About this artwork
Lia Cook has long been occupied by issues of sensory perception. In addition to visual concerns, she has considered the sense of touch and how our brains react to the desire for tactile contact. Cook worked with scientists to compare the brain’s response to viewing a woven image of a face with the response to viewing a photographic image of the same woven face. She discovered that seeing the woven image triggered greater activity in that part of the brain affected most by touch. Facing Touch illustrates this experiment. The test subject, dressed in a cap trailing the sensors that measure his neural responses, reaches out to touch a woven image, actually an enlarged version of Cook’s own Binary Traces: Young Girl, created in 2004.
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Status
- Currently Off View
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Department
- Textiles
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Artist
- Lia Cook
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Title
- Facing Touch
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Place
- California (Object made in)
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Date
- Made 2011
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Medium
- Cotton and rayon, weaving on digital hand loom
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Dimensions
- 137.2 × 130.2 cm (54 × 51 1/4 in.)
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Credit Line
- Purchased with funds provided by the Textile Society
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Reference Number
- 2016.79
Extended information about this artwork
Object information is a work in progress and may be updated as new research findings emerge. To help improve this record, please email . Information about image downloads and licensing is available here.
