Catalog of In-Between: Teo Esguerra

A wave of nostalgia that can be felt in an unseemingly foreign place. A discernible customary discomfort that lingers in the ambiguity of mere existence. A disarming undertone of uneasiness that accompanies the continuous passage of time. A trace of melancholy that persists in growth that is yet to be defined. A barely palpable disorientation that can bring calm in the transient state of being neither here nor there.

Liminality is the familiar guised as the unfamiliar.

By dwelling on the peripheral, Teo Esguerra takes us on a sojourn into liminal spaces--the in-betweens that we often pass through without noticing. It is a practice he has come to embrace as an artist, and quietly observes in others. Reflecting beyond the tangible, he ruminates on the oscillating nature of the process of creating--the moments of uncertainty, reception and surveillance that shapes the craft.

Enter, and there lies a makeshift studio contained within these four walls. On the table are scattered remnants of the artist at work--an assortment of paraphernalia that serve as a physical staging. The walls display frottage and textured markings from everyday surfaces from his own home. Enlarged to reveal often overlooked intricate details, they are visual echoes of existence. Alongside them, ink drawings capture places he has encountered in passing--ones that are strangely familiar, yet distant, like real-world glimpses of the subliminal. Illustrating spaces that exist without clear purpose, each stroke and shade conveys the ineffable sense of time passing. Nearby, second-pass lithographs document transition spaces: a passageway, a street, a parking lot, a thicket and a resting point—ordinary places that, in certain light, take on a surreal, otherworldly quality.

Catalog of In-between is a compendium of the liminal. It is a conscious cataloging of the unnoticed--a mindful documentation of the in-betweens that tend to slip us by

Notes by Celene Sakurako