Survivors

“Survivors” is an installation of three objects on a white tabletop: a broken violin, a bow and a few pages of sheet music. The violin stands upright with a hole torn through its body, its snapped strings curling loose in the air. The bow rests across the open score; neither has been touched. The three objects divide music into its parts: the instrument, a physical thing that new technology can break and replace; the playing, with all the feeling and improvisation of a hand on a string; and the composing, the thought that decides what is worth playing at all. The damage falls only on the first. The bow and the score are the survivors, and what survives was never an object. New technology can break the instrument and take its place; playing and composing belong to the person who does them. The violin could be replaced, and it was. What it was meant to carry stayed.