FIGMENTS · Episode 03
the crack
The one where the rock splits in half with Moss on the wrong side.
What they were looking at
Japanese ceramic repair, 15th century onward
Kintsugi
When a bowl breaks you can glue it and hope nobody notices, or you can join the pieces with lacquer dusted in powdered gold so the fracture becomes the most expensive-looking thing about the object. The repair is the decoration. The bowl is worth more. This is the series' entire visual philosophy and it arrived in episode three, which is earlier than I had any right to expect.
A note
Moss crosses open space on four pebbles and I have never been more frightened of anything. The score drops out almost completely for the crossing because a small creature doing a brave thing does not need an orchestra explaining it. He ends the episode lying down on the warm gold seam, which was not in the plan, it was just where he went.