The Breathing Canvas

The Breathing Canvas (2017), by Zihua Tan and Kenny Wong 

The Breathing Canvas is a performative installation work that involves the collaboration between Kenny Wong (media artist), Karen Yu (percussionist), and Zihua Tan (composer). The work is based on an earlier media installation of Wong, The Canvas of Resonance (2012). The original version features a stand-alone installation, which produces sound and light. The audience is able to walk around in order to experience the piece according to his or her design. In 2015, the three of us came together and decided to expand the dimensionality of The Canvas of Resonance. We aim to push the limits of this instrument, from a supporting role to an interactive and performative solo instrument from which multifarious sonic and visual materials can be drawn. The innovative use of the thunder sheet refreshes our perspective on an object of fixed identity by bringing it into the context of installation art and contemporary music. In our work, the instrument no longer serves to enhance any scene – the performance of it itself is the scene. 

The work has been presented in Montreal, Brisbane and Hong Kong.