TypeTown #8: A poignant, musical Selectric
🏰 PLUS Tudor palaces, vintage ads, royalty, and more...
Two weeks, really?
Is it that time already?
Welcome, TypeTowners, to issue 8.
And, yes, like you I too haven’t a clue how we made it this far.
But somehow we’re still kicking, so let’s get started with a poignant new musical installation powered by an IBM Selectric.
Anechoia Memoriam
is the brainchild of
Jonathan Henderson
, professor of music at College of the Atlantic in Bar Harbor, Maine, and
Mark Dixon
, associate professor of art at Guilford College in Greensboro, NC.
“The score for the piece is composed of a list of 180 unarmed people of color killed by law enforcement in the United States. The score unfolds over seven hours, whether anyone engages with it or not. When typists participate, each letter typed is enunciated by specific notes on the piano. If no one types, the score scrolls by, accumulating on the floor in silence.”
READ:
»
Guilford Alumni Collaborate on New Work
-
Guilford College
»
Jonathan Henderson's (PhD 2021) "Anechoia Memoriam" is a unique memorial to lost lives of color
-
Duke Trinity College of Arts and Sciences
Your class starts soon
Next up is some more typewriter art, and a behind-the-scenes look at the creative process of
James Cook
.
Cook’s YouTube channel
has a few videos to watch, including this interview with Australian TV. Well worth checking out.
READ»
Artist creates gorgeous sketches using an analog typewriter
—
BoingBoing
The good, the bad, and the ugly
As a copywriter by trade, I’m always drawn to old ads. So this vintage double-pager for Exxon’s
Intelligent Typewriter
immediately caught my eye.
As well as being a spectacularly ugly machine, there’s also now something quaint about its ability to grow into a word processor.
“Our typewriters can talk to our typewriters and send or receive a page of text in 20 seconds.”
How that repetition of typewriters ever got past the copy editor, I’ll never know.
Speaking of vintage…
Take a peek at these two images from the UK monarchy.
First, a young Queen Elizabeth II is gifted a new typewriter. Fast forward a few decades to 2021, and her grandson
Prince William gets ready to type
on another old typer (a Royal, naturally).
I’ll leave it to you to ponder which — typewriters or the monarchy — will outlast the other.
Worth pausing the platen
📬
In our age of tablets, the romance of typewriters lives on
—
The Guardian
📬
Clack of typewriters captivates authors
—
The Sydney Morning Herald
📬
At one time, half the typewriters in America were made in Syracuse
—
Syracuse.com
📬
Meet the Alabama man who makes old typewriters new again
—
AL.com
And finally… typewriters in the wild
In this extraordinary dress designed by Mary Katrantzou (see the
full story here
)…
In new Netflix film
Munich: Edge of War
(typewriters galore *and* well worth a watch)…
And as a part of a better-than-average working-from-home-bookcase-background on this MSNBC section (yes, I know it’s the Lego typewriter - but I’m counting it)…
You’re a lovely bunch
A couple of readers have been in touch to ask how to show their support or say ‘thank you’.
So with absolutely no pressure, expectation or hard sales push… if TypeTown brightens your week, I’m open to coffee.
(Thank you to those who donated last time. It’s hugely appreciated.)
Please share the love
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Until next time
PS: New here?
TypeTown
is a fortnightly celebration of the typewriter’s place in modern (and not so modern) culture.
Excellent read, thank you!