'my work sharpens people’s senses' - jeppe hein on his breathe with me series

interview: jeppe hein launches breathe with me at UC san diego

The Stuart Collection at the University of California San Diego is hosting Danish artist Jeppe Hein‘s ongoing participatory public art project known as Breathe with Me. Designed to promote mental health, mindfulness, and community, this growing series invites participants to paint vertical blue brushstrokes on a surface as they inhale and exhale, representing the rhythm and flow of their breathing, which Hein views as a fundamental and shared human experience.

‘My work sharpens people’s senses, raises their awareness and perception of their surroundings, and encourages a dialogue between them. […] Even though we all live different lives, we all breathe, and each breath keeps us together, connected, sharing the same air,‘ Hein tells designboom. Ultimately, by connecting breathwork with artistic expression, participants are encouraged to be more present, reflective, and empathetic. On the occasion of the UC San Diego launch, we spoke with the artist to further uncover the healing power of breathing and community, both championed by Breathe with Me.

Breathe with Me in Central Park, New York, 2019 | image © Studio Jeppe Hein/ Jan Strempel, courtesy the artist

how conscious breathing defined the project worldwide

Based in Berlin, Jeppe Hein is widely known for producing experiential and interactive artworks at the junction where art, architecture, and technical inventions intersect. Conscious breathing became a critical element of the artist‘s life more than a decade ago when he began incorporating internal awareness into his work. ‘The awareness of my breath enables me to balance out the body and mind in all circumstances of life. A crucial example of this balance can be found in my work entitled Breathing Watercolours (2012),’ he shares with us. This project, initially developed as an individual documentation, eventually scaled into an artwork that involved public participation.

Breathe with Me in Central Park, New York, 2019 | image © Studio Jeppe Hein/ Jan Strempel, courtesy the artist

The public version was introduced as Breathe with Me in 2019 in Central Park and at the United Nations Headquarters in New York City during the Climate Action Summit. Since then, the ongoing project has traveled worldwide, inviting different communities to participate in this mindful experience. When asked if taking this installation across the world, to other communities, triggered any challenges, Jeppe Hein emphasizes that ‘there are no challenges, just different logistics. Breathe with Me works in all scales – whether you do it alone in the Instagram workshops I offered during the pandemic, with a class in an elementary school in Romania and with teenagers at Opendorf Afrika, with a large group of people in front of Moderna Museet in Stockholm, or with hundreds of passers-by in Central Park in New York City.’

Breathe with Me in United Nations Headquarters, New York, 2019 | image © Studio Jeppe Hein/ Jan Strempel, courtesy the artist

the power of self-awareness and community for healing

The essence of Breathe With Me unfolds in two layers. The first one sheds light on the importance of slowing down, centering ourselves, and recognizing the significance of mental health and self-awareness in our daily lives. This awareness materializes as vivid blue brushstrokes that symobilize ‘the invisible – our breath and the resultant relation between us. Since the sky can be seen by almost every living being, thus connecting us, and consists of the air we breathe, blue is the perfect colour to make the invisible visible,’ Jeppe Hein notes.

Walking us through the participant’s meditative actions, the artist explains how the ‘breath guides the strokes of the watercolour, to create a repetitive pattern of vertical blue lines painted onto a white paper or wall. Each line represents one breath. The colour is intense and vigorous at the beginning of each line, but gradually fades towards the bottom. Each line signifies the process of breathing in or breathing out in full awareness.’ Hein goes on saying that once all brushstrokes are gathered on the same canvas, the artwork not only symbolizes personal reflection but also a collective awareness that encompasses communities, societies, and the environment.

This collective awareness reveals the project’s second layer honoring community, empathy, and shared spaces. According to Hein, easy access to art changes people’s behavior for the better. The communal nature of his work promotes unity, as people from different backgrounds and experiences come together and realize that we all share the essential human experience of breathing. ‘During the pandemic, it became even more obvious how important art in public space is […]. Since then, I have developed more public installations like my Social Playgrounds for cities and schools, my accessible water pavilion in front of Rockefeller Center that offers citizens a cooling in the hot city, and my Modified Social Benches that encourage dialogue between people worldwide […] Altogether, Breathe with Me has become a collective breath for the world,’ he elaborates.

Breathe with Me in United Nations Headquarters, New York, 2019 | image © Studio Jeppe Hein/ Jan Strempel, courtesy the artist

In times of chaos and growing social unrest, public artworks like Breathe with Me help break down barriers and make room for dialogues and allow gentle check-ins with ourselves. ‘In general, I think it’s very important to ask yourself and to listen within yourself: How am I actually doing? How do I feel right now? And especially in these times, which are different for all of us – more stressful, worrying, uncertain – it is essential to always look at where am I right now. That’s what I try to encourage and support with my art,‘ concludes Jeppe Hein.

Held at the Epstein Family Amphitheater at UC San Diego between October 24th and October 26th, 2024, the artist’s latest iteration of Breathe with Me joins the Stuart Collection’s 22 site-specific permanent installations at the university. It represents the collection’s first public program, a cross-departmental commissioning initiative developed to encourage interaction between the UCSD student community and in-person projects developed by internationally renowned artists. Programs are expected to occur during the start of the school year.