About

Minute/Year is an automated, multi-year durational installation artwork, by Kata Kovács and Tom O’Doherty.

The work creates a new, one-minute-long layered audio recording, and accompanying spectrogram image, every day. Each day’s recording is published on this site — and additionally on Telegram, Vimeo, Mastodon, and as a short weekly podcast.

Minute/Year alters location each year. For the whole of 2025, the work is installed in ausland, an event space in Berlin, Germany.

Minute/Year began on January 1st, 2016. It has no set ending date.

Overview:

Minute/Year is an automated, process-based, durational work, in which sound is played, recorded, and layered, in a resonant space, for one minute each day. The result that is created each day is then automatically published online.

This process occurs daily, but the location of the space in which it occurs alters annually. Over time, this has meant that the work has existed in a variety of public, private, and semi-public spaces, outlined below. Each day’s one-minute-long recording is archived as audio, with an accompanying spectrogram image and video. This ongoing daily process has created an accumulating archive of these sounds and images, which continues to grow.

This archive — the daily images, sounds, and videos created by the work — has in turn been the source for a series of derived works.

Publishing:

The recordings from Minute/Year are published daily on this site. They are also published on Telegram, Vimeo, and Twitter.

Additionally, the recordings are available as a weekly summary podcast, available via RSS, on Apple