Ethics of Touch in Art Practice During Covid-19 Pandemic

Abstract

Starting PhD research about sense of touch, and responsive materiality during the worldwide Covid-19 pandemic became an ethical journey in Art Practice, Phenomenology, and the materiality of Computer Human Interaction. This paper is a reflective and critical account of practice-led research within lockdown limitations. It includes the personal perspective of an early career researcher and maker’s response to a health emergency. The reflection is focused on the impossibility of creating a physically shared tactile experience as direct contact between skin and matter which, in times of isolation, sparked a conversation within the supervision team, and colleagues on different aspects of touch: agency, contact, self-awareness, research documentation, and ethical implications. My PhD drastically evolved from investigating how the somatosensory system can enhance wellbeing, to exploring how material-based approaches can comprehend tech-matter-human relationship. The research is supported by ‘100 Year Life’ project at Lab4Living, Sheffield Hallam University. In a study that set out to explore the nature and potentiality of touch through human material interaction, in the context of high risk of contagion through touch during COVID I was compelled to consider alternatives. The paper is about the interrogation the touch screen as the safe replacement for human interaction.

Keywords:

• Touch
• making
• materiality
• observation
• contagion
• transmission

How Covid framed the context of touch

To identify how the Covid-19 pandemic impacted on my research I introduce the lockdown context and its attentiveness towards the avoidance of physical contact. I outline my review of the literature on the sense of touch, and its ethical framing, which concludes with an account of the relevance of new materialism to my study. I discuss and describe my art practice in a domestic environment and my justification for focusing on touchscreens. In the encounter with materiality, I draw on an understanding of interaction as intra-action (Stark 2016), Karen Barad (2007) concern with a way of relating in which touch is considered as an exchange of dynamic forces, between the toucher and investigated matter. The artwork produced and disseminated during lockdowns is described and discussed with an ethical consideration of materials and material methods that I employed (Woodward 2020) employed. I describe/discuss how the constant adjustments of social distancing restrictions (due to uncertainty regarding the virus) shaped tensions in experiential practice-led research.

The Covid-19 pandemic’s restrictions commenced in United Kingdom on 26 March 2020, with recommendations to work from home and social distancing guidelines (Gov.uk 2021). Being an Italian citizen, I began self-isolating earlier in March 2020 following my family’s advice and strict Italian regulations due to their high hospitalization and mortality rates (Governo.it, Gazzettaufficiale.it. 2020). Restrictions imposed by governments of the United Kingdom and Italy, combined with the enigmatic nature of the Covid-19 virus, acted as significant stressors, resulting in my extreme caution regarding contagion.

By the end of March, I was concluding my first semester of the PhD program, conducting a literature review, and addressing initial research feedback. My objective was to explore embodied self-awareness and wellbeing through responsive artwork that expressed human electrical potential in domestic spaces. Due to limited access to workshops, material science experts, and specialized machinery like galvanic response metres and ECG instruments on campus. I delved into new subjects in literature reviews including New Materialism, Affect Theory, CHI, and Art Practice theory. The extensive time devoted to reading shifted my research from a human-centred approach to a material-centred one. To overcome limitations of studying skin responses, I redirected my attention to materiality, allowing me to interact with and examine matter within domestic space without risk of transmission, or being contaminated.

While it is still early to fully comprehend the pandemic impact since easing of restrictions, conducting research under such conditions provided an opportunity to test my resilience. The Covid-19 pandemic influenced every aspect of my research, including the contextual and theoretical shift to a framework of touch and material practice. It shaped the understanding of physical contact as a health hazard and raised ethical questions about contagion and power dynamics. Furthermore, the absence of human touch prompted a reassessment of its fundamental importance for human existence, and the realization that no screen device can replace its significance.

The pandemic profoundly affected perspectives on the meaning of touch, exploring emotions, bonding, safety, agency, and health, as demonstrated in the timely and extensive research on touch released by BBC Radio 4 Touch Test¹. This radio program, aired at the outset of the Covid-19 pandemic, delved into perils of direct contact, and underscored the significance of touch by interweaving participants’ narratives with research dissemination. The impact of the pandemic for me was one of silent brutality that allowed times for reflection on a wide social scale, rituals, behaviours, and personal contemplation about desire and necessity for connection with the world. Work, meetings, reflection, experimentation, and research became confined within domestic walls.

