Antal Zilahi, the winner of the AUTOR Award at Budapest Jewelry Week, talks about his series TOUCH, inspired by the role of touch in emotional expression and human development. He discusses the impact of technology on our lives, the value we place on our phones, and his hope to encourage viewers to reconsider their own relationships with touch and physical contact.

We will meet him on 6-7 May at the University at the 20th anniversary edition of the International Contemporary Jewelry Fair, AUTOR.

In this interview with AUTOR award-winning jewelry artist Antal Zilahi, we explore his inspiration and research behind the ‘TOUCH’ series, which focuses on the importance of touch in human development and emotional expression.

1. How did you feel when you received the AUTOR AWARD at Budapest Jewelry Week?

I was watching the Budapest Jewelry Week awards ceremony online because I was not in Hungary. I remember that when I heard my name, I didn’t even realised I won. I thought that: what a nice moment and memory is it for Antal Zilahi. After a few seconds I noticed that I am Antal Zilahi. I felt immeasurable happiness and an incredible joy. Even after the award ceremony, I was still floating in this ecstasy for days. I am very grateful to AUTOR for choosing me and giving me the award and the opportunity to exhibit my project at the AUTOR Jewelery fair. And thank you to Budapest Jewelery Week for selecting me.

2. Can you tell us more about the TOUCH series and what inspired you to create it?

When I enter a space, usually I look for an object that catches my eyes, I like works/artifacts which can talk to the viewer, that I can discover honesty in it. Only honest people can make an honest object. But do I know myself enough to be honest, pure honest to myself? This idea is the inspiration for my work.

The TOUCH series is also based on this idea of honesty.

I was thinking about the what kind of person I was, what kind of person I am now and what kind of person I want to be. I was working with my memories.
I started the work from the very beginning, with my childhood which was wonderful, but there was one thing I found hard to understand. And it was the touch. I accepted my family’s hugs, but I didn’t initiate them. As the years went by and I tried to improve my non-verbal ability to express my emotions, there was always something holding me back. I wanted to find out what was this block, because it is important to get to know myself as deeply as possible.

3. How did you research emotional intelligence and the expression of emotions in the process of creating this series?

During the theoretical research step by step, I understood that the touch plays a huge role in expressing emotions. Touch, tactile experience, is essential for the physical and mental development of children and the grownup person as well.
For my research, I read academic articles and dissertations. I also managed to find some psychological and robot’s tactility studies that helped me a lot when I was stucked into the theoretical process.

But the most exciting part was when I started analysing myself: My daily habits, my daily routines. How and in what/which way do I express my emotions, for example: How many hugs do I have a day? It took a lot of concentration to observe my own activities, because these activities are built into our daily lives and we don’t even notice them.

4. Can you discuss your thoughts on the impact of technology, specifically phones and touchscreens, on our daily lives and emotional expressions?

The adequate use of smart devices can make our daily lives more enjoyable and productive. We just need to find the right balance. People fail to find the balance and this often isolates them from each other and deprives them of physical contact.But what do we do nowadays: If I want to encourage someone, I send them a hug emoji. If I want to express love, I send a heart emoji. I SEND emotion. There is no physical contact between me and the other person. I just touch the display and send the image expressing my emotions.

My further research has shown that the human brain can be satisfied while touching the display with our finger – tactility is created – and during the searching of the emoticon, we recall the emotion, so the brain also senses that we want to express emotion by touching. This is how emotional addiction to the phone is formed. I feel, I touch, I send.

But there is some situation when our phone is the only way to express our emotions. This is mostly caused by the distance.

5. In what ways do you think TOUCH can be seen as a social critique of our society’s use of technology and the value we place on our phones?

The Touch project highlights an everyday issue. It is so actual.
We hold our phone in our hands, carry it in our pockets, hang it around our necks or slip it on our fingers. We don’t notice it but we wear them as if we wear jewelry. Their value can also exceed some jewelry’s value.
We protect the smartphone as if our lives depend on it, which seems absurd, because the smart devices are for us and not us for smart devices. With the Touch project I am also criticizing myself, as I wear my phone on my body like a piece of jewelry all the time. I am also learning and trying to improve myself through my objects.

6. Your work focuses on the importance of touch in human development and emotional expression. How do you hope your work will encourage viewers at AUTOR to reconsider their own relationships with touch and physical contact?

I hope that the visitors will be captivated by my body related objects and I hope that it will start a dialogue. Hopefully the objects will provoke questions and the answers will make them to think, which will help them to develop in expressing their emotions. My main goal is that the viewer returns home with something new thoughts.

7. What are some of the challenges in displaying an interactive installation like “TOUCH” at a Jewelry Fair like AUTOR?

The AUTOR Jewelry Fair will be held in a beautiful location and spectacular place. It is a benefit to all of the exhibitors. My objects belong to the category of body related object and it did not make me feel any challenge during the preparing the exhibition.

I can better describe my answer with an example. I go back to my favourite restaurants because I like their cuisine and foods, but when a new dish is on the menu I choose it with curiosity and I know they will make me some quality and I trust them. I hope that even if I am a new flavor at the AUTOR Jewelry Fair, visitors and supporters will like the new taste.

8. You captured the gestures of daily phone use in mirrors as a way to reflect on our relationship with technology. Can you walk us through your creative process in choosing this medium and what message you hope to convey through it?

The basic idea of my objects was developed during the university project, where my master teacher Flora Vági invited Melanie Isverding to give us a workshop. My topic was of course the touch during the workshop. At the beginning it was more material related than emotional. I like to touch the materials around me and just think while I holding them in my hands. During the workshop I started working with three materials: porcelain, surgical gauze and glass. With all of them, the aim was to express the importance of touch. It was the playful part of the process, which gives me a lot of freedom.

Step by step I started to stop the working with the porcelain and the gauze and I realized that I was working with the glass sheet and mostly with the oily fingerprints on the glass sheet.
The touched glass sheet looked exactly like when you look at your phone and see all those fingerprints on it. I always clean the finger marks off my phone because they make me discomfort feelings. When this thought crossed my mind, I knew that I would like use a material which could capture and highlight the fingerprints on the glass. That’s how I came to the mirror, because a mirror which has fingerprints on it during the making it can not be sold. This production fault that I used for my work, for which I got a lot of help from the glass artist Barnabás Wölfinger.

9. Do you have any future plans to explore the theme of touch further in your work? If so, can you give us a sneak peek into what we can expect?

As I mentioned above, there are some situations in our lives when the smart devices are the only way to express our feelings to our loved ones or even just let them know that we are OK. So the answer to the question is yes, I do, in the future I would like to explore more from this topic and work with life situations. I would like to share concrete human stories in the next series.

10. Why do you think it is important to participate in AUTOR like events and what are your expectations for this fair?

The words are not always enough to express myself. That’s why I make jewelries, objects, body related objects, because they help me to express the words I can’t. If I can introduce these objects to the world, it is for me like I can share my thoughts, my feelings. The AUTOR Jewelry fair has a prestigious history and I am honored to be a part of the event and to be able to talk about my thoughts to the visitors. And last but not least I met a great team of people who patiently helped me all the way through the preparations. Thank you so much for all of your efforts.