The sense of touch is our ability to absorb stimuli through the skin. It shows us in small pieces what surrounds us, allows us to find the shape, texture, size, temperature and movement of what we are – very directly – in contact with. Not an all-round view, not a panorama of sound, a world made up of many tangible individual parts. Even if the sense of touch lacks a wide angle, we can only really grasp many things when we touch them. tactile comes from the Latin tactilis, the same root word from which “tact” originates. It means to feel, touch, the sense of touch and primarily means the touch that we receive. If we actively and consciously feel something, this is also described as haptic perception.

Tactile and acoustic stimuli overlap: we hear waves, vibrations in the air that cause our eardrums to vibrate. Certain frequencies also trigger vibrations in solid matter, which we perceive tactilely on the skin or in the body. Some vibrations are only transmitted to the ear via the bones and we hear “with the body”. Other acoustic stimuli cause a tingling sensation in the neck without any actual contact – the phenomenon is being researched as ASMR (Autonomous Sensory Meridian Response) and has become an artistic medium.

With our skin, we are completely enveloped in our largest organ: On an area of around one and a half to two square metres, we carry very different nerve cells that are specialized in transmitting touch, pressure, pain or temperature to our brain. With the help of Merkel cells, which are mainly located on the lips and fingertips, we can feel objects, sense shapes and find out how hard something is. Another type of sensory cell, the Meissner corpuscles, registers vibrations and lets us know when something moves over our skin. Receptors for cold and pain transmit their information more slowly to the brain. C-tactile nerve fibers react exclusively to caressing, tender touch. They react most strongly to touch that moves at 3 cm per second – the optimum stroking speed?

Some areas of skin have few sensory cells, making our sensations coarser. Others, such as fingertips, lips or erogenous zones, are densely covered with different nerve cells and can sense the finest nuances. In the brain, a tactile stimulus is compared with other sensory information, expectations and knowledge and then interpreted as pleasant or unpleasant. Only then do our sensations and reactions arise.

Without tactile and haptic perception, people would not be able to sit, stand or live. The sense of touch enables us to grasp and hold objects and operate tools. Sensory cells for balance and receptors that help control swallowing and breathing are located in deep layers of skin and in the muscles. We owe our self-perception (proprioception) to our sense of touch. We know where we end and where the other begins. Thanks to receptors in joints and tendons that measure the angle of the joints, we know where our limbs are at all times without looking and can therefore feel with our hands in the dark. Interpersonal touch increases our willingness to enter into social relationships and also to connect emotionally, can make us more helpful and generous, can send us into ecstasy or trigger absolute disgust. Touch enables us to communicate emotional states with astonishing precision.

From November 25 to December 4, the sens taktil festival will focus on the overlaps and interactions between the experience of touch and the experience of hearing: in the rooms of ZiMMT and on the grounds of Kontor 80, we invite you to a joint multi-sensory, synaesthetic exploration in which the boundaries between art and the viewer become blurred. In audiovisual concerts with 3D sound or in an ASMR performance, on sound loungers or in walk-in and touchable installations of the tactile exhibition, in workshops, in the festival sauna or on the tactile path, experiences are created that can be heard and felt.