https://www.p61gallery.com/en/kunstausstellung/atmen-mit-dem-chaos
Daha Kim, <Breathing with the Chaos>, 2026, Data-driven Single Channel Video with Sound,.approx. 18 min.
-Overview
《Breathing with the Chaos》 is a single-channel video generated using actual visitor counts recorded during the exhibition period (December 5, 2025–January 22, 2026), weather data, and color data extracted from images of the exhibited works. It consists of six video recordings organized into three categories: art game, data visualization, and 3D visualization. Each video interprets the same data in a different way.
This work originates from the artistic practice of Ayako Rokkaku, who paints by tapping the canvas directly with her hands. Instead of a brush, Rokkaku uses her hands to apply paint, directly expressing the energy emitted by the human body onto the canvas. The video *Breathing with the Chaos* is an attempt to translate that tactile sensation and the offline creative process into a digital environment. In this video, the artist’s actions—such as clicking, dragging, and adjusting the screen—correspond to the gestures of applying paint by hand, visualizing invisible energy through data and algorithms. The mouse cursor functions as an extension of the finger and a key visual element in this process.
The video *Breathing with the Chaos* begins with the premise that “energy” already exists in the form of data. Among the exhibition data—“statistics on visitors to the exhibition space, weather data, and colors and information extracted from images of all the works”—all of these are living data and traces of existence.
The elements of focus are breathing, chaos, and the tactile sensation of painting by hand mentioned earlier. In the video, the artist does not interpret this data as statistics but treats it as a material that fights, draws, and moves. The mouse cursor becomes a finger, the algorithm becomes paint, and the screen becomes a canvas. The chaos within the video is like breathing—a living structure that breathes as the physical actions of the artist, the weather over dozens of days, and the various visitors intermingle.
The artist chose a format that involves creating six web-based works using data and recording the process of manipulating them. The reason for this was to demonstrate how the screen is completed through the confrontation between the data—that is, the environment and energy of the exhibition space—and the artist. The composition of the six videos reveals the diversity of the exhibition in a different way.
-Video Composition
Part 1 — Art Game
This video takes the form of a deck-building roguelike game. The number of visitors is treated as enemies, weather data as the main character’s stats, and colors extracted from the artwork are translated into layers of paint accumulating in the background and visual chaos. The artist personally selected a single day during the exhibition period (January 14, 2026) to play the game, with the goal of starting on the B1 level of the exhibition hall and working their way up through the floors. The video is a record of that gameplay itself.
Climate data is mapped to the Five Elements—Wood, Fire, Earth, Metal, and Water—to form the main character’s stats and skill deck. Enemies appear in numbers corresponding to that day’s visitor count, and the eight primary colors extracted from Ayako Rokkaku’s works accumulate on the screen like layers of paint as battles continue. The artist traverses the space while directly confronting the energy generated by the data. This video is not merely a record of gameplay, but a record of the artist’s actions as she faces this invisible energy head-on.
Part 2 — Data Visualization (DATA VISUALIZATION)
Climate data and visitor counts are translated into flow and density on a p5.js-based sketch. The act of moving the mouse cursor and adjusting the screen, much like in the art game mentioned earlier, is a digital translation of Ayako Rokkaku’s hand movements as she spreads paint. The cursor’s path intersects the flow of data.
Here, “Chaos” is not mere disorder. It refers to the organic and complex structures (fractal patterns, clusters of particles, overlapping waves, etc.) generated through the interaction of data and repetitive human actions. The artwork’s color palette is overlaid onto fractals—which symbolize the repetition of order within chaos—and the density and speed of the particles vary according to visitor numbers. The visualized chaos is a retrospective form of the energy that filled the exhibition space.
Part 3 — 3D Visualization
Through mouse manipulation, sculptures that would be heavy in reality are controlled with a single finger. The 3D space unfolds the temporal axis of the data in a three-dimensional manner. It compresses the duration of the exhibition into a single space, creating a sensation as if the viewer were floating within the data.