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This review discusses how visual and the tactile signals are combined in the brain to ensure appropriate interactions with the space around the body. Visual and tactile signals converge in many regions of the brain (e.g. parietal and premotor cortices) where multisensory input can interact on the basis of specific spatial constraints. Crossmodal interactions can modulate also unisensory visual and somatosensory cortices, possibly via feed-back projections from fronto-parietal areas. These processes enable attentional selection of relevant locations in near body space, as demonstrated by studies of spatial attention in healthy volunteers and in neuropsychological patients with crossmodal extinction. These crossmodal spatial effects can be flexibly updated taking into account the position of the eyes and the limbs, thus reflecting the spatial alignment of visuo-tactile stimuli in external space. Further, studies that …