Minor Compositions

For this episode we have a conversation with Bernard Marszalek and Peter Bloom about Bernard’s new book  Jobs, Jive, & Joy: An Argument for the Utopian Spirit . In it we cover a wide range of topics including tech bros, the place of Bernard’s mum in labor history, and the ongoing quest to have our lives be filled with radical hedonism, collective joy, and non-alienated time. “Utopianism arose...

As part of previewing and preparing for a larger project with Penny Rimbaud, this episode revisits a conversation with Penny from 2017. This was part of the “Stop the City… Revisited” installation which was part of “Discipline the City” exhibition and event series at the Substation in Singapore. It’s an interesting, if somewhat strange conversation, where Pen, as is his wont, answers questions in...

In this episode we chat with Pil and Galia Kollectiv to explore their new book,  Subversive Performance in the Age of Human Capital . Stevphen was originally to take part in the book release event last autumn in London but was unable. So instead we’ve turned that missed event into an excuse for a conversation around Pil and Galia’s work. Topics covered include intersections of performance, labor,...

In this episode of Minor Compositions we delve into the complex intersections of gender, power, and contemporary alt-right and neofascist politics with Jack Bratich and Ewa Majewska. Drawing on Bratich’s  On Microfascism: Gender, Death, and War and Majewska’s Feminist Antifascism: Counterpublics of the Common , the discussion unpacks how gender dynamics are central to the rise of fascist ideologie...

Minor Compositions Podcast Episode 20 The Arts of Logistics with Michael Shane Boyle & Elaine W Ho    This episode is a conversation around the new book The Arts of Logistics: Artistic Production in Supply Chain Capitalism by Michael Shane Boyle. For this conversation we are joined by Elaine Ho, who artistic practice explores similar areas to those explored in Shane’s work. Through this conver...

Episode 19 Emergent Assemblages of Relationist Football with Jamie Hamilton  For this episode we talk with Jamie Hamilton, a football coach and tactical writer based at Ayr United in Scotland. Hamilton is best known for coining the idea of relationism in football, which is an approach that emphasizes emergent patterns of play discovered by the players themselves rather than fitting into a set plan...

Minor Compositions Podcast Episode 18 Anxiety as Vibration with Ana Minozzo   For this episode we talk with we chat Ana Minozzo about her new book Anxiety as Vibration: A Psychosocial Cartography . What can anxiety do if approach anxiety not simply as a problem to be solved, but also as a potential site of rupture and transformation? And what tools might we find in a rethought version of psychoana...

Minor Compositions Podcast Episode 17 Militant Aesthetics with Martin Lang  For this episode we talk with art historian and painter Martin Lang about this book Militant Aesthetics: Art Activism in the 21st Century. How are practices of art activism changing in the current political and media climate? What tensions exist within these forms of political engagement and how can they be productively wo...

Minor Compositions Podcast Episode 16 Sports & the Avant-Garde with Przemysław Strożek  For this episode we talk with Przemysław Strożek about the relationship between avant-garde arts and sports in the 1920s and 1930s. We discuss two of his books, one as editor: Sport and the European Avant-Garde (1900–1945); and one as sole author: Picturing the Workers’ Olympics and the Spartakiads: Moderni...

Minor Compositions Podcast Episode 15 Class, Disasters, and Mutual Aid with John Preston and Rhiannon Firth For this episode we talk with John Preson and Rhiannon Firth about the relationship between class, disasters, and mutual aid. The conversation is formed mainly around re-visiting their 2020 book “Coronavirus, Class and Mutual Aid in the United Kingdom” but branches off to discussing broader...

Minor Compositions Podcast Episode 14: Revolutionary Love & the Deep Commons with Matt York For this episode we talk with Matt York about his book Love and Revolution: A politics for the Deep Commons “Based on award-winning research, Love and Revolution brings classical and contemporary anarchist thought into a mutually beneficial dialogue with a global cross-section of ecological, anti-capita...

