Breathless
2020

When you are born you inhale, and when you die you exhale… in-between this breath is the unfolding of our transitions and physical metamorphosis through life. Our connection through breath with our exterior surroundings forms the basis of my artistic exploration.  
Through this process, I am interested in uncovering the role of healing: through both touch and connection with matter, repetitive actions, slow stitching and slowing down of the breath and heart rate.  Through this creative investigation into the power of breathing and connectivity, I am exploring both the inhalation of freedom in mediative conscious breathing practice, but also the invisible and invasive reality of limitations due to breathlessness and illness.

My visualization is in the investigation of the abstraction of lungs in mutation, growing beyond human physical restrictions, imagining our bodies existing simply in breath. Folding into itself in uncomfortable twists, mutating, challenging our daily reality, gasping for breath. We are sometimes choked and imprisoned in the physical limitations of the unwell body. But the breath, like a spirit, can escape and observe the body slowly gasping to heal itself.

TINA MARAIS 2022 ©
All rights reserved