When You Whistle, It Makes Air Come Out, 2019

This cinematic installation, which includes the sound of breathing, is inspired by The Child’s Conception of Physical Causality (1927), a publication by Swiss psychologist Jean Piaget. The author and his collaborators interviewed groups of children of different ages in several cities in Switzerland, sometimes accompanied by simple experiments, in an attempt to determine the development of the concept of cause.

Ana Torfs was especially interested in the chapters that deals with children’s precausal explanations of the origins of air, wind and breath. The answers they give to questions as: ‘Where does the wind come from’, ‘What happens when you blow’, ‘Why does one breath’, ‘Where does the air in your mouth come from’ are both innocent and surprising. She slid their responses letter by letter into the strips of an old light box and edited the filmed sentences to the rhythm of her breathing.

HD projection (16:9) custom made wooden screen on a tripod, colour, sound, loudspeaker on a tripod, 7’30”, loop

This work can be shown as a diptych with The Shadow is Black and in the Darkness It Can’t Show, on the rearside of the same freestanding screen. When this work is presented without its counterpart, it should be shown on a 55 inch thin bezel led screen, on a tripod.

Produced by vzw NN

This work is part of the collection of:
Museum M, Leuven (BE)