Minor Compositions Podcast Episode 13: Up Against the Real with Nadja Millner-Larsen For this episode we talk with Nadja Millner-Larsen about her book Up Against the Real Black Mask from Art to Action. “With Up Against the Real, Nadja Millner-Larsen offers the first comprehensive study of the group Black Mask and its acrimonious relationship to the New York art world of the 1960s. Cited as pioneer...

Minor Compositions Podcast Episode 12: The Subhumans & Punk Historiography with Ian Glasper For this episode we talk with Ian Glasper about his book Silence Is No Reaction: Forty Years of Subhumans . In the conversation we cover broader issues of ‘punk historiography’ and documenting more marginal musical, artistic, and political milieus that one is a part of (rather than falling on or relying...

Minor Compositions Podcast Episode 11: Italian Operaismo with Gigi Roggero This episode of the Minor Compositions podcast is recorded as part of the Ultradependent Public School exhibition at BAK (https://www.bakonline.org/program-item/ultradependent-public-school-2/) For this episode we are talking with Gigi Roggero about his book Italian Operaismo: Genealogy, History, Method. In this conversatio...

Minor Compositions Podcast Episode 10: Autonomia and Art with Jacopo Galimberti https://fireflyfrequencies.org/podcasts/minor-compositions This episode is a discussion with Jacopo Galimberi about this book Images of Class: Operaismo, Autonomia and the Visual Arts (1962–1988) “During the 1960s and 1970s, Workerism and Autonomia were prominent Marxist currents. However, it is rarely acknowledged tha...

Minor Compositions Podcast Season 1 Episode 9 Compound Lyricism This episode intersperses a performance by experimental Indonesian doom folk metal band Senyawa (recorded in Folkestone in April 2022) with a discussion with their vocalist and lyricist Rully Shabara. The interview covers topics including his approach to writing lyrics, use of allegory and imagery, and how this has changed over Senyaw...

Minor Compositions Podcast Season 1 Episode 8: After the Internet For this episode we have a discussion with Tiziana Terranova about her recently released book After the Internet: Digital Networks between Capital and the Common . We cover a range of topics including the shift from the internet as open network to the rise of corporate platforms, the psychopathologies of digital culture, and capital...

Minor Compositions Podcast Season 1 Episode 7 Feminism, Punk and the Avant-Garde For this episode we have a discussion with Becky Binns about her recently released book Gee Vaucher: Beyond punk, feminism and the avant-garde . We cover a a range off topics including Gee’s work in relationship with punk and artistic countercultures, as well as the changing historiography of punk and feminism. Does a...

Minor Compositions Podcast Season 1 Episode 5 Squatting, Art, and Gentrification  For this episode we have a discussion with Clarrie Pope and Alan W Moore around squatting, art, and gentrification, as well as a range of related topics. The idea is to explore these topics, but coming from different angles, for instance how writing a graphic novel about squatting is different from a personal account...

Minor Compositions Podcast Season 1 Episode 4 The Weight of the Printed Word In this episode we have a conversation with Steve Wright, about his book The Weight of the Printed Word: Text, Context and Militancy in Operaismo . In it we discuss the role of print production and document work in the history of Italian operaismo and autonomist Marxism. What role did the production of various forms of pr...

Minor Compositions Podcast Season 1 Episode 3 Surrealism and the War on Work In this episode we have a conversation with Abigail Susik, about her book Surrealist Sabotage and the War on Work . We cover a range of topics including the centrality of work refusal to the history of Surrealism, automatist practices and aesthetic sabotage, the class composition of labor that influenced the beginning of...

Minor Compositions Podcast Season 1 Episode 2 For this episode, as something of a preview to the upcoming publication of Paolo Sollier’s book Kicks, Spits, and Headers. The Autobiographical Reflections of an Accidental Footballer we have a conversation with Gabriel Kuhn about the relationship between radical politics and sports, particularly focusing on his book Soccer Vs. the State: Tackling Foot...

Minor Compositions Podcast Season 1 Episode 1: Communizing Publishing This first episode of the Minor Compositions podcast is a discussion with Nick Thoburn about experimental publishing and communizing media. Nick Thoburn is Reader in Sociology at the University of Manchester. He writes about publishing, political theory, social movements, and architecture, and is author of "Anti-Book: On the Art...