TOUCHING AND TURNING

Known for her thoughtprovoking photographic and video performances that examine social encounters, Cherine Fahd’s exhibition, Touching and turning continues to explore and resolve the impact of touch on humanity, during and post the 2020 pandemic.

Through her unique perspective and artistic lens, Touching and turning consists of three innovative works, Held, A Proxy for One Thousand Eyes and a new work Touch on Repeat, currently in the making, created especially for this exhibition. Against the backdrop of recent societal changes due to Covid-19, Cherine examines touch and intimacy through participatory performances – fuelling discussions on human interaction and the significance of expression and connection.

Cherine describes the impetus for Held as ‘the hesitancy around who you could and couldn’t touch’, during the pandemic. Held highlights the complexities around the compliance and alienation of human connection during a time where touching a stranger was a great risk to one’s health and life. Incorporating a ten-channel video installation, the artist affectionately embraces friends and family, envisaging ‘being-with’ and ‘being-together’ after periods of social distancing. Two people hold each other tight, barely moving, appearing as statues upon a rotating stage. Close viewing of the videos reveals the artist and coperformer negotiating each other’s bodies, adjusting proximity, posture, and the entanglement of arms.

Similar themes are explored in A Proxy for One Thousand Eyes – the 2020 work commissioned by the Sydney Opera House as a response to the pandemic. The performance itself focuses on social distancing and its alienating impact on communal gathering. Shielded by vinyl plastic, complete with the ritual of hand sanitising, fifty friends, acquaintances, and strangers to Cherine act as touching playmates. The negotiating of bodies