H Project Space presents Economies Of Touch, a participatory video installation that explores controversial ambiguities around the experience of physical intimacy.
US-born and Thailand-based feminist artist Sheelah Murthy will transform H Project Space with a specially designed hut in which her performance of deep-tissue, therapeutic massage is linked to digital representations that fluctuate according to stock-market reports: when stock prices drop, a surveillance camera reveals disconcerting close-ups of the bodies at work; and when stocks rise, these bodies are seen from a distance.
Related imagery extends this metaphoric dynamic to explore political issues around intimacy, objectification, authentic experience and financial exploitation.
The exhibition is a provocative deliberation on our typically unacknowledged complicity with a complex global economy that can blur the boundaries of intimate experience in terms of sensual-yet-cold exchange and critical matters of privatised, economic notions of self, health and well-being. Visitors can provide donations to activate video footage and this money will be donated to the NGOs Dignity Returns and No Chains. Those interested in participating in the live performance are encouraged to contact the artist via email at she.murthy@gmail.com.
Economies Of Touch will run from Monday until Jan 31 at H Project Space within H Gallery, Sathon Road Soi 12. The gallery is open daily, except Tuesdays, from 10am to 6pm.
There will be live performances there, from 3pm to 6pm, on Monday as well as Jan 10, 26 and 27.
Call 081-310-4428.
