By leaning against it, you can heat up the wall. Leave an ephemeral imprint. QVE created an eternal one. Feel around and find it. Feel free to leave your own imprint while doing so.
QVE: 36 °C / 97 °F
Sensory sculpture. Part of the wall heated to 36°C in the shape of a hand.
As experienced in Passage and Sand, there is an absence of the actor in 36 °C / 97 °F and a maintained presence of their “trace”. When we sit down on a public bench or grab hold of a rail on the bus, we are sometimes shocked by the tangible “presence” of someone who has already left the exact position we have just taken. We can feel they left part of the heat emitted by their body and our body can immediately sense this heat. By artificially recreating the imprint of such body heat, we recreate the presence of someone absent. As part of an interactive exposition, participants are encouraged to search for the imprint (not visually perceivable) by feeling around the walls of the exposition space. By doing so, they often leave their own ephemeral heat traces on different parts of the walls. These heat prints can make it difficult to differentiate between the original piece of art and the traces left by visitors. As time is (and visitors are) passing by, the exposition evolves, as smudges start to appear on the whitewash, more or less abundantly centered on the permanent "handprint".
© A QVE production 2017.
