Soap Machine
London, UK / 2023
Did you ever sit on a Japanese toilet? You don’t need to answer loudly. They are warm. I heard that Mexican toilets are as well, but I have never been there and can’t confirm. For European butts, the warmth is unexpected and rather unpleasant. Instantly, the picture of the former toilet user pops up, leaving their temperature and certainly germs. Once we realise that the source of warmth comes through cables, the opinion changes: having it a bit cosy is pretty nice. It remains the same situation, but one’s attitude changes with cognitive access.
The soap machine plays with the twist between refusal and attraction of a sensation. A bar of soap is an object that documents human presence. A new block feels uncomfortable, and it takes some days until it understands the shape of our hands. We wash ourselves into the soap until it becomes a very personal object. Another person’s soap is not very appealing. Let’s try to twist this around.
Porcelain, Metal, Wood, Electronics, Human-Body related Oxides
The casts in porcelain document and fossilize the object’s disappearance; the less matter, the more presence of a human hand. Does a sterile version in glazed, clean porcelain make it better?
Bringing back the human by coating the surface with body-related oxides that look like germs in a petri dish. And now?
Fixed on a belt, they rotate along your arm, stroke you, and wash themself smaller and back to large. Through the movement and your body temperature, they warm up and transport your own warmth back to you. And now?
The small hand in the window frames moves back and forth but doesn’t reach the copper-coated soap, so the electric circuit can’t close. How frustrating. Instead, the movement causes a sound, metal on metal, and a slow breathing rhythm. That is much more calming and physically transformative.
Despite the distance. How strange.