Frank Bretschneider

Born in 1956 in Obercrinitz, Saxony, Frank Bretschneider has since the mid-1980s developed work situated between experimental electronic music and video art. After studying art, he began composing in the DDR and participated in 1986 in the founding of AG.Geige, a group from Karl-Marx-Stadt’s art scene, whose approach blends performance, offbeat pop and experimentation. In the mid-1990s, Bretschneider pursued a solo career under his own name and under the pseudonym Komet, while co-founding in Chemnitz the Rastermusic label with Olaf Bender, before its merger with Noton within Raster-Noton in 1999. His music sits in a zone crossing ambient, minimal techno and clicks & cuts, with a pronounced taste for repetitive structures, dry textures, micro-variations in rhythm and a form of highly constructed abstraction. Among his discographic milestones are Rand (1999), Curve (2001), Rhythm (2007), Exp (2010), Super.Trigger (2012), Sinn + Form (2015), Lunik (2018) and abtasten_halten (2020). Bretschneider has also pursued numerous collaborative projects, notably with Carsten Nicolai and Olaf Bender in Signal, with Taylor Deupree, Steve Roden or Jan Jelinek, extending a career tied to European and international experimental electronic scenes.