“Breath-Earth Beth-El” is a new installation which is part of the The Breathearth Project.

The work was installed in the exhibition 100% FEMALE, organized by Stichting White Cube, from the 24th to the 27th of October 2019 in the Grand or St Laurens Church, Alkmaar (NL).

This version is called Breath-Earth Beth-El and it refers to the Old Testament story of the stone on which the Biblical patriarch Jacob rested his head when the vision of a ladder to heaven appeared to him. Jacob anointed the stone and named it Beth-El, meaning “House of God.” In Jacob‘s vision, God said to him: “I will give you and your descendants the land on which you are lying. Your descendants will be like the dust of the earth, and you will spread out to the west and to the east, to the north and to the south.”
In Breath-Earth Beth-El the flowers, leaves and insects appear on the surface of a pulsing stone. Every session begins with a different, blank stone. Thus I offer to the visitors the possibility to start all over again. Could your breath spread out a better ecological footprint than humanity left so far?

Breathearth is an interactive installation made with a Raspberry Pi, a small earth globe and a projector.
Visitors are invited to pick up the small globe and gently blow on it. With every breath flowers and leaves appear on a surface or an object until it is covered with colours and life. Every new session presents other combinations and it‘s a surprise to see what flowers one‘s breathing has created. The natural vegetation disappears when you stop blowing: the earth cannot live without our breath!
Breathearth is a work in progress. Several editions have been created. Versions exist for screens of different sizes and for large outdoor projections, with different backgrounds, leaves, flowers and insects. Click here to see other versions.