18 October – 22 November 2025
Art Director
Silvana Ancellotti-Diaz
Exhibition Team
Thess Ponce
Sarah Jean Ruales
Roy Abrenica
Gabriel Abalos
Jose Joeffrey Baba
Mariela Araza
Patrocinio Aguirre Jr.
Franco Zuñiga
Graphic Designer
Jean Isabel Magcamit
Exhibition Notes
Janine Go Dimaranan
Curator
Leslie de Chavez
by Janine Go Dimaranan
Breathing is the most essential of bodily processes, continuously facilitating the exchange between the body and the atmosphere. As air enters the nose, it is filtered and warmed, and travels downward until it reaches the tiny sacs in the lungs where true transmission occurs. Within these fragile sacs, oxygen passes and binds, while carbon dioxide, the waste of cellular metabolism, moves out to be expelled with the next exhalation. Here, the body transforms invisible air into the fuel of life, sustaining the constant labor of trillions of cells. Each breath, brief and often unnoticed, is a vital act that carries unfathomable depth. 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 paradigm, the exhibition presents breath not only as a subject that generates meaning, but also as method and measurement.
The works of Jomar Galutera, inspired by the Bataan Death March; accord with Jelly Jimenez, whose work captures the almost breathless force of a typhoon; Renz Baluyot, with his covered and bound paintings that evoke asphyxiation; and Lymuel Bautista, with his precise rendering of a fence; find similar visual strategies with Joen S udlon, whose mythical image is molded by the influences of the past. All of these works signal limitations, boundaries, and struggle, yet through these intense and forceful images, one also senses the opposite – freedom, relief, and even transcendence. From the act of holding one’s breath arises the inevitable need to exhale or sigh. In the curator’s prompt, Leslie De Chavez refers to buntong-hininga as a kind of breath laden with tension and burden.
In contrast, the works of Alee Garibay depict religious images rendered silent and cathartic; while Lyn Patricio evokes light and flowing inner worlds; and Guenivere Decena bridges the cosmic and the finite with her cosmetic explorations. Their works speak of salvation and the unbound, where vast and expansive elements coexist with intimate details that signal the viewer to navigate between universality and personal reflection. They envision breath as a pathway inward, inviting viewers to enter the self, linger in suspended moments, and encounter the infinite within.
Lastly, the works of Janrey Llegue serve as a form of breathing exercise, a ceremony through which he honors the day by marking the cadence of his awareness and attentiveness. These are complemented by the works of Christopher Zamora, who celebrates the breath of everyday life by transforming mundane images into moments of careful observation. He draws attention to the subtle, and often overlooked patterns that sustain daily existence. Together, their works emphasize breath as both practice and perception, inviting viewers to see the ordinary as extraordinary and to experience the flow of life in the most immediate of forms.
Alee Garibay (b.1989) works at the poetic intersection of the personal and the universal, where memory and immediacy converge. A graduate of the University of the Philippines College of Fine Arts, she has developed a painterly language that merges cinematic sensibility with psychological depth. Figures emerge from atmospheric grounds through expressive brushwork and layered gestures, while script-like marks evoke fragments of remembered speech. Since 2005, she has held eleven solo exhibitions and directed Artletics Inc., fostering community engagement through the Linangan Art Residency. Garibay’s practice reveals how personal narratives expand into shared human experience.
COP - 20620
40.50 x 38.00 cm / 15.96 x 14.97 in. 2025
A punk and a pedestrian, Christopher Zamora (b.1978) draws insight from the streets—its raw truths, movements, and shifting rhythms. Preferring open spaces over structured ones, he captures the banal and commonplace as metaphors for survival, existence, and the act of daily breathing. Borrowing imagery from print, television, and the Internet, his often darktoned paintings reflect the endurance of life amid constant change. A Philippine Women’s University Fine Arts graduate, Zamora has exhibited widely since 2000, with residencies in Korea, Malaysia, and the Philippines. His 11th solo show, Every Breath You Take (HOM Art Trans, Malaysia, 2016), continues his meditation on the everyday.
- 20635
122.00 x 76.00 cm / 48.07 x 29.94 in.
- 20636
quadryptic 60.96 x 60.96 cm /
x 24.02 in.
Guenivere Decena (b.1986) is a multidisciplinary artist whose practice explores the poetry and science of interconnection. Moving fluidly between visual arts and music, she approaches artmaking as respiration—a cathartic exploration of the inner self and a meditation on being and becoming. Her works dwell on the delicate balance between fragility and strength, self and environment. A former Fine Arts lecturer at La Consolacion College, Bacolod (2022–2025), Decena now works full-time as an artist engaged in community-based projects in Negros Occidental. She has exhibited widely across the Philippines, Switzerland, and Malaysia, including Take Cover (2018) and Fragile (2014).