Touch: ethics reflecting on participants and materiality

Learning to conduct research during this time has fostered a deep sense of care, intimacy, attentiveness, and unravelling relationship towards potential participants. In May 2020, I began the process of obtaining ethical approval, a requirement for research in UK universities, which took several months to complete. The ongoing pandemic and its evolving regulations influenced the design of gestural and tactile rituals that I was asking my participants to engage in. As a result, my application underwent revisions and considerations to ensure safe conditions for working with participants. Exploring tactile relationships between individuals and matter posed challenges, such as physically engaging with people, sharing artwork, capturing data on touch, and preventing transmission of the Covid-19 virus.

To reflect on the ethical implications of physical contact during social distancing, I used materiality as a substitute for human interaction. This approach led me to apply ethical considerations to interactions with matter itself, going beyond standard requirements of ethics when working with individuals. Taking a voyeuristic perspective, I designed the observation of tactile agency of others interacting with specific materials. My proposed method considered the touchers (participants) and materiality, in shaping their potential interactions. These modes of engagement became focal points of the study, prompting a deeper exploration of seemingly mundane actions. The research became imbued with a profound attentiveness on how humans interact through tactile experiences.

During the pandemic, we were urged to refrain from touching surfaces and objects touched by others or to sanitize them thoroughly. Whereas usually, in a safe domestic environment, individuals can freely touch things and leave their marks without endangering someone else’s health. This led me to question the continuous operation of touch and its role in daily life, drawing inspiration from the concept of directional stretch of touch between bodily inwards and outwards, as discussed by Maurette (2018). An understanding of touch, often overlooked and neglected, has evolved throughout history, shaping social interactions and assuming heightened importance in challenging times. Touch is an ever-present sensation, manifesting in various ways, such as the pressure of clothes, bedding, touch screens, and the act of eating. These embodied sensations are individualized and are challenging to articulate in words. Touch operates seamlessly, serving as a bridge between our inner and outer experiences through the medium of skin.

In the moment of touch, an individual initiates movement and contact with a passive object, which responds by giving textural, or temperature feedback. The toucher’s action encompasses both an active and passive quality, as audience assumes a simultaneous role of passivity and activity. This duality of touch is a key motivation behind my research, as it is reflected in the interaction between the public and myself as the agent interacting with matter. Those who agreed to touch my work, taking contagion precautions, were referred to as ‘touchers’. Attention is given to who or what is active in this encounter with matter, as the dynamics of activity and passivity constantly shift. However, the toucher’s intention remains essential, determining the potentiality of the object to respond.

Art practice led research in the domestic spaces

My research revolves around concept of material agency within a framework of intra-action, as proposed by Barad (2007). My background in Textile Mixed Media, and the influence of practitioners and academics such Makela, Carter, and Bennett have shaped my engagement mode with materials. Through an extensive literature review, I have developed a heightened sensitivity towards the potentialities of materials, ranging from soft surfaces to solid materialities, which I can employ in my artistic exploration. In my quest for responsive materials, I sought an intimate object that could be mindlessly touched or grasped. A material that I could dissect, analyze, observe, melt, stitch, and recompose—a material that would facilitate iterative conversations, like my usual textile practice. This practice involves a disruptive investigation of matter, starting from its deconstruction and analysis, followed by photography, combinations, layering, stitching, and knotting (Figure 1)

Figure 1. Touchscreen matter, touchscreen and acrylic paint, screensaver, goldleaf, back of touchscreen and white cotton thread (March 2021).

Coinciding with my material search, I became aware of my excessive reliance on technology. Personal interactions had shifted to digital platforms due to inability to meet in person, and my smartphone became a safe conduit through which I could connect with people without the constant need for hand sanitization. This observational perspective led me to explore rituals of touch and hand sanitation in public spaces such as grocery stores and streets. Interestingly, I noticed that touchscreen was one of the few objects people touched in public without following customary hand-cleaning.

Touchscreen as research subject

The repetitive engagement with my smartphone fostered a sense of security and reinforced my dependence on the device for communication. As a result, my research started to focus on my iPhone as a symbol of our visually saturated contemporary society, as described by Dorothea von Hantelmann (2018). The iPhone responded visually and audibly to tactile interactions when fingerprints are left on its glass screen. It was an object that was frequently touched throughout the day, however, there was no change in texture or smoothness.

