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Even if you don't know how to play music, it’s practically impossible not to reach out and strum or pluck the strings when an instrument appears in front of you—or at the very least, expect that a musician will appear to play it. That’s what makes these new abstract artworks by Jennie C. Jones so mind-bending.
Three massive instrument sculptures now sit on the Metropolitan Museum of Art’s rooftop in Jones’ latest work titled “Ensemble.” But only one of the instruments makes sound when it’s activated by the wind. The other two don’t make sound at all, even though they’re capable of doing so. That's exactly the point. Instead, their potential for sound and the tension between dormancy and activation is where they hold power. Go see these cool sculptures on the Met’s gorgeous rooftop through October 19.
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Since the 1980s, the Metropolitan Museum of Art has invited contemporary artists to take over its Cantor Roof Garden. In past years, visitors have seen an “Afrofuturist, ancient Egyptian funkified spaceship” by Lauren Halsey and a poignant sculptural exhibit by Petrit Halilaj that served as an ode children living in war zones.
This year, the museum is featuring American artist Jennie C. Jones who has spent three decades deploying sound as a conceptual element in her work. Three maroon-and-red sculptures make up the piece: A trapezoidal zither, modeled on a low frequency-absorbing bass trap; a tall Aeolian harp, activated by the wind; and a doubled, leaning one-string, made as an homage to the twentieth-century improvisers Moses Williams and Louis Dotson.
The instruments sit at attention waiting to be heard and making us wonder about the bodies not present to play them.
“The pieces are not always singing, they’re not performing, they’re not always activated.”
“What I hope for this work is that it ignites the sonic imagination. The pieces are not always singing, they’re not performing, they're not always activated,” Jones said at a media preview of the installation. “I think for me, that’s also a tremendous part of the work is the way to hold space and nuance and not always be full of an outward expression, but to hold a rich interior imagination and to hold a rich sonic imagination.”
Max Hollein, the Met’s CEO, describes the sculptures as “enormously powerful” as they evoke minimalism, modernism, avant garde music and Black culture.
In researching the piece, Jones considered the history of the Met’s rooftop installations as well as the instruments in the Met’s collection, associate curator Lauren Rosati explained. She and Jones have been working together to make “Ensemble” a reality for the past five years.
“The tension they hold between dormancy and activation, anticipation and release is where they hold their power.”
“While these works are mostly silent, their potential for sound and the tension they hold between dormancy and activation, anticipation and release is where they hold their power,” Rosati said.
This will be the last roof garden commission for at least five years as the museum will soon embark on construction of its new modern and contemporary art annex, the Oscar L. Tang and H.M. Agnes Hsu-Tang Wing. When it opens in 2030, it will house the Met’s collection of 20th- and 21st-century art. The rooftop commission is expected to be back in 2030 as well.