la fleur d'haleine
- Nov 10, 2018
- 2 min read
the breath flower
5x5 film
Grief is non-linear. It comes in waves in tears in fury in screams in silence. It transcends time and space, embedding and binding pain and beauty on heart and soul. I carry grief with me everyday. I have carried it for a long time and will continue to do so for the rest of my life.
This past week, grief greeted me by flooding my eyes with tears hour by hour. I know that God created me as someone who feels everything so deeply. But it has been a journey to see emotions, especially ones of sorrow and suffering, not as a weakness but rather as a strength of mine to carry with fearless embrace.
As I prepared to take the video, I set up a background with my white sheets and focused my lamp's light toward where I would sit. It took extra strength to let the tears roll that evening because I felt like I had cried out everything throughout the day. But as my heart ached over loss of people, places, I couldn't help but cry. I cut off pieces of baby's breath flowers I had bought a week earlier. Using scissors felt violent to me, so instead I continued by breaking them apart gently with my hands.
In the first frame, I simply cried quietly. Then from the second one to the very last I increasingly added pieces of baby's breath and glitter under my eyes in downward movement. I moved my head from the left to the right as the frames progressed. In the fifth and last frame, my face is covered in baby's breath flowers and my eyes look upward in longing for hope.
I must admit that this is the hardest and most vulnerable art I have done so far. From the preparation and video-taking to the editing and presentation, I came face to face with my raw, broken-hearted self. It also reminded me that I am being redeemed, for the growth and imprint of the flowers on my face present the adornment of pure grace and hope that comes when we do let ourselves grieve. In pursuit of using art for healing, I find myself healing through my own painful past and present.
This project gave me a desire to continue to create artwork that unveils the human heart's brokenness and beauty in a personal way. I hope that this piece stirs others' hearts, as it did mine.
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