Smartphones have become ubiquitous over recent years, and many of us now hold these devices in our hands as though they were an extension of our bodies. The vast information that floods through their modest screens have the power to rock our emotions, creating new encounters, misunderstandings, divides. exonemo produced this work – commissioned for Aichi Triennale 2019: Taming Y/Our Passion – departing from the question of what a monument symbolizing such an age might look like. Though the sculpture of two large hands recalls the didactic monuments of socialist regimes, these hands hold up screens that each display a face, pressed against one another as though engaged in a kiss. In reality, however, these are just two separately taken photographs of people with their eyes closed. The sculpture’s hand parts have been created by 3-D printing, a technology that allows for easy reproduction, enlargement, and reduction. This lends the sculpture a certain lightness unseen in ideological monuments, rendering the artwork’s message more uncertain and abstract.

Commissioned by Aichi Triennale 2019

Collection of Tokyo Photographic Art Museum [exhibited in the second-floor lobby]

Cooperation: MagnaRecta, Inc., Mitsui Chemicals, Inc.