Broken Music
Broken Music Vol. 2: 70 Years of Records and Sound Works by Artists
Paperback. 248 pages. The essential continuation of Ursula Block's legendary 1989 Broken Music. Artists' Recordworks exhibition and publication. This volume traces the development of the vinyl record as an artistic medium from the post-war period to the present across seven decades. Based on the 2022-2023 exhibition at Hamburger Bahnhof – Nationalgalerie der Gegenwart in Berlin, curated by Sven Beckstette and Ingrid Buschmann, the book presents over 700 records arranged in ten chapters, establis…
Set of 16 Catalogues (16xBooks)
An extraordinary archive documenting over three decades of radical sound culture. Founded in 1981 by Ursula Block in Berlin-Wilmersdorf, gelbe MUSIK was one of the world's most important places for New Music enthusiasts, experimental sound, and artists' records. This complete set of 16 original sales catalogues represents the evolving inventory and vision of the legendary store, chronicling the development of sound art, free jazz, contemporary composition, and avant-garde practice from the early…
Control (LP)
Control captures Conrad Schnitzler at a pivotal moment in his solo career, with recordings made between 1979-1981 at his home studio in Berlin. Following his departure from Kluster and his brief tenure with Tangerine Dream, Schnitzler had fully committed to his vision of electronic music as pure sonic exploration. Where Convex explored minimalist repetition and icy atmospheres, Control reveals a different facet of Schnitzler's artistry. The album showcases intriguing electronic patterns, tape ma…
Convex (LP)
Conrad Schnitzler was a prolific German experimental musician and co-founder of West Berlin's Zodiak Free Arts Lab, an early member of Tangerine Dream and founder of the band Kluster. After leaving Kluster in 1971, Schnitzler embarked on an extensive solo career, pushing the boundaries of experimental electronic music. Originally released as a private pressing in 1982, Convex stands as one of Schnitzler's most compelling and underrated works. A minimalist album composed of shrill loops and disso…
My Jubilee Ist Unverhemmet
A rare artist record and sonic memoir. Published in 1977 in an edition of only 100 copies, hand numbered and signed by the artist on the record label. The B-side features grey/black art by Nam June Paik. This extraordinary document captures Paik performing his radical reinterpretation of Arnold Schoenberg's Verklärte Nacht at a Merce Cunningham dance event—playing the original 78 RPM record at 16 RPM, four times slower than intended. Paik writes in the liner notes: "In 2 weeks I will be 45. It i…
Music on Paper by Chance (Score)
A rare printed score on parchment paper, approximately A3 size. Originally folded and sent as an invitation card to an exhibition, this work embodies Suzuki's philosophy of listening, chance, and the spatial dimensions of sound. Akio Suzuki (*1941 Pyongyang) is known as a pioneer of sound art, but the breadth of his activities and the form of his works far exceeds the normal boundaries of sound art. It is perhaps more as a "quester after sound and space" that he has received the most attention f…
Für Git (Print)
A rare offset print by the radical German composer and visual artist. Published by Edition Block in an edition of 60, signed and numbered, 50 x 100 cm. Dieter Schnebel (*1930 Lahr – †2018 Berlin) was among the most uncompromising figures in post-war experimental music, exploring the boundaries between sound, silence, notation, and performance. A student of theology and musicology, Schnebel brought rigorous intellectual inquiry to his compositions, which often investigated the physical gestures o…
TV-Dog (Print)
A rare screenprint and offset print by the legendary video art pioneer. Published by Edition Block in an edition of 60, signed and numbered, 55.4 x 82 cm. Nam June Paik (*1932 Seoul – †2006 Miami), the founding father of video art, consistently explored the relationship between technology, media, and organic life throughout his career. TV-Dog embodies this investigation—the fusion of the electronic and the biological, the mechanical and the animal. The work reflects Paik's playful yet profound e…
Mozart Mix (Art Multiple)
One of the first sound multiples ever created. Published by Edition Block in an edition of 36 copies, signed and numbered. Complete sound installation in wooden box (10.2 x 86 x 81 cm) containing 25 cassettes with different recordings of Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart compositions, 5 tape decks with built-in speakers, and accompanying screenprint. Created for the 200th anniversary of Mozart's death, Mozart Mix is considered the first sound installation published as a numbered edition. Cage composed wor…
Mozart Mix (Print)
Screenprint from one of the first sound multiples ever created. Published by Edition Block in two versions: the complete sound installation in wooden box (edition of 35-36 copies) and this screenprint in red (70.2 x 70.2 cm, edition of 35, signed and numbered). Created for the 200th anniversary of Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart's death, Mozart Mix reflects Cage's fundamental aesthetic principles of chance, indeterminacy, and the dissolution of boundaries between composer, performer, and audience. The s…
