The video installation titled “Breathe with Me” by Kate Bae, in collaboration with Hyo Jung Bea, immerses viewers in a poetic underwater world. Inspired by diving with haenyeo, women divers from South Korea’s Jeju Island, the work explores human and climate vulnerability as divers release their breath, walk along the sea floor, and reach toward one another. Through captivating underwater footage, Bae and Bea offer an alternative form of movement to the rush of urban life—one that allows for intentional connection and a moment for a deep breathing. The work will run every six minutes through March 2026.

“Breathe with Me” is supported in part by Foundation for Contemporary Arts Emergency Grant. 

Directed & produced by Kate Bae

Creative Collaboration, Editing: Hyo Jung Bea

Performers: Hyo Jung Bea, Choongkwon Ko, Sookyung Min, Hyeyeon Hyun, Minkyung Jeong

Cinematography: Chunbum Huh

Assistant Camera: Thaewan Kwon

Organization and Support: Minkyung Jeong

Underwater Guidance: Choongkwon Ko

Production Support: Jeehoon Hyun, Sangyep Lim

With additional appearances by friends and mentors whose presence and influence shaped the work.

Kate Bae is a multidisciplinary immigrant artist working between New York City and South Korea. Her practice spans painting, site-specific installations, and sculptural works, with a strong focus on material exploration and transformation. She experiments with layering, casting, and peeling paint on unconventional surfaces, creating works that embody fragmentation, memory, and identity. Recently, inspired by diving with Jeju’s haenyeo (Sea Women), Bae has expanded her work into video and installation, exploring the fragile, rhythmic qualities of water. These new mediums allow her to investigate the porous boundaries between body, environment, and memory. She holds an MFA from the Rhode Island School of Design and a BFA from the School of the Art Institute of Chicago. She is the founder of Women’s Cactus for the Arts and has exhibited at the Jeju Museum of Art, Brooklyn Museum, and Wausau Museum. Her work has been supported by the Puffin Foundation, the Real Art Award, and the Ora Lerman Trust. She has participated in residencies at the Golden Foundation, MASS MoCA Studios, and the Wassaic Project.

Hyo Jung Bea is a multidisciplinary artist whose work spans performance, video, sculpture, and installation. Her practice centers on the body’s connection to trauma, labor, displacement, and healing. Drawing from her own experiences of migration, illness, and cultural dislocation, Bea reinterprets the body as a space of both fragility and strength. Through poetic and visceral imagery, she confronts emotional and physical discomfort, often embodying symbolic forms—such as a hedgehog covered in thumbtacks—to explore themes of fear, intimacy, and protection. Bea’s recent work is profoundly influenced by the haenyeo , the sea women of Jeju Island, whose strength, silence, and interdependence with the ocean serve as metaphor and inspiration. She studied Visual Arts at Seoul National University of Technology, holds a BFA from CUNY Hunter College, and earned her MFA in Sculpture from Jeju National University. She has exhibited at the Jeju Museum of Contemporary Art, Jeju Museum of Art, and the Insa Art Center (Seoul).