By integrating the investigation of touchscreen materials with touch observations, I began to grasp the concept of self-sensing. During the spring 2020 lockdown in the UK, within boundaries of harmless exploration, I delved into my capacity to sense tactility, physically feeling the touchscreen and being mindful of time spent touching it. The objective was to study touch without direct contact with another human, thus avoiding potential contamination or virus transmission. The health risks posed by Covid-19, when modes of transmission were not yet fully understood, instilled a sense of responsibility, and need to consider implications of touch. According to Heller-Roazen (2007), perception operates through materiality, and touch creates an existential bubble in which the subject is aware of their senses sensing. Touch continuously shapes new experiences throughout a person’s life, it is a hidden sense, an Inner Touch (Heller-Roazen 2007). It perceives everything without being perceived as a metaphorical elastic net that responds but cannot be fully grasped. The observation and inquiry into touchscreen formed a closed and safe circuit, involving the screen itself, and the researcher’s capacity to sense matter.

Touch and material methods

My exploratory research approach varied due to contagion fears, impacting production in the house. This paper combines engagement, analysis, and self-reflexivity through production, documentation, and journaling. The development of my methodology is interdisciplinary, drawing on interdisciplinary aspects of the research, drawing from Material Engagement Theory and Art Based Methods (Mäkelä 2007; Woodward 2020). Both Material methods function in a New Materialist frame, acknowledging an interlacing of meaning and physicality. Phenomenological analysis considers touch studies and self-sensing knowledge. My self-reflexivity follows complex decision-making in art production, informed by material behaviours. Different methods cooperate to study touchscreens and media philosophies. The research explores human relationships with touched matter, and my questioning on its behalf. The study acknowledges growing tensions and contradictions, considering all parts. The combination of different methods decided to study touchscreen, which opened consideration of media philosophies. The relational study is a continuum of growing tensions and contradictions, which are constantly challenged and need to be acknowledged, while all parts are considered. The produced artwork aims to acknowledge these tensions between literature review and the daily restraints of lockdown.

Touchscreen: the use of technology in the domestic environment

During the Covid-19 pandemic, materiality became a threat, causing the intangible and surrogate online space to take centre stage (Martin 2021). The smartphone emerged as a tangible tool to access society and the online realm. I noticed that my iPhone represented my thoughts, as an outside brain serving as a gateway to the Cloud. This bodily reflection inspired creation of the sculptural work, Screen-mind (2020), composed of a portrait frame, broken glass, cotton, and metallic thread (Figure 2). The smooth gestures on touchscreen became quick responses and expressions of personal intentions, allowing for instant emotional communication. The artwork, Screen/Mind theory (Figure 3), embodies a material-centred research approach, symbolizing integration of self and technology. Touchscreen acts as an extension of our hands, ears, and minds, bridging the gap between physical and ethereal realms. It functions as a means of documenting, searching, calling, photographing, and playing. The screen becomes an extension of my mind, reflecting my inner thoughts. The artwork also explores interplay between touch and human senses, emphasizing importance of tactile interaction in times of isolation. The small rectangular scale of the screen defines boundaries of tactile engagement, providing a constant presence in our lives and intertwining with our thoughts and actions.

Figure 2. Screen/mind theory (2020), iPhone, cotton and metallic thread, acrylic and wooden frame.

Figure 3. Screen/mind theory (2020), facetime MacBook camera.

Touching textile and technology

Confined within our homes, neighbourhoods, and nations, there arose a yearning for new spaces and objects that could articulate both physical and psychological realms in fresh ways (Morton 2021). The rooms of our houses transformed into sensuous museums, providing space for exploration, play, and interaction with materials, free from virus transmission fears. This sense of safety and playfulness within the house reminded me of Victorian designs (Classen 2012), where wall decorations and furniture aimed to subtly engage visitors. The bedroom became a space to rediscover surfaces through the sharpness of touch. It also served as a workshop and laboratory, where material experiments unfolded to advance research. As Morton (2021) noted, the quest for new spaces fed our need to experience and feel alive, which, in my case, involved crafting small objects and exploring nuances of touchscreen.

Driven by desire for novelty, I delved behind the touchscreen in search of something soft and fibrous (Figures 1 and 4). After projecting emotions, apathy, and boredom over these months, I expected the technological scraps collected from iRepair Stop, a local iPhone repair shop, to bear the imprints, pains, and feelings of strangers. The leftovers of the broken touchscreens were kindly collected by the team, and offered to me in large quantities, there were around 200 pieces. However, there was no porosity; instead, everything felt smooth and sterile. Occasionally, I encountered fingerprints from previous users or repair technicians. The layers felt cold, rigid, structured, and reflective, or at times opaque, transparent, and grainy like paper. Engaging with touchscreen involved gentle tapping and stroking of its sleek surface. The glass layer bore marks of contact with skin and other surfaces until the touchscreen eventually succumbed to human hands agency.