Gelbe Musik (1991)
This copy is slightly damaged in transportation and has been mounted on plexiglass for protection and presentation. A rare signed and numbered screenprint created for the tenth anniversary of Ursula Block's legendary gelbe MUSIK record store in Berlin. Edition of 60, signed and numbered, 54 x 100 cm. Founded by Block in 1981, gelbe MUSIK was one of the world's most important places for New Music enthusiasts, a gathering point for collectors, artists, and radical sound practitioners. Cage (*1912 …
The Readymade Boomerang (Print)
Rare signed and numbered screen print by the legendary composer and conceptual artist. Published in a total edition of 60 numbered copies. Two-color screenprint, 70 x 100 cm. Created near the end of Cage's life, The Readymade Boomerang continues his lifelong investigation of chance operations, visual composition, and the dissolution of boundaries between art forms. The title evokes Marcel Duchamp's readymade while suggesting return, repetition, and transformation - key concepts in Cage's practic…
Gelbe Musik (1991)
A rare signed and numbered screenprint created for the tenth anniversary of Ursula Block's legendary gelbe MUSIK record store in Berlin. Edition of 60, signed and numbered, 54 x 100 cm. Founded by Block in 1981, gelbe MUSIK was one of the world's most important places for New Music enthusiasts, a gathering point for collectors, artists, and radical sound practitioners. Cage (*1912 Los Angeles – †1992 New York City), student of Henry Cowell and Arnold Schoenberg, was among the most influential co…
Künstlerschallplatten. gelbe MUSIK (Poster)
Original exhibition poster, 1987. Big Size. A rare document from the origins of the legendary Broken Music project. In 1987, a small Hamburg gallery—an artists' cooperative—invited Ursula Block of gelbe MUSIK to organize a groundbreaking exhibition of artists' records. To accompany the show, this poster was printed, featuring images of exhibited objects and short texts. The exhibition followed Block's first KÜNSTLERSCHALLPLATTEN (Artists' Records) show at gelbe MUSIK in Berlin in 1986, which inc…
Gelb
The second chapter in Schnitzler's color trilogy of pure electronic minimalism. Released in 1981 on Edition Block, Gelb continues the radical sonic experiments begun with Grün, stripping electronic music to its most stark and uncompromising essence. The original Edition Block pressing is exceptionally rare and highly sought after by collectors of minimal electronics, early industrial sound, and the German underground. "The chronology of Schnitzler's solo releases in the 1970s -- and even more so…
Gruen
Electronic minimalism at its most hypnotic and uncompromising. Released in 1981 on Edition Block, this is pure Schnitzler—no concessions, no commerciality, just the sonic vision of one of Germany's most radical electronic pioneers. Former Tangerine Dream and Kluster member Schnitzler strips away all excess, constructing strange, pulsating soundworlds from primitive synthesizers and tape manipulation. Grün unfolds like a series of sonic experiments, each track a self-contained universe of repetit…
Afrika Para Noia
A.R. Penck makes his explosive entry into recorded sound with Hinter der Wüste sterben die Gespenster (Afrika Para Noia). This is Penck's first record—a monumental document from 1979, released as an extremely rare private pressing. The legendary neo-expressionist painter channels his raw visual power into uncompromising free jazz, leading TTT with Frank Wollny on drums, Heinz Wollny on saxophone, and himself on drums. Recorded live, the music erupts with primal energy and fierce collective impro…
1965/1-∞
** condition: M/NM ** Limited edition of 400. Gatefold sleeve. In 1965, while sitting at the Café Bristol in Warsaw waiting for his wife to arrive, French-born Polish painter Roman Opałka conceived an idea that would consume the rest of his life: to paint numbers sequentially from one to infinity, a project that would become one of the most profound meditations on time, existence, and mortality in contemporary art. Upon arriving at his studio the following day, Opałka began painting small number…
Klavierduett: In memoriam George Maciunas
Signed. Comes with its original record bag/shopper! When George Maciunas died in New York in 1978, aged 47, Joseph Beuys and Nam June Paik did what artists do when words fail: they played. The piano duet they performed at Düsseldorf's Kunstakademie lasted precisely 74 minutes, the numbers inverted as if time itself could be bent backward in grief. An alarm clock ended the performance at 9:14 pm, another numerical echo of Maciunas's brief, incendiary life. This wasn't theater. It was something ra…
Ja As Long As I Can
A minimalist exploration of voice, breath, and human connection across continents: this rare 2013 LP release documents an extraordinary sound art collaboration between Norwegian artist A.K. Dolven and American poet John Giorno, produced by Edition Block in Berlin. The 22-minute work represents a unique transatlantic dialogue that explores the fundamental properties of human communication through the sustained repetition of a single word: "ja," the Norwegian equivalent of "yes." A.K. Dolven (born…