Justine Goldberg

Haptic Endearment

My work explores haptic visuality in relation to an alternative gaze, one that is non-possessive and one that exists externally from the framework of the male-gaze. Haptic visuality is about tactility, touch, and embodiment between the artwork and viewer. This kind of tactile awareness emphasizes texture and materiality–the grain of video imagery, for example–and encourages the viewer’s gaze to move horizontally over the image, “like fingertips caressing a particularly lush fabric or the dry grain of a sandy beach.” Haptic art abounds with “intimate, detailed images that invite a small, caressing gaze.” My film depicts two women, Jenkie and Lou, and illustrates the seductive effect that haptic visuality has on the spectator by inviting them to relate sensorily with the screen. This seduction stands in stark contrast to optic visuality, as in there is always a clear separation between the screen and the spectator, because the viewer makes use of only one sense, namely sight. Their relationship to the spectator is ambiguous, we see they have a strong companionship but it’s unclear if it’s platonic, romantic, sexual, familial, etc. The film follows them as one prepares to leave the house in which they shared these moments together.