Dear Toronto

This is a reflection from showing The Violins at Nuit Blanche on Oct 4th 2025 7PM - 7AM, a 12-hour overnight public art festival, in Toronto, Ontario.

More than 3000 people came through our installation that evening.

Oct 2025

Dear Toronto,

I loved looking so many of you in the eye and saying: 

Sit across from a violin, read the booklet, interact with the instrument, please keep the violin with the chair you picked it up from, and be reasonably gentle with it.

You nodded yes, and said ‘of course’ with your eyes. 

I loved seeing your curiosity. 

I loved seeing your openness. 

You asked me: 

Can I play it?

How long can I stay? 

If I know how to play, can I have a bow? 

You said, ‘My first time getting to touch a violin!”

…

You plucked, viciously.

You broke strings.

You ‘interviewed’ your friends about the questions.

You healed conservatory trauma.

You begged me to tune the violin. You asked if you could tune other violins. You tuned your violin. A lot. 

You came alone, you came with your family, you came with your lovers. 

You came from the Jays game with sports merch on. 

You asked me how it all worked. 

You thanked me for ‘orchestrating this’ with such earnestness I don’t know if you caught your own pun. 

I was overwhelmed by the energy you came in with. 

… 

You got quieter once we understood how to manage this energy, how you came in. You seemed to start to listen to the room, to yourself. I hoped.

You didn’t seem to know what you came for - you were out! Nuit Blanche!

You giggled while I gave you my spiel, holding big slurpies. 

You took photos of yourself holding the violin. So many selfies. 

You plucked, cradled, chatted. 

I hoped you asked yourself the questions I was asking you. 

Did you pluck to hear the violin? To hear yourself play the violin? It was waiting to hear from you. 

You were rough with the violins.

With yourself. 

In a way that I didn’t understand. 

Maybe the questions were ‘too much’ and it was easier to talk loudly to your friend and pluck the strings as hard as you could.

You were an uncouth cousin at my dinner party who didn’t know better. I had guests I was excited for you to meet, and you talked over them too much. 

I could feel it was partially because you haven’t been to many dinner parties. There have been budget cuts, you see. 

I was overwhelmed by how starved you were. 

To be in company. 

To be close to art. Literally. 

You kept plucking.

You turned pegs you didn’t need to turn or were asked to turn. 

You added salt to the pot without being asked. 

You gulped with your phone camera.

I don’t know if you tasted anything. 

You didn’t know how long it took me, us, to make this for you. How much care and attention. 

Yes, I expected you to be distracted, on some drugs, with some drinks. I was ready for this.

But I didn’t realize how starved you were. 

I don’t think you knew. 

I don’t think you know. 

…

To the violinists in the room who couldn’t resist tuning, pizzing loudly to show your training, who asked me for a bow without even knowing what the offer was before you… 

I get it. 

I understand the part of you that couldn’t help it, to show what you knew, what you could do with the violin.

It’s not your fault. 

All the more reason to open the gate. 

… 

At the beginning, when you lined up, you trickled in, then gushed in. 

I didn’t know exactly how you’d be with the art - that was, is, the point. 

To share a relationship with the violin, to share what it represents. 

To guide you to a place with the instrument that took me 40 years to get to that has more to do with listening than making sounds.

Were they great instruments? No, but they were violins nonetheless, and we tuned them before you came, out of respect for them. 

You were rough with the violins. 

You were grab-assey with them. 

I created something with an assumption of a certain level of respect and understanding of art work that I didn’t realize I was holding until I saw how you handled the work.

As a continuation of my desire to have a different relationship with the audience - in this case, you weren’t exactly the audience in the usual way. You were out! Nuit Blanche! 

…

Maybe you didn’t have the arts in your life as a child, you didn’t get doses of it like math and geography. 

You didn’t sing in a choir and harmonize next to another kid with your voices vibrating together. 

Maybe you didn’t get the class where the teacher had everyone make paper top hats, learn New York New York together, and dance in a line up like it was the only important thing in your life.

… 

I’m still glad you came. 

I don’t see you like this very often. More open than usual. That part was thrilling. 

… 

To devote yourself to the violin - to anything - is a privilege. 

If this makes you feel tense, angry, resistant (especially the word “privilege”) about class, wealth, colonization… yes, yes. I don’t deny any of these things. 

Maybe this all sounds condescending, but that’s not what I mean. 

During those 12 hours -  you showed up, incredibly, and I loved it. We did our best to invite you in, graciously, even as I watched you eat with your mouth open... 

I guess rather than resent you, and speak ill of you behind your back, I’m trying to say that … I’m not blaming you, but I’m begging you, Toronto, please - look me in the eye, and meet me half way. If you just consume it all mindlessly, you’ll miss it and we both lose. 

And also - thank you for looking me in the eye, meeting me half way, getting quiet and listening. 

To the violinists - I hope in your desire to make sounds and be heard, you heard what I was asking you.