‘The hand is the visible part of the brain.’ Immanuel Kant

Hands express our inner self and so there is an infinite array of gestures representing our emotions, supporting our communication, helping us carrying out tasks, simple or very complex and precise.

My hands are my most precious tools. Many artists feel this way; Henry Moore drew many hands and made the 1950 bronze sculptures displayed in the Maidstone museum, which generated this response.

This collection of hands evokes William C Stokoe’s taxonomy of gestures, from arbitrary to iconic and primate to cultural. Sometimes they also evoke the response of other artists, such as Bruce Nauman.