Hand Addressed, Digital Postcards Series 1

Long-time collaborators Claudia Brazzale and Blake Morris have been exploring the potential of mobile phones to create interactive exchanges that bridge global and local spaces and highlight how friendship and scholarly exchange function as fluid and significant components of academic and artistic endeavours. Since 2022 they have been sending each other ‘digital postcards’ through WhatsApp, which consist of miniature finger walks based on a set of agreed rules and procedures. Filmed through their phone cameras, these postcards serve as a form of communication between the artists, creating haptic, small-scale and slow-moving explorations of their locations and a shared, embodied experience through digital space. Seeing and capturing angles of their environments through the lens of the phone camera allows them to explore details of overlooked quotidian geographies whilst bringing attention to moments and ruptures in the everyday that are marked by contemplative curiosity, frivolity and unexpected joy. The first iteration, Hand Addressed, “Series 1” was filmed in January 2023, while Claudia was in London and Blake was in Mexico. Through a side-by-side montage simulating Claudia and Blake’s call and response process, the piece reveals the subtle similarities and contrasts of their spatial experiences and the microcosms of their everyday worlds.