Projection, sound, reeds, reed cases, poplar
5 minutes
The inspiration (or inhalation) of oxygen and expiration (or exhalation) of carbon dioxide is one of our bodies’ most essential functions—and we often use this phenomenon to transform ourselves and the world around us. Black American music has particularly been one of the most revolutionary functions of human culture, and the collaboration that takes place between metal, wood, and air when playing a woodwind instrument has been a very prominent component within this jubilation. Music, and especially Black American music, is often an antidote to ways that wood and metal have historically been used against Black bodies in more harmful ways. Overplayed/玩瘫 (ShavasaNah) is an interactive meditation on the preciousness and power of breath and the fatigue that can come from the ways in which breaths from Black bodies have been so celebrated and devalued.
Viewers are invited and encouraged to blow continuously into the microphone within the sculpture to activate the installation.
