02/17/2026
Submitted for Hope and Healing Art Show
Artist: Nikki Bartel
Title: I Gave you my Breath
20 x 40
Acrylic
Price: $1200 (payment plans accepted/nonrefundable down payment required)
*custom frame by Rustbelt Rebirth
I Gave You My Breath reflects a breaking point that emerged during 2020 — a year when the world seemed to stop breathing. Confined within the folds of home and family, distance disappeared and truth became unavoidable. What had long been endured in fragments was suddenly inescapable.
Breath in this work symbolizes life, voice, and autonomy. For years, it felt surrendered — measured carefully, withheld to keep peace, given away to survive. But isolation intensified what could no longer be ignored. The peak was not explosive; it was suffocating. Silence tightened. The air thinned. Hiding became impossible when breathing itself felt restricted.
This moment marked a turning point. Reclaiming breath became an act of defiance and survival. It was the quiet beginning of a plan — not born from impulse, but from clarity. Taking my breath back meant reclaiming agency, identity, and the right to exist fully.
This work honors that shift: from containment to intention, from endurance to action. I Gave You My Breath is about recognizing suffocation and choosing, finally, to inhale for oneself.