COP - 20629
COPI Wish cosmetics,
26.50 x 20
Just Embrace Me, No Matter Where You Are cosmetics, nuetral tint watercolor on acid free grained paper 224g
26.50 x 21.80 in. (framed) 2025
- 20631
(framed) 2025
COP - 20641
Unang Ritual oil, charcoal, on bristle board
130 pieces of drawings size variable 2025
Jan Llegue (b.1992) is a visual artist and graphic designer whose practice flows with the rhythm of daily life. Coming from a working-class background, he paints the quiet dignity and resilience of ordinary people, treating art-making as a ritual—a way of breathing and making sense of the world. Formerly in graphic design and advertising, he turned to painting during the pandemic, focusing on Philippine culture, labor, faith, and society. Since 2020, he has exhibited widely, using art as reflection and dialogue to reveal unseen truths and cultivate empathy within his community and beyond.
Angelee “Jelly” Jimenez (b.2002) is a self-taught visual artist whose intuitive practice fuses magical surrealism and expressionism, transforming emotion into dreamlike imagery that blurs reality and imagination. Painting directly on canvas without sketches, she treats art as a way of life—an act of breathing, feeling, and belonging. For Jimenez, creation is both personal and communal. After her residency at Linangan, she founded the Kulay Gabay Project in Pangasinan, an artist-led initiative offering free discussions and workshops that foster creativity, shared learning, and a collaborative spirit within local communities.
COP - 20622 Mahangin oil on canvas
152.40 x 120.00 cm / 60.05 x 47.28 in. 2025
Joen Sudlon (b.1993) is a Manila-based artist whose practice bridges memory, imagination, and the everyday. A graduate of the Eulogio “Amang” Rodriguez Institute of Science and Technology (BFA Painting, 2016), he has exhibited locally and abroad since 2012. Working primarily in graphite and charcoal, later expanding to oil and acrylic, Sudlon’s imagery draws from his coastal upbringing in Aklan—its seascapes, labor, and endurance. An alumnus of Linangan Art Residency and Tuklas Grantee at Eskinita, his exhibitions Salamangka and Salamin reveal his role as a visual chronicler, reflecting on nature, history, and the fractured narratives of contemporary life.
COP - 20623
Impluwensya oil on canvas
142.00 x 111.50 cm / 55.95 x 43.93 in. 2025
Jomar Galutera (b.1981) is a visual artist whose practice examines the structures of power and the power within structures—unearthing ambivalence in layered histories, memory, and collective trauma. Working across painting, drawing, photography, and moving images, he treats breath as a quiet measure of scale—a way to navigate the vastness of history through the intimacy of lived experience, reinterpreting the pulse between personal and national memory, presence and erasure. Since 2014, Galutera has been part of Project Space Pilipinas, an independent artist-run initiative fostering critical and collaborative art practice in the Philippines.
COP - 20637
To Live Is To Die acrylic and oil on canvas, TV monitor size variable 2025
Jenny Lyn Patricio (b.1996) is a mixed media and tattoo artist from Nasugbu, Batangas, whose practice flows with the rhythm of nature. Working with water-based media such as watercolor, ink, and coffee pigment, she creates ethereal works where organic forms, faces, and figures emerge like whispers of memory. Guided by intuition and sensitivity to her surroundings, Patricio treats art-making as a form of meditation—breathing as a way of listening to the natural world. Her dreamlike imagery reflects a deep attunement to life’s currents, revealing art as both reflection and continuation of nature’s quiet, fluid movement.
COP - 20624
Moment of Stillness
acrylic and ink on satin
60.80 x 45.80 cm /
23.96 x 18.05 in.
2025
COP - 20625 Reflection
acrylic and ink on satin
60.80 x 45.80 cm /
23.96 x 18.05 in.
2025
- 20626
60.80 x 45.80 cm / 23.96 x 18.05 in. 2025
- 20627
60.80 x 45.80 cm / 23.96 x 18.05 in. 2025
Let’s
COP - 20628
Lymuel Bautista (b.1994) is a visual artist whose works confront social realities through distorted, surreal figures that embody struggle, deprivation, and denial. A graduate of Bulacan State University (BFA, Visual Communication), his practice explores the liminal spaces of society—unveiling contradictions between truth and illusion, beauty and despair. Influenced by music and his background in student journalism, Bautista fuses emotional depth with social critique. A Vision Petron Grand Prize (2018) and Metrobank Art and Design Excellence Grand Prize (2021) awardee, and a Tuklas mentee at Eskinita Art Gallery (2019), his art amplifies voices from the margins with fearless urgency.
COP - 20643 Ghosts
Oil and image transfer on canvas 122.00 x 152.50 cm / 48.07 x 60.09 in. 2025
Renz Baluyot (b.1989) is a multidisciplinary artist whose practice investigates how remnants of the past continue to shape contemporary urban life. His works question the temporality of urban decay and examine how traces of destruction reveal the influence of oppressive political and economic systems on the present. Through painting, sculpture, and installation, he explores the tension between revelation and concealment—how rust, debris, and discarded materials expose hidden histories and social realities. His works turn ordinary artifacts into meditations on memory and resilience. A University of the Philippines Diliman graduate, Baluyot has held residencies in the US, Malaysia, Japan, and the Philippines. He received the Juror’s Choice Award of Merit (Philippine Art Awards, 2020) and was an Ateneo Art Awards finalist (2021).
