3/4 Humours

Three contemporary artists revisit the archaic medical theory of the four humours: Sanguine, Phlegmatic, Melancholic, and Choleric. Rooted in classical understandings of health, the humours were thought to govern not only the body, but temperament and mood. To be well was to be balanced; to suffer was to be out of sync.

 

Benjamin Rostance (Melancholic/Black Bile) and Mark Walker (Sanguine/Blood), both New Contemporaries alumni, join Dr. Kerry Langsdale (Phlegmatic/Phlegm), each embodying one of the humours through their artistic practice.

 

The fourth humour, Choleric/Yellow Bile, traditionally associated with dominance, volatility, and aggression, is intentionally absent from this exhibition. Its absence reflects a broader view of the contemporary world, which is increasingly defined by division, anger, and reactivity. The Choleric traits already permeate public discourse, social media outrage, and systems built on competition, consumption, and control.

 

By leaving Yellow Bile out, the exhibition reclaims room for vulnerability and thoughtful processing, qualities often overshadowed by unchecked heat and intensity. It’s not an escape but a rebalancing: a quiet act of resistance that reminds us that true strength doesn’t always need to be loud.

 

Though humoral medicine has long been eclipsed by modern science, its framework of imbalance and restoration continues to echo in how we speak about mental health today. We still seek causes, diagnoses, and cures, ways to balance the “too much” or the “not enough” within us. 

 

Each artist in 3/4 Humours brings a trauma-informed lens to their practice. Making art becomes a kind of inquiry, a reaching toward healing, a way of tending to the self and its unknowns. Like the doctors of old, we work without certainties. We search for answers we don’t fully understand, guided by feeling, intuition, and the need to soothe something unsettled.