric immersion found in Mark Rothko, though here expressed through movement rather than stillness.

​

Breathe suggests a kind of internal landscape, where energy circulates rather than resolves. It is not about control, but surrender, allowing the act of breathing to guide a return to presence.