Hannah Lutz Winkler & Ryan Diaz

This performance involves artists wearing sculptures and competing in three different games, with the goal of using their sculptures to mark other performers with ink. The sculptures are strapped to the performers’ chests and protrude 6 feet in front of them, enforcing the social distancing rule of the New Normal. The piece investigates ritualized forms of male-male touch in sports and how humans negotiate physical contact, social distancing, and intimacy in the age of COVID, while defending play and humor as essential to maintaining human connection.