“Slow Finishers” is a haptic installation responding to the effects of late capitalism and technology on intimacy and eroticism. Sound is the central medium because of its capacity to be physically felt. Fused with video and sculpture, sound produces the sensation of being touched from afar; a feeling innate in digital exchanges of care and sex.

ASMR and athletic aesthetics are employed as primary references through which I investigate the corporeal excess accompanying their erotic potential. The visual references to athletics draw parallels between the physical thresholds of humans and machines. This imagery also functions analogously to the speed and isolating competition of the digital era and hints at the erotic capacities of sport. I am deeply interested in the ephemeral erotic moments that follow pushing the body’s limits. For example, sprinting to the point of exhaustion, where all that can be experienced is one’s primal functions: breath and heartbeat. Aural and visual techniques from ASMR videos are appropriated for their direct associations with this subject matter. This internet-born genre is engaging on many levels; the videos are uncanny performances engaging with sonic textures of objects, bodies, and the voice. These videos and ASMRtists act as unconditional purveyors of care and intimacy through their sensory engagement with viewers. The ability to physically feel the sounds and images produced by bodies miles away serves as an ideal window in considering how the erotic can be accessed amidst digital chaos. Appropriating these thematics, the work prompts a visceral response that at once pleasures and disturbs the visitor’s senses. Through tactile forms I hope to invigorate attention to the fleeting erotics accessible in the mundane.