Delyth Barlow

Last Breath

14.5cm x 14.5cm

Clear Resin

Delyth’s practice explores the relationship between art, science, and life. This involves taking a critical view on health, history, and society to better understand and question the world around her. She is currently exploring the coronavirus pandemic and what it is like living through this crisis.

Her work mainly consists of sculpture, but she also works with painting and drawing. She recently developed a passion for casting, particularly as it allows her to create a series of unique yet similar objects that are connected by a theme.

Throughout the coronavirus pandemic many have lost loved ones. It has claimed many people’s last breath. Delyth’s work tries to capture this last moment and preserve it. This brought the question: how do you capture something as ephemeral as breath? Breath is personal, life-giving but now potentially deadly.

Due to Delyth’s fascination with the covid-19 molecule and its beauty, she devised a way to hold someone’s breath in a hollow-casted covid molecule that is sealed to keep a lasting record of that person. She chose to work in clear resin because it allows you to “see” the breath inside as well as adding to the fragility of the work’s message. The three stages show the fading of life /the last breath in action, slipping away until all you are left with is a memory, represented by the gradual decrease of the light.

Instagram: www.instagram.com/delythbarlow/