Digital Bones
(2021)

Emma Bäcklund and Hamish MacPherson | As part of "Performing Dawns" curated by Tom Lovelace. Exhibited at Hoxton Gallery,
London, UK, January 2021 and online.

Excerpts from a six-hour virtual conversation exploring ephemerality, face hijacking, holograms, skin hunger, transhumanism, finiteness, doppelgängers, gender, technology, digital legacy, ghosting, self-curation and more...

Bäcklund and MacPherson's work challenges the dialogue as an outcome, and the implications of sharing private thoughts and ideas with the public. By excluding the face from the dialogue, the focus shifts to the fragmented, layered, and camouflaged body, raising questions about the role of the body in virtual spaces. The artists emphasized the importance of long duration to resist immediacy, impatience, and and an instantaneous climax. Their aim was to explore the effects of crossing a threshold of exhaustion. Through exhaustion perhaps the body releases itself from its own image?

Hamish and Emma have collaborated on performance and publication projects since 2018.