The starting point for this exhibition is a sui generis interpretation of the famous aphorism by Spanish philosopher Ortega y Gasset: “I am myself and my circumstances, and if I do not save them, I cannot save myself”. This maxim encapsulates his theory that the self cannot be conceived without the circumstances around it, i.e. the physical, historical, cultural and social environment. Those circumstances must be “saved”, explained, named, identified, for them to make sense. From this perspective, Sandra March interprets the body as a duality of biology and biography, and her discourse revolves around the concepts of body and circumstance. Based on this duality, the exhibition is structured into five parts. The works displayed in the first section problematise and question the physical body. A second area is devoted to self-image and acceptance, focusing on how we see, judge, love or hate our body and how our self-image is influenced by education, history and culture. The third section is concerned with pain, an experience that, while intrinsic to the human body, is not easy to understand and conceptualise. The works shown in the fourth space explore scars, marks that make us unique and tell the story of our body, determining our self-image and maybe influencing our relationship with others and with the environment. In the last area we find masks, understood as a series of internal characters we create in order to adapt, depending on our emotions, thoughts and actions, the circumstances around us and the people we relate to.
