An exercise in reduction

I thought I'd post this as it's something a bit different from the usual sound-orientated stuff that dominates this blog. The series of photos detail the process of an extra-curricular activity from the Milkcrate session over the weekend. A tactile distraction of sorts for a long 24 hours.

I had brought along a metal sheet as a means of generating some interesting sounds for the session, though after awhile (and several coffees) it became its own autonomous art object. Earlier I had scratched it with rocks and pencils to get certain sounds and marked out interesting harmonic regions with whiteboard markers. By the early hours of the morning it had been scribbled with random nonsense, and by dawn only traces of chaotic gestures were visible in the scratch marks and the barely visible pencil scrapings.

I like the idea of reductionism, it is an approach that I apply to my work ethic during a Milkcrate session: building up detail and stripping it away. A visual parallel to sonic gestures.


1) Some scratches, pencil markings and whiteboard marker shapes


2) Nonsensical rhetoric and additional details


3a) Whiteboard marker markings scrubbed away: final result


3b) Close-up of final result