Marc Behrens

Marc Behrens positioned himself at the vanguard of the post-minimalist movement known alternately as lowercase or microsound upon issuing his debut CD Advanced Environmental Control in 1995. This approach occupies an extremely subdued zone linking electroacoustics to sound art. He ranks among the leading practitioners in the area, sharing that status with Francisco López, Bernhard Günter, Steve Roden, and John Hudak, while maintaining parallel activity as a sound installation artist and graphic designer whose albums have appeared on Trente Oiseaux, Raster-Noton, Edition..., Intransitive, and CMR, among additional imprints.

Behrens first operated inside the industrial cassette underground beginning around 1989. Nineteen years old at that point and following three years performing in jazz-rock ensembles in his birthplace of Darmstadt, Germany, he founded the independent label Animal Art, which also served as the name of a project undertaken with Gregor v. Sivers. Far more maximalist and collage-oriented, those works attracted scant attention yet constituted merely one facet of the artist's wide-ranging abilities. He mounted his earliest photographic exhibitions during the same interval and initiated collaborations with Ho. Turner involving video art and installations.

Nineteen ninety-three proved decisive. Behrens initiated experiments with acoustic feedback, producing a body of recordings that later supplied material for several compositions released under the title Lecture Feedback/Source Feedback/The Aesthetics of Censorship. After perceiving unforeseen elegance and clarity amid near-inaudible sounds, he redirected his practice toward field recording and sound-producing machines. This change terminated both his label and the Animal Art persona after seven cassettes while prompting formal studies in design, a pursuit that grew nearly inseparable from his sonic work.

Advanced Environmental Control appeared in 1995 on Günter's Trente Oiseaux label and helped define the strikingly fresh aesthetic of the still-new imprint, for which Behrens also created its earliest album covers. In 1996 he undertook his first tour as a sound artist alongside Günter, López, and John Duncan. Recognition expanded steadily within experimental circles, as did his recorded output. To his European releases he added a Japanese CD titled Contraction in 1999 and an American one titled Elapsed Time in 2001, the latter accompanied by installation presentations in that country. Throughout the same period he maintained a discreet presence on the minimal techno circuit under the name Eyephone, issuing recordings on Hypnotism and completing a collaboration with Atom Heart on Micropossessed in 1997. During 2001–2002 Behrens examined his earlier tapes for usable source material featured on Elapsed Time and Transition.