If you’ve ever jumped into cold water, you’ll know that the human body can be transformed by this extreme change of state. Sure, you might end up listening to the sound of teeth chattering inside your head, but in those moments when your skin screams to adjust, lungs bursting for breath and legs kicking out, you might feel properly alive.

Is there anything else, besides oxygen, which we so instinctively crave? A cold drink of water might keep us quenched and vital. But even a few inches of H2O can cause death by drowning. Is it this compelling tension that makes us yearn for a dip in the sea? All the while knowing that with the one swipe of its foamy white paws, water could undo us.

Our bodies are mostly made up of water and in life as in art we must go with the strongest currents and tidal pulls, while also finding ways to catch or follow quieter, perhaps creative, trickles of our own making.

Battersby, M., 2022. Editorial. Popshot Quarterly, (35).