Drawing Breath

2022
video Installation
29 Min

I have been thinking a lot about breath lately: about how moving air through our lungs is a personal and individual action that uses (and changes) a universally-shared resource. How in a pandemic, the ability to breathe freely is both precious and dangerous. And how for many Black Americans, the right to breathe is not inalienable.

But how we breathe is also influenced by how we feel. As an Asian American, I have experienced an increase in xenophobic harassment and racism-based trauma during the pandemic; it has shaken my sense of self, and it’s been really difficult to let go of my anger, fear, and anxiety. In many ways, it feels like I’m not allowed to exhale. Feeling like I don’t have agency over where, when, or how I perform this fundamental action has changed how I move and carry myself in public spaces.

Because of this, I started exploring how emotions manifest physically in the body—how frustration starts with a furrow of the brow, or how fear shows up in the tension of our necks, or how our shoulders drop when we are relieved. How we feel can also be externalized through the act of exhalation—like a short, shallow snort of incredulity or a protracted expulsion of air during a moment of catharsis.

Drawing Breath features 12 people of color expressing a range of complicated emotions through their faces, bodies, and breath. As racialized people, our safety and acceptance is often dependent on our cultural utility or ability to assimilate. However, I want this project to simply focus on how we feel and breathe—without needing to blend in, code switch, or prove our worth. By centering this involuntary and necessary act of respiration on a 100 ft wide outdoor screen in the middle of New York City, I intend to make it clear that, no matter what we are feeling, we have a right to exhale.

It also includes an interactive section with text where each person breathes deeply at their own pace, taking in what they want to keep and releasing what they want to let go of. Each inhale and exhale is as unique as their fingerprints. I invite you to breathe along with them, matching your rhythm with each of theirs.

This project was commissioned by Arts Brookfield for a super wide format 100 ft outdoor screen in Manhattan West plaza. (The excerpts shown here were reformatted to better fit computer and phone screens.)

More Information:

• Located outdoors in the Manhattan West plaza above the entrance to Whole Foods and the Peloton studio

• Exhibition info: Digital Canvas: For the Time Being curated by Superblue