The sound of your own breathing

Richard Lewer has had a long engagement with sport: boxing, wood-chopping, table tennis and rugby have all featured in his art. For Lewer the connection between art and sport can be quite direct; he sees both as reactive and physical, involving responses to tasks and challenges. It is also metaphorical; the two are equivalent, he says, because both involve routine, skill, discipline, involvement, training, participation and socialisation. Sport is also about storytelling. Often the narrative structures of a sport story borrow from unusual sources, the journey of an athlete towards victory reads like an Arthurian legend. One of the most familiar structures is the tragic form. These are the stories of the one that got away, the putt that didn't drop, the error that cost a game. Lewer's animated work 'The sound of your own breathing' (2010) is an exploration of such all-time lows. A melancholic tone is established by the monochrome drawings of the animation. The tales are unembellished and the tellers seemingly resigned to the hand that fate has dealt them. The stories themselves may not recount catastrophic failures but they do remind us that aspiration can just as likely lead to failure as to success. As many an acerbic coach reminds us, "Wantin' ain't getting."