Take a copy of Monopoly, cover it in lye for a few days, boil from off the bones whatever flesh remains, and give the clean white skeleton a tasteful, minimalist paintjob, and you end up with
ONOPO, an extreme reduction of the original boardgame by Metafilter's own Matthew Hollett, aka
oulipian.
Via mefi projects, hat tip to fastcodesign c/o Rock Paper Shotgun's always-lovely Sunday Papers feature.
posted by cortex
on Jan 20, 2013 -
56 comments
"A composer's dream : a fail-safe orchestra at one's fingertips obeying ever so gently to his every command : a timeless sounding orchestra, both futuristic and slightly dada, conjuring ancient traditions in its surprisingly sensuous music. This is, in a nutshell what
Pierre Bastien's "Mecanium" is all about" -Michel F. Côté.
Watch him in action
Live at Faster than Sound or enjoy a track from his album
Mecanoid - Avid Diva. [more inside]
posted by mingo_clambake
on Dec 29, 2012 -
7 comments
The
Canto Ostinato is a minimalist classical composition written in 1976-1979 consisting of "small, entirely tonal cells which are repeated - how many times is left to the performer". Usually performed by
two or
four pianos, it's also been adapted to other instruments
like the harp. The Canto Ostinato ("stubborn song") was written by Dutch composer
Simeon ten Holt, who passed away yesterday.
[more inside]
posted by MartinWisse
on Nov 26, 2012 -
6 comments
Simple Desks:
A frequently updated collection of beautifully minimal desks and workspaces, interspersed with occasional musings on minimalism, productivity, design and technology
posted by Egg Shen
on Jul 30, 2012 -
48 comments
Beautiful Type is a patchwork of photos and illustrations having a relationship with typography.
AisleOne is focused on graphic design, typography, grid systems, minimalism and modernism.
iABC is a collection of beautiful letters.
Inspiration Bit has a nice archive of articles about web typography.
Nicetype is about fonts, logos, posters and software.
Twenty-Six Types celebrates the beautiful letters.
Typenuts is type-themed iPhone and desktop wallpapers.
Typoretum is about typography, letterpress and printing history. Enjoy.
posted by netbros
on Nov 6, 2011 -
5 comments
"The day with its cares and perplexities is ended and the night is now upon us. The night should be a time of peace and tranquility; a time to relax and be calm. We have need of a soothing story to banish the disturbing thoughts of the day, to set at rest our troubled minds, and put at ease our ruffled spirits. And what sort of story shall we hear? Ah, it will be a familiar story. A story that is so very, very old, and yet it is so new. It is the old, old story of …" the
2012/13 touring production of
Einstein on the Beach.
[more inside]
posted by williampratt
on Mar 2, 2011 -
21 comments
Minimal origami is paper folding with just one fold. A single fold in a piece of paper is enough to make a
swan or an interesting
curve. Notably,
Paul Jackson has made beautiful one crease origami structures.
posted by twoleftfeet
on Jan 31, 2010 -
16 comments
Terry Riley celebrates
the 45th anniversary of his groundbreaking composition,
In C. A major work in the history of
minimalist music, In C has an incredibly flexible
score and performance guidelines, which have inspired many musicians to make their own versions, including a
French guitar quintet, a
traditional Chinese orchestra, a
keyboard ensemble, an
all-synthesizer group,
CalArts Music students,
French-Canadian hippies, a
Danish vocal and percussion ensemble, another
percussion ensemble,
Japanese acidheads, a
"laptop orchestra", the
Bang on a Can Orchestra, and a
rock "orchestration" by the Styrenes. No two versions can sound exactly the same, but it's still an open question how they will compare to the performance of In C at its
Carnegie Hall debut next month. No recording of the original 1964 performance has ever been publicly released, but some eyewitness accounts can be found
here.
posted by jonp72
on Mar 4, 2009 -
40 comments
Counting in groups of 12 the first performer claps on 1,2,3,5,6,8,10 and 11. The second performer starts by clapping the same pattern but gradually shifts the pattern one step to the right. You are playing
Steve Reich's clapping music. If you are serious you will want to study the
score - and perhaps a
watch a performance). If you are happen to be Evelyn Glennie you can have a go at
both parts at once. - those slightly less more mortal are likely to end up like
this.
[more inside]
posted by rongorongo
on Jan 14, 2008 -
25 comments
"“If the book were to be published as it is in its present edited form, I may never write another story, that’s how closely, God Forbid, some of those stories are to my sense of regaining my health and mental well-being.”
The New York Times
reported today that Raymond Carver's widow, Tess Gallagher, is pushing to republish the stories in Carver's acclaimed 1981 breakout collection, "What We Talk About When We Talk About Love," in their original, unedited form.
[more inside]
posted by sock it to me monkey
on Oct 17, 2007 -
25 comments
MNMLST POETRY is an essay by
Bob Grumman about a strand of poetry that he claims is "unacclaimed but flourishing". Here are poems in this vein by
Aram Saroyan (
2),
jwcurry,
LeRoy Gorman,
bpNichol,
Michael Basinski,
John M. Bennett,
Karl Young,
John Martone,
Ian Hamilton Finlay and finally some
mathemaku by Bob Grumman, the essay's author.
posted by Kattullus
on Jun 8, 2005 -
12 comments
For over a decade,
reclusive Berliners Mark Ernestus and Moritz von Oswald have published a distinctive style of minimalist techno through
Basic Channel and several other labels based out of
their record store. In 1996, they expanded into dub with
Burial Mix, a series of 10"s featuring long-lost reggae vocalists. (They've also begun reissuing out-of-print releases by NYC's
Wackies.) Although their vinyl-centric releases have always been relatively underground, they may soon be reaching a wider audience thanks to a domestic (US) release of their latest CD comp by
Asphodel. Also see the latest issue of
The Wire for a new quasi-interview.
posted by hyperizer
on Oct 3, 2003 -
15 comments
