David Bobier is a self-identified hard of hearing media artist with a mental health diagnosis and is the parent of 2 deaf children. His work has been exhibited internationally and has been the focus of prominent touring exhibitions in Ontario and the Atlantic provinces. Bobier has received grants from Canada Council for the Arts, Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council, Grand NCE, Ontario Arts Council and New Brunswick Arts Council.

He is currently partnering with Inclusive Media and Design Centre at Ryerson University, Toronto and Tactile Audio Displays Inc. in researching and employing vibrotactile technology as a creative medium. As an extension of this research Bobier has established and is Director of VibraFusionLab in London, Ontario, Canada. The Lab emphasizes a holistic approach to considering vibration as a language of creation and exploration and to investigating broader and more inclusive applications of the sensory interpretation and emotionality of sound and vibration in art making practices. Through VibraFusionLab and in his own art practice Bobier aims at creating opportunities of greater accessibility in art making, art appreciation and in viewer experiences of art practices and presentations.

Using performance and interactive installation Bobier explores the bridging of methods of communication and language and ways of interpreting or transforming one modality to another. His work is engaged in a multi-sensory approach and experimentation that allows for the transitioning and re-interpreting of content and experience from one medium to another with particular emphasis on the tactile as a form of creative expression.

please ask for David’s CV

Individually there is no specific meaning. They are simply different hand shapes that are familiar and with that familiarity they imply certain meanings that we have come to understand or accept. I have studied the history of gesture as it applies to oral communication as far back as the Roman period when orators employed hand gestures and shapes that where given specific meanings. Many of these signified meanings have carried forward to today. The fingerprints simply relate to the individuality of humans as no two fingerprints are exactly the same. I wanted to draw attention to the uniqueness of each of us and to the natural beauty of the design of each. In our contemporary society, as a squared image, they also make reference to the ubiquitous Q Codes, also unique but contrast them in that one is natural and one is a human-made digital invention. In the end, for me, the natural prevails in design and beauty.

This work is part of a continuous study into gesture, hand shapes, sign language as methods of non-verbal communication. The language of the ‘hand’ goes back to pre-history, becomes oratorial signifiers in the Roman era and for the Deaf over the ages becomes their cultural language. The use of the familiar ‘V for Victory’ and the American Sign Language representing both ‘v’ and the number ‘2’ overlapping the letters of the English language alphabet represents an urgent call for communication in all its forms to commit to equality, social justice, humanity and peace in a world of crisis. ‘can’t we just work together on this?’

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