Posted by: gin2811 11 hours, 56 minutes ago
«Petite Violence: Breath» is a developing series of multisensory, multichannel dynamic spatial installation that explores the intersections between sound and visual perception, and the resulting connections, similarities, and conflicts within individual sensory experiences.
The project draws its creative inspiration from an incidental discovery — the sound of a manual balloon pump resembles the sound of rapid human breathing. Both sounds are akin to the swift passage of air through a narrow tube, creating a similar compression noise. The gradual inflation of a balloon becomes a visible metaphor for the accumulation of pressure. Its tension and the threshold of possible rupture mirror the human body’s physiological and emotional responses under stress. The intention is not to pursue formal tension alone, but to use the layered sounds of everyday objects to evoke a bodily awareness—one that recalls sensory experiences often suppressed and overlooked through social conditioning. Through this process, the project seeks to make perceptible the subtle traces of perception that lie hidden within ordinary experience.
Inspired by this concept, the early versions of this project employed a latex balloon inflation device and a multichannel speaker system, attempting to evoke a shared human experience through the interplay of balloon inflation sounds, human gasps, and the physical act of an inflating balloon.
«Petite Violence: Breath» evolved through two distinct stages.
The first version: Petit Violence: Breath #1
In the first stage, the work was presented within a black box, where a six-channel sound system surrounded a central balloon pump, creating an enveloping field of sound. Viewers could move around the installation, immersed in layers of sound emitted from multiple directions—each channel carrying a unique fragment of the same unfolding narrative. Amid the dense sonic layers, a red latex balloon at the center gradually inflated toward its limit. Just as it seemed about to burst, a sudden explosive sound ruptured — yet the balloon itself remained intact, producing a sensory contradiction. As the balloon slowly deflated, the heightened tension began to dissipate and settle. Once it was fully deflated, the system automatically restarted, initiating a new cycle of inflation and release.
The second version: Petite Violence: Breath #2
The second stage reduced the installation to a two-channel sound system within a semi-enclosed space, limiting the experience to one participant at a time and transforming it into an intimate bodily encounter. The core element was replaced by a single white latex balloon, installed at the center of minimalist white walls. Its inflation generated not only visual tension but also physical contact, directly challenging the viewer’s sense of bodily boundary and psychological tolerance. Two speakers, placed at the far left and right, projected sound directly toward the listener’s ears, compressing the sonic field into an unnatural proximity that deprived of spatial sense. The sound seemed to embed itself within the listener’s head, blurring the boundaries between exterior sound, spatial perception, and the body. When the balloon reached its designed limit, a sharp, final intake of breath coincided with the extinguishing of the overhead light—leaving only the slow deflation of the balloon as the lingering resonance of the space.
The third version of «Petite Violence: Breath», set for IRCAM Forum Workshops Taipei 2025, will be a 4–6 channel sound installation, replacing the balloon pump with the proximity of sonic experience, offering an intimate, solo experience focused on how sound enhances bodily awareness and sensitivity to internal states.
«Petite Violence: Breath» seeks to expose the latent structures of perception embedded in everyday life, rendering them into a tangible spatial experience. The work is not merely a representation of “pressure,” but a critical reflection on how emotional tension is endured, internalized, and ultimately normalized under the disciplinary forces of socialization. Through the interplay of sound and mechanical activation, the installation constructs of other spaces – one that invites the viewer to re-examine the relationship between bodily sensation, emotional awareness, and the structures of social alienation.
In this process, «Petite Violence: Breath» confronts the boundaries of the body, evoking sensations that lie beneath conscious awareness — those suppressed, unspoken, yet undeniably present forms of feelings. The cyclic rhythm of inflation, strain, and release mirrors the oscillation between control and collapse, tension and relief. Like a recurring dream, it returns endlessly to the subconscious, where the invisible perceptions of everyday life quietly reveal themselves.
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