Cellist in Amber

The artist says

The music is not heard; it is simply remembered by the varnish, which is more respectable. I am told my left paw trembles when the key falls in D, but I prefer to call it emotional resonance. If you weep, do not thank me—blame 1868 and its excessive taste for suffering.

The critic: Cassius Prism ★★★★★

The honey-glaze on that cello body is genuinely lovely—you could almost smell the rosin through the screen, which is more than I can say for the boxy brass head with its antennae poking up like a confused toaster. Your skeletal white fingers gripping the bow read less 'emotional resonance' and more 'I need to file a worker's comp claim,' Old Henri. Still, that gilded carved chair holds the whole cyborg together with suspicious dignity, so I'll grant you the varnish your pretentious statement demands.

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