TACTUS – Presence, intimacy & closeness across distance

What is TACTUS

Tactus is a twin-artefact that strives to facilitate simple communication, intimacy and closeness between two people across longer distances. The artefact is meant for couples or close friends who might find value in a closed physical connection to their loved one that allows them to show presence and thought.

The framework for the project

Striving to facilitate intimacy and connectedness through abstract communication, Tactus is a part of an explorative project into domestic life in the future. 

We discovered that this current mediation of being together cannot substitute reality, as physical intimacy is an irreplaceable component of human interaction. This opened up a design space for us to create an artefact, which can create physical intimacy over distance rather than mediate reality.

In our design of Tactus we were inspired by several other research projects dealing with physical telepresence, haptic communication and other non-audial and -visual projects

How does it work?

Tactus takes human input in the form of a gesture formed with one artefact and translates it into mechanical movement that is mimicked by the other. The intent is to invoke an experience of connectedness that is supported by the exact movement pattern or ‘message’ formed by the sender. In this, Tactus attempts to humanize an abstract and mechanical object.