Tactile Memories

September 7 – November 11, 2023

UniX Gallery is pleased to present Tactile Memories, a new exhibition of  Tarlan Tabar, Minoo Yalsohrabi, Elham Pourkhani, Taba Fajrak, Maryam Amirvaghefi, and Mahsa Tehrani.

Tactile Memories explores touch, movement, and synesthesia, as well as the transformative power of our surroundings. It delves into visibility, motion, action, and chromatic perception to examine how visual stimuli suspend our awareness of time and space and evoke memories and sensations of touch.

Memories of touch profoundly influence our interactions with the world, shaping our engagement with people, spaces, and objects. Touch is associated with movement, temperature changes, and multi-sensory experiences that help us gather haptic information stored in our memory. Certain areas of our body that are sensitive to touch act as hotspots for recalling haptic stimuli. The exploration of tactility and memory takes us on a journey through time, allowing us to reconnect with past experiences. The artists’ works on view offer synesthetic connections and journeys through seeing. They explore their materials and approaches, starting with a sensory curiosity for the tactile senses. The layers in their compositions evoke memories of tactile nature. The artists, especially as young Iranian women, express sensory experiences such as tactile reactions and memories, implying notions of body criminalization and visibility censorship.

Each artist’s work conveys unique aspects: Tarlan Tabar captures haptic expression and communication, Minoo Yalsohrabi documents movements and actions in food preparation and painting, Elham Pourkhani creates tactile connections with meticulous detail and Girth geometric forms, Taba Fajrak’s installation and video allude to teardrops that initiate touch with our own body, Maryam Amirvaghefi uses collage to depict stretching and expressing happiness, and Mahsa Tehrani explores the totality of one’s presence in an environment.

Maryam Amirvaghefi

Taba Fajrak

Elham Pourkhani

Tarlan Tabar

Mahsa Tehrani

Minoo Yalsohrabi