Don't Touch (see video attached) by Kelly Witmer

Kelly Witmer

Don't Touch (see video attached), 2024

steel, glass, various yarn, electric motor, wood, silicone hand

24 x 21 x 8 in (60.96 x 53.34 x 20.32 cm)

Available

This work is part of a new series of kinetic pieces I’m working on, meditations on how physical barriers construct psychological ones regarding full-body perceiving experiences.
“Don’t Touch” features an eerily realistic robotic hand performing repetitive motions, its fingers trailing delicately across the plush, textured surface of a hand-tufted tapestry. One can see through a curved glass window the hand's explorations unfolding, but any actual tactile experience is physically cut off and separated from our reality. This creates an uncomfortable sensory disconnection and blocked desire to feel the same sumptuous textures ourselves. It challenges the viewer's role as passive observer, leaving them grasping for multi-sensory participation that has been specifically walled-off and put on display as some kind of bizarre private act.
We are left with a phantom presence of materials never quite grasped.

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