Soom: Breath Drawing Series., April 2023, ongoing, Ink and gold leaf on paper, 30 drawings, each 21 × 29.7cm
Soom: Breath Drawing Series
Soom: Breath Drawing Series began in April 2023 as a daily practice. One drawing was made each day, dated and signed on the reverse like a page in a diary. It is the record of a time when something unspeakable happened and words were lost. In mind was the old East Asian literati tradition of putting what could not be said into poems and playing it out on the zither.
Ink was poured onto paper and blown into shape by mouth. Where the ink ran, how far it travelled and where it stopped were decided by breath alone. Once the paper was fully dry, gold leaf was laid on it. The series continues, and the thirty sheets shown here are its first month.
A breath drawing cannot be corrected. The ink goes where the breath sends it, and a breath once released cannot be taken back. Each sheet records a single breath on a single day: its length, its force, and the point at which it faltered. These drawings are not pictures of anything. As a calligrapher’s single stroke was read as the energy of the whole person who made it, they become the trace a human body left on one particular day. Gold leaf asks the opposite of the body. The leaf is so thin that the slightest breath lifts it, so the one who lays it holds their breath.
Stop, Breathe, and Be.
