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‘Under’ by Martina Amati

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  • Installation
Photograph of visitors exploring a gallery installation. They are standing in the dark in front of a large projection of a figure floating underwater. The room has a blue cast.
Somewhere in Between exhibition. Martina Amati, in collaboration with Kevin Fong, Thomas SG Farnetti. Source: Wellcome Collection. Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International (CC BY-NC 4.0).

Gloriously tranquil

Time Out

Breathing is the physiological act that is most natural, and most integral to human survival. So how can freedivers voluntarily control this crucial function to dive underwater without any breathing apparatus?

Immerse yourself in an alien, underwater world and examine the limits of our bodies, our breath and our environment.

About the contributors

Martina Amati

Artist

Martina Amati is a film-maker and artist based in London. Many of her films study the human body crystallised in movement, and the limits of its strength and fragility. She grew up close to the sea in Italy, and water is a recurring theme in her work. In 2010 she was awarded a BAFTA for her short film about holding your breath underwater, ‘I Do Air’. She received a Wellcome Arts Award in 2012 to create ‘Under’.

Photographic black and white portrait of Professor Kevin Fong showing his head and shoulders.

Professor Kevin Fong

Scientist

Kevin Fong is a Consultant Anaesthetist at UCL Hospitals in London. He is co-director of the Centre for Altitude, Space and Extreme environment medicine and an honorary senior lecturer in physiology at University College London.