Our interactive performance shows that relationships continuously change concepts of who we are, we become an updated version of ourselves. When we attune to our entourage, humans, non-humans, plants, cyborgs and atoms, we expand ourselves and make a meaningful connection with everything around us. We can connect to them through our breath, the bridge between our out- and inside. When we breathe we make the most everyday connection with our environment. Our bodies exchange oxygen from the air with carbon dioxide from our bodies. The oxygen is taken in through the lungs, absorbed into the bloodstream, and distributed throughout the body. The carbon dioxide is released from the bloodstream and exhaled back into the atmosphere. If we take a closer look, however, the mundane turns into probably something of the most intimate and intense that a breathing creature can experience, which we embodied into our performance. With every breath we take, we enter into direct dialogue with everything around us and everything that was around us. A filled lung of air contains about 1.25x10²² molecules. If we assume that the breaths of all living creatures that live and have lived are evenly distributed around the globe, then with each time we breath in we take in molecules that have passed through the lungs of all other living creatures that have ever lived. Every breath is a connection to everything that is and has been. When we exhale, we ourselves return information to the world. The composition of our breath consists of gases, volatiles and metabolites whose composition is as unique to each person as a fingerprint. Each breath means complete dissolution in the being of all and absolute individuality at the same time.
Auxetic structures are materials that have the unusual property of expanding when stretched in a certain direction. They may appear as solid structures such as foam, fabric, or paper, with a regular pattern of interlocking cells or fibers. The cells are arranged in a way that when pressure is applied, they expand in all directions instead of contracting like a traditional material would.
The similarities between auxetic structures and breathing were particularly interesting and relevant for us. Just like auxetic materials, when we breathe in and out we have a similar expansion and contraction of our ribcage and lungs. Inhaling brings in air which causes an expansion of the ribcage and lungs, while exhaling causes a contraction. This continuous cycle of expansion and contraction is very similar to what happens with auxetic structures when they’re stretched or compressed.
We used these properties of auxetic structures in our design process for creating parts of the organism in our performance. We used it to create structures that could both articulate its form and also breathe. By stretching the auxetic structure in different directions, it could expand and contract, giving the organism a sense of dynamic motion. We also felt, that it makes the organism more responsive to interactions with the environment. By stretching the auxetic structure in different directions, we could allow the organism to take in more stimuli and respond to them accordingly.
We all wanted create and work with bioplastics. Over the 4 weeks, we experimented with many different ingridients, formulas and hardening techniques. For making the plastic we used banana and orange peels, coffee grounds, agar agar and many more. The result was a wide range of materials with curious texture, behaviour and qualities. A big hurdle was to create patches of plastic that were big enough to be integrated in our performance.
In the end we decided on taking images of the materials with a microscope. These images represented the small scale interactions that happen when we breath. The echange of molecules and gases from the environment and other beeings into our bodies and vice versa. We projected them into the room, the organsim and the person to create a manifestation of a synchronised echange of breath.
It was important to us, that we recycle material, that was not used by others anymore. We used things we already owned, went to OFFCUT to buy leftover fabrics or into the Cycle zone at zhdk and so on. That was on the one side limitating in terms of what the end product looks and feels like but on the other side really liberating in the matter that we did not produced unneccessary waste.
The structure consisted of several parts. We had the organism, the costume, the visuals and the sound. The organism consisted of two movable parts that could be controlled with strings. The body was made of textiles with auxetic structures and tulle. We wanted to trigger a breath-like movement and association with the materials and the form. The fabrics were translucent and airy. For the costume we chose the same auxetic ribbons that we attached to the organism. This was to further strengthen the connection between the two entities. For the visuals we took the micrographs of the bioplastics and a generative construct representing the growth of the organism. The sound consisted mainly of synthetic ethereal sounds and self-recorded breathing rhythms.