The Hands that Write History presents hundreds of close-up images of white male hands performing seemingly ordinary gestures and tasks. Drawn from contexts ranging across archaeology, art history, bureaucracy, racial science, technology, finance, and warfare, these actions include handling weapons, excavating artifacts, and carrying out quantitative procedures such as measuring, classifying, and ordering. 

The owners of the hands remain anonymous, yet their overwhelming repetition points to the pervasive reach of Western patriarchal power and the institutionalized, structural violence that binds together administration, global politics, finance, science, warfare, and technology.