Kirstin Burckhardt

Installation and video performance, harp and HD video projector, freestanding projection screen

String Tension History is an installation and video performance that centers on the relationship between the artist and her historic harp. Having arrived in Germany on the day the First World War began and having survived both World Wars, the harp is now at a breaking point.
What is the sound of transformation? The video performance documents the harp’s restoration process both visually and sonically. It follows the restorer’s hands as he breaks the harp open and reassembles it. The sound is recorded from an internal perspective using binaural microphones placed inside the “belly” of the instrument – creating an immersive and intimate environment. Subtle vibrations and sudden crackings are captured with contact microphones, alongside vocal elements, as the artist sings a lamento into the harp’s resonant body.
The harp’s history is set alongside the artist’s personal history: her German great-grandfather signed forced sterilizations in the name of the Nazi eugenics policy of a “healthy nation.” The artist herself has undergone surgeries and lost her fertility due to a gyneco logical tumor and endometriosis, a disease affecting many women.
In the exhibition, the harp stands as an altered object, bearing traces of the process and articulating a shared narrative of bodies in endurance and transformation.

DYSTOPIA SOUND ART BIENNIAL 2026
Sound Art | Performance | Discourse
25.09. - 17.10.26
HAUNT | Berliner Medizinhistorisches Museum der Charité | Flutgraben e.V. | Deep See @CafeBabette | Floating e.V.