Figure 4. Touchscreen matter, touchscreen and paint (March 2021).

The domestic walls served as boundaries for both research and practice in which stroking the iPhone became an exploration of unique, monogamous, and obsessive relationship. When there is contact with an object, the toucher is also touched in return, establishing an exchanging of energies, seeking to break the hierarchies of the agency (Barad 2007). Embracing the passive-active shifts of touch power, I paid closer attention to touchscreen’s response.

I experimented through intuitive alterations and juxtaposition of thread, paint, and gold leaf which offered a dual view on touch. The layers of the touchscreen become an energy transmission toll infused with the maker’s intentionality. The matter can receive and transmit the contact energy, which is documented by the marks left on the surface. The research observed the behaviours corresponding to the touchscreen material qualities (Bennett 2010), which then informed the progression of the material explorative exercises.

Material exploration, different kinds of touch

I began working with functioning iPhones and then transitioned to the material exploration of broken touchscreens, seeking to uncover possibilities that arise from their altered state. Exploring the materiality of these broken touchscreens allowed me to delve into their inner layers. The broken object became an extension of skin’s senses, and investigating its internal components served to discover personal agency as both a maker and an observer employing forensic actions. Amidst the pandemic lockdown, touch became both the mean and the object of my inquiry.

Through the exploration of materiality, tangibility, and physical touch, I gained a deeper understanding of touch in terms of perception. It became a daily process of engaging with surfaces and a means of communication and material expression. I considered both mundane touch in domestic environment, intertwined with everyday activities, and practice touch employed for making, altering, exploring materiality, support critical thinking. However, during lockdown, boundaries between different activities blurred as the same space encompassed sleeping, studying, exercising, communicating, dressing, ordering, making, thinking, and researching. This intimate setting influenced my reflections on touch in terms of agency and self-awareness.

Ultimately, the contribution of this research lies in considering the unique circumstances of isolation that enabled cultivation of a tactile, explorative, and intimate relationship with matter, fostering self-awareness regarding tactile agency. This endeavour required acknowledging phenomenological duality of touch, wherein one is both touching and being touched in return (Maurette 2018). The physical contact experienced within a caring context entails a continuous exchange of touch, energies, dust, and bodily remnants, necessitating consideration of invisible contamination.

Conclusion

In these extraordinary times, engaging in practice-based research has provided me with a unique opportunity to delve into depths of myself as a researcher, observer, and maker, allowing me to embrace various perspectives. The crisis within the healthcare system, brought about by the Covid-19 virus, compelled me to delve deeply into the embodied sense of touch, in contrast to intangible forces that were shaping our lives. Touch, as an intimate and embodied mode of interaction, was profoundly influenced by isolations we experienced, as well as conversations surrounding touch, supported by the postgraduate research community and my supervisors. This paper ultimately revolves around my response to a historic event, as I critically and meticulously delved into the material realm to explore touchscreen.

In conclusion, this research has inhabited realm of physical contact, offering support to extensive studies on touch within confines of the small domestic sphere. It is an exploration that seeks to navigate intricacies and complexities of touch, allowing for a deeper understanding of its significance and impact on our lives.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Additional information

Funding

This PhD research is supported by the‘100 Year Life’ project² at Lab4Living, Sheffield Hallam University, through Research England’s Expanding Excellence in England (E3) fund.

Notes on contributors

Marika Grasso

Marika Grasso is an artist PhD candidate funded by Lab4Living. Her research concerns materiality and tactile relationships. She studied Textiles at Royal College of Art and Fashion at Central St Martins. Her work has been exhibited at the CHI University of Bolzano, Stanley Gallery, YAS, Ars Eletronica. She joined Activism Neuroaesthetics by Saas-Fee Summer Institute of Art. She was a Junior Fellow at the Institute for Human Sciences (IWM).

Notes

1 Claudia Hammond (2020) launched a new study about the role of touch commissioned by the Wellcome collection and in collaboration with BBC Radio 4, it’s the largest study on touch, with 40,000 people from different countries. The episodes cover different approaches to tactility from neuroscience to grief and touch-hunger.

2 The 100 year life project Lab4Living https://lab4living.org.uk/projects/the-100-year-life-project/.