Caducei is a sculptural diptych consisting of two piles of books incased in soap.

Each sculpture (Caduceus I and Caduceus II) has a pile of 60 books within it. The 60 books are identical copies of small books of love poems. These two piles of book have then been moulded into blocks of chestnut blossom soap.

Caducei plays with the contradictions of speech and silence, offering and withholding. It makes what it offers unavailable and uses its materiality as a tool of refusal. All that is meant to be handled in intimate bodily exchanges is now combined to refuse that handling.

Books — which are meant to be held, opened, read — are encased in soap — which is meant to be rubbed over the skin — nullifying the use of both materials.

What does it mean to have the very nature of something deny other parts of its nature? What does it mean to have such contradictions define your nature?