After almost two decades of artistic practice shaped by constant motion, Renz Baluyot arrives at a turning point. The exhibition, titled Time, Being, is a breath; a pause from the external demands of the world. Baluyot enfleshes ideas that have been incubated for years, buried under layers and layers of more urgent demands. These works make space for a reassessment of Baluyot’s own relationship with time and how it weighs on the reckoning of the Self.
 

In Pendulum, an exploration in moving-image art, Baluyot inspects the way time is perceived. The poetry of the work lies in his close attention to the laws of motion: he recognizes the movements of human life in the mechanics of the clock. The video begins with the work of winding, setting the clock’s pendulum into a steady, repetitive course controlled by an invisible push. This rhythm is interrupted by the violent introduction of a sledgehammer. Yet still, in this act of breaking, the swinging motion echoes the pendulum. Movement is replaced by stillness and space, presenting a new means of measuring its value.
 

This act of redefining continues in the work Eleventh Hour, a sculptural installation composed of twelve patinated copper plates that hold each letter of the phrase. Traditionally, this implies a frantic state, a critical point marked by urgency and an impending end. But Baluyot defies this expectation by spatially deconstructing the word. Here, the letters are made to feel unburdened; its rhythm syncopated—like a sigh, or paghinga*. Taking from the resist-dyeing processes from his previous works, Baluyot masks the copper plates to preserve the material’s sheen, while allowing the exposed surfaces to oxidize, making visible its gradual surrender to time.