This activation of WOOD PIECE, one of the instruction scores from Yoko Ono’s Grapefruit (1964), was realized as part of Yoko Ono: Music of the Mind at the Museum of Contemporary Art Chicago.

My reenactment began with an act of simple play and haptic engagement, allowing the instruction to unfold through my body’s intuitive response to the material. This process soon evoked a distinct childhood memory of using found objects to sense texture and explore the edges of my world. During performance, I sought to gratefully honor Ono’s open score, which opens a space for my interpretation and the audience’s interaction. It became a site where the score and improvisation could meet. Through playing and listening, I rediscovered what matters through the simple, profound act of relating to an everyday object—a wood piece.