It's been a while since I took my pulse. This was the intrusive thought that struck as Rachel Rossin walked me through her solo show The Totalists at Albion Jeune in West London. It came to me in the face of Telos (2025), a large oil canvas adorning the back wall, upon which a biomechanical heart sits front and centre, lipid smears surrounding its chrome core. The organ’s vessels are attached to an arch of tablets, each encasing ghostly apparitions in blemished shades. I can’t help but feel my own heart, thinking of the machines that once measured its cadence: stethoscopes and pulse oximeters, wearable monitors, the smell of a straining, old rubber armband. A mechanical flutter where heartbeat touches machine. What made me forget my body?
May 22, 2025
