The TRELLIS project brings together researchers, artists, disabled and non-disabled people to explore and discover new perspectives into enablement.
Working with Beyond SightLoss, a group for people who are blind or partially sighted, and a project team comprised of academics from the UCL Global Disability Hub, the project aimed to reveal how the sensory experiences of different materials, focusing on tactility and sonic resonances, can bring understanding of diverse environments.During a workshop, the members of Beyond Sight Loss shared insights into their nuanced sensory and spatial understanding through materials, leading to questions of what touch means if it is mediated between the skin and one or more materials, and how visual information of materials can belie their characteristics, for example, weight, surface texture and malleability.
In theworkshop, several participants spokeof their reluctance to visit an art gallery due to the lack of accessibility and difficulty experiencing art without vision. Utilising construction materials (e.g. steel, aluminium, Perspex), a series of artworks were designed withBeyond Sight Loss members and academic Maryam Bandukda to form amulti-sensory gallery experience. Shaped into disks, different construction materials were ‘played’ on a turntable, and the resulting sounds heard through headphones, accompanied by a set of textured prints created from the various material surfaces. An audio guide, created with the participants, supported all visitors to encounter the exhibits