Ann Hamilton

Ohio State students, faculty and staff were photographed by artist and professor Ann Hamilton through a semi-transparent membrane that registersin focus only what immediately touches its surface while rendering more softly the gesture or outline of the body. In these images, touch-something we feel more than we see-is visible. In them, we feel the glance of cloth's fall, the weight of a hand, the press of a cheek, the possibility of recognition in portraits haunted by contact.Standing behind the semi-opaque film, one can hear but can not see, hidden until stepping toward the surface, guided by my voice. Each press of the object, the face, a hand, or cloth touching the membrane is revealed in focus, the shallow depth of field a consequence of the membrane's optical qualities. The images made in this exchange-between a subject that offers self or object and a voice that stands in for the visually absent camera-record an interiority that is perhaps more private, more vulnerable than the self we offer up in the world of a constantly present camera. Following and trusting the voice while having a sense of being hidden makes a space for this vulnerability. Each image is a tactile register of an exchange.

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