Emma McLean
An Invitation to Touch
2023
Wool, 4'5" diameter
Artist statement
An Invitation to Touch is a wet felted merino wool sculpture that explores the body through what the artist calls "inside touch and outside touch." Touch your hand. What your fingers feel is outside touch. Keep touching your hand. What the skin of your hand feels is inside touch.
Visitors are encouraged to engage respectfully with the sculpture and explore the various sensations brought on by touching the sculpture's surface and insides. As the viewer explores the tactile sensations, the woolen mass will react to their touch like a living body would.
Artist’s biography
Emma McLean is a sculpture artist working in Montréal. As a Fine Arts undergraduate student at Concordia University, she explores fibre media and its intersection with sculpture. She studies the presentation of the body as an object for viewership and the purpose of the female body in the acts of production.
