Hold my Breath


© Juan Fabuel


year: 2016 - 2019


technique: multi-channel video installation, paper, mirror and net


duration: variable



Video, installation, and performance are the three elements combined in Hold my Breath. The videos display my physical point of view. While lying on the ground facing the sky, I hold my breath as long as I can. My heart races because of the lack of oxygen, and the camera, standing on my chest, follows the inner rhythm of my heartbeats. The landscape moves with me and within me.

In combination with the videos, the artwork uses the audio of speeches given by influential political figures of the twentieth century. However, the only sound that is audible is their breathing between the lines, suggesting the irrelevance of the spoken words and highlighting the importance of breath and air.

In addition, Hold my Breath features a pile of papers lying on top of a mirror and containing the words taken from the same political speeches. Due to the process of extraction and separation from the sound, they instantly become anonymous, meaningless, and self- reflected objects.


Installation Views Frontier Gallery No. 52 B1F

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Text by Zoe Yeh
The three videos in the exhibition show speeches of three historical figures which have been edited with only the pauses between sentences remaining. Along with the “breathing sounds,” the artist returned to the locations where the speeches were made and lied on the ground of the square, placing the camera on his chest, facing the sky. Since the camera is placed near the heart, the images pulsate with the artist’s heartbeat, creating changes in the texture of the sky. The recorded image is then projected on a mosquito net, creating a “secure interior” with the net’s transparency, hinting to the unheard declarations and rhetoric of politicians and how they cover up truth and reality.

Text by Rikey Cheng (Wen-Chi)
By meticulous application of the metaphoric meaning of objects (mirror, photography, or mosquito nets) or behavior (holding one’s breath while listening to a political speech), Fabuel’s multi-channel video constructs a contrasting affective space that seem to be straight-forward but are in reality ambiguous, an arrangement that also points to the faint idea of wandering between artistic and social tendencies. Also, the artist holding his breath outside of the image seems to be asking: Are photography and images reliable? How can words or representations filled with power reflect the different layers of the viewer’s perception?

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