Breathe for Ella: artivism, intersectionality and sensing air pollution

This paper responds to Breathe:2022, a multi-sited public artwork across London and the UK by mixed media artist Dryden Goodwin. Read as artivism, I argue that Breathe:20222 demarginalizes existing discourse on air pollution by intervening in public space and framing air pollution as an embodied and intersectional experience. This paper contextualizes Breathe:2022 in relation to a contemporary politics of atmospheric governance following the tragic case of Ella Kissi-Debrah. I hold that Goodwin’s artistic portrayal of breathing shows a processual condition of exposure that resituates knowledge of air in the breathing body. In doing so, the work suggests a possible paradigm shift in narratives of air pollution whereby phenomenological understandings of breathing and breathlessness might enhance, corroborate, put into perspective or hold to account scientific measurements of air quality. To orientate this approach, I put forward the notion of “breathing interfaces” as material and affective zones (buildings, bodies and digital media) where qualities of air become palpable and where bodies and worlds become together. Circling back to Breathe for Ella in the conclusion, I reflect forces of hope and uncertainty regarding the legacy of Goodwin’s artivism and its related campaigns.