COP - 20633
Within Stillness I oil on canvas
76.00 x 61.00 cm / 29.94 x 24.03 in.
2025
COP - 20634
Within Stillness II oil on canvas
76.00 x 61.00 cm / 29.94 x 24.03 in.
2025
- 20632
Soft Weight of Silence oil on canvas
152.50 x 152.50 cm / 60.09 x 60.09 in.
2025
Manila-born artist Leslie de Chavez is known for his incisive explorations of history, colonialism, religion, and contemporary life. Through his deconstructions of cultural icons and master narratives, he reflects on the social and moral responsibilities of art within its milieu. His practice spans painting, sculpture, video, drawing, installation, and socially engaged projects that examine power, miseducation, and collective memory. His process draws from historical templates and lived discourse, weaving reflection and resistance into visual forms that confront the layered realities of Filipino experience.
De Chavez has held solo exhibitions in the Philippines, China, Korea, Singapore, the United Kingdom, Germany, and Switzerland, and has participated in major exhibitions such as the Singapore Biennale (2013), Asian Art Biennale (2011), and Nanjing Triennial (2008). A two-time Ateneo Art Award recipient (2010/2014), he is also the founder and director of Project Space Pilipinas, an artist-run initiative in Lucban, Quezon, dedicated to fostering significant artistic dialogue with the community and supporting young emerging artists. He has curated several group and solo exhibitions of both emerging and established artists in esteemed art galleries and institutions, including the Yuchengco Museum, The Cultural Center of the Philippines, Silverlens Galleries, Finale Art File, West Gallery, Orange Project, Galleria Duemila, Project Space Pilipinas, and Gajah Gallery (Yogyakarta). As both artist and cultural worker, de Chavez regards art as a vital act of resistance, reflection, and communal renewal.
De Chavez lives and works in Tayabas, Quezon, the Philippines.
Janine Go Dimaranan (b. 1992) was born and raised in San Pablo City, Laguna. An independent writer and researcher, she co-edited the literary anthology Danas: Mga Pag-aakda ng Babae Ngayon (Gantala Press, 2017) and has published the poetry collections IO (Gantala Press, 2020) and Banahaw (self-published, 2024). She has been writing children’s stories since 2014 and has edited and translated children’s books for Southern Voices Printing Press since 2021, including Sayaw ng Pantaron (2021) and Datu Birang (2023), among others. Her English translation of Eljay Deldoc’s Nakikisilong (2023; 2025) was supported by the National Book Development Board’s Translation Grant Program. Writing on visual arts ssince 2013, she is currently working on two major art publications: Emmanuel Garibay’s Art History as the Evolution of the Sacred (Artletics Inc., 2025), which received the NCCA’s Competitive Arts Grant, and Mark Justiniani’s forthcoming book on his more than twenty-five years of artistic practice. Janine lives in Dolores, Quezon, with her husband and children.
While breath is a pathway to the essential activity that sustains life, it also serves as a measure of presence and a method that defines the dimensions of human experience. In this exhibition of paintings, drawings, and mixed-media pieces, this 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 and composed, 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. Larger canvases call for a witnessing that echoes expansive breath, while smaller works invite close scrutiny and subtler modulation of respiration. In both, the artist’s breathing is inscribed through the sweep of grand gestures or the precision of concentrated strokes.
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.
Galleria Duemila was established in 1975 by Italian born Silvana Ancellotti-Diaz. Duemila means “twentieth century” and it was this vision that inspired the gallery’s advocacy in promoting and preserving Philippine contemporary art. To date, it is the longest-standing commercial art gallery in the Philippines maintaining a strong international profile.
Galleria Duemila takes pride in being the only local gallery to publish and mount retrospectives of artists as part of its advocacy in pursuing art historical research and scholarship.
210 Loring Street
1300 Pasay City, Metro Manila
+63 908 307 9972
+63 2 8831 9990
+63 2 8833 9815
gduemila@gmail.com art@galleriaduemila.com www.galleriaduemila.com
With the collaboration of institutions, Galleria Duemila has mounted the retrospectives of Roberto M. A. Robles (Ateneo Art Gallery, 2011), Duddley Diaz (Vargas Museum, 2009), and Julie Lluch Dalena (Cultural Center of the Philippines, 2008). It has also published a book on Diosdado Magno Lorenzo (National Library of the Philippines, 2009) and produced a major Pacita Abad exhibition at the Cultural Center of the Philippines in 2004.
Galleria Duemila is a presumed important cultural property through Article III of the National Heritage Act of 2009 (R.A. 10066) and is listed as a local cultural property of Pasay under City Ordinance No. 4624 series of 2019.
Gawad Parangal para sa mga Alagad ng Sining ng Pasay (2023)
Plaque of Local Cultural Property (2023)
