about

The physical act of making a mark leaves a record of our presence; it is an imprint that can be used to give voice to the silent. This work explores the power of these traces through the use of the index, a literal signifier of an absent referent. The indexical sign, a semiotic device first identified by Charles Peirce (1895), affords us the ability to intuitively understand a trace with a meaning that exists outside of time and culture, its physicality effortlessly accessible and understood. 

Hair can be an indexical trace of the head to which it once belonged. In the same way, the handprint is an indexical sign of a hand, and crucially, the owner of a hand – it is an “unmediated register of an individual act (with individual authorship) via externalised trace” (Dobrez, 2013:303).  

The index necessitates a physical connection to its signifier, “something of the object leaves a legible residue through the medium of touch” (Doane, 2007:136). This creates a tangible materiality; the index is a witness to a past event, aligning it to a historicity, a “that has been” (Doane, 2007:136). This unique intersection of touch and absent presence is where this art practice lies, inspired by the handprints of prehistory and medieval graffiti. When we see these traces, we intuitively understand how it may have been made and the human hand that made it. Yet, we will never know for sure; the reality of these human beings has long since been lost to time. They silently and passively allow us to contemplate their enduring nature.