The sprawlingly inclusive use of media by artists today marks the work of Rebecca Horn, born in Germany in 1944 but resident in New York, Paris and Berlin, where she also is at home in just about any medium you can name. Rebecca Horn: Bodylandscapes surveys the diversity of her work and also makes apparent the importance of that old-fashioned first step, drawing, for this thoroughly contemporary artist. Eighty works on paper and around 25 sculptures and installations make up the show.'Finger Gloves' is a performance piece and the main prop of that performance piece and was done in 1972. They are worn like gloves, but the finger form extends with balsa wood and cloth. By being able to see what she was touching and the way in which she was touching it, it felt as if her fingers were extended and in her mind the illusion was created that she was actually touching what the extensions were touching. There is another piece that she did that is very similar to this one. It is part of her Berlin Exercises series done in 1974 called “touching the walls with both hands simultaneously”. In this piece she made more finger extension gloves, but this time measured it so that they specifically fit the selected space. If the chosen participant stood in the middle of the room, they could exactly touch opposing walls simultaneously.
Another piece that involves the illusion of feeling and one’s hand is 'Feather Fingers.' (1972). A feather is attached to each finger with a metal ring. The hand becomes “as symmetrical (and as sensitive) as a bird’s wing”. When touching the opposite arm with these feather fingers one can feel the touch on the left arm and of the fingers on the right hand moving as if to touch the left arm but it is instead the feathers which make contact. Rebecca Horn describes the effect: “it is as if one hand had suddenly become disconnected from the other like two utterly unrelated beings. My sense of touch becomes so disrupted that the different behavior of each hand triggers contradictory sensations.” This piece focuses greatly on sensitivity.
Rebecca Horn continued to explore the image of feathers in her works of the 1970s and 1980s. Many of her feathered pieces wrap a figure in the manner of a cocoon or function as masks or fans to cover or imprison the body. Some of these pieces are 'Cockfeather' (1971), 'Cockfeather Mask' (1973), 'Cockatoo Mask' (1973), 'Paradise Widow' (1975), and 'The Feathered Prison Fan' (1978) made for her film Die Eintänzer.
Another piece that involves the illusion of feeling and one’s hand is 'Feather Fingers.' (1972). A feather is attached to each finger with a metal ring. The hand becomes “as symmetrical (and as sensitive) as a bird’s wing”. When touching the opposite arm with these feather fingers one can feel the touch on the left arm and of the fingers on the right hand moving as if to touch the left arm but it is instead the feathers which make contact. Rebecca Horn describes the effect: “it is as if one hand had suddenly become disconnected from the other like two utterly unrelated beings. My sense of touch becomes so disrupted that the different behavior of each hand triggers contradictory sensations.” This piece focuses greatly on sensitivity.
Rebecca Horn continued to explore the image of feathers in her works of the 1970s and 1980s. Many of her feathered pieces wrap a figure in the manner of a cocoon or function as masks or fans to cover or imprison the body. Some of these pieces are 'Cockfeather' (1971), 'Cockfeather Mask' (1973), 'Cockatoo Mask' (1973), 'Paradise Widow' (1975), and 'The Feathered Prison Fan' (1978) made for her film Die Eintänzer.
more information http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rebecca_Horn
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