Together with Touch

Together With Touch is a live performance that took place in a public space in Dec 2021. Underlying theme of Mental Health is explored through the mediums of contemporary dance and live data that drives the music.

In the course of the pandemic, people have been forced to adapt to a new normal. Globally, already deteriorating mental health conditions were subsequently aggravated. Records show that India currently is among the countries with the highest number of suicides in South-East Asia. A recent survey by Suicide Prevention India Foundation(SPIF), a Bengaluru-based organisation, found that suicide ideation, depression and relapses are at an all time high. Many are struggling with emotional and psychological problems enhanced through isolation and the lack of physical contact. The term “contact”, deriving from the latin con- and -tangere, “together with touch”, has gained significant urgency in current circumstances. While physical contact is being radically restricted, visual artist @lenaheubusch invites performer and mental health specialist @thestormfactory, sound engineer @nik.nagaraj and @mathscapes to converse at the intersection of their practices. Heubusch poses questions such as: How is contact perceived when organisms touch through the means of modern technology? How can we experience a sense of being body in the digital realm?

@thestormfactory physically responded to sound that is generated by live Twitter data; fed by the relevant hashtags concerning mental health.

Goethe Institut Bangalore presents this project as part of the Artistic Exchange at Goethe Institut Bangalore, facilitated by @walkinstudios.

@publicdomain.garden explores the changing landscape of public life, and hybridity of the virtual and physical that we live in. The project is conceptualised by Walkin Studios and funded by the International Relief Fund for Organisations in Culture and Education 2021 of the German Federal Foreign Office, the Goethe-Institut and partners.

1. Sudevan, Praveen. ‘Dancing to the Sounds of Twitter: An Experimental Art Performance to Highlight Mental Health’. The Hindu, 18 Dec. 2021. www.thehindu.com, https://www.thehindu.com/entertainment/art/together-with-touch-lena-heubusch/article37983905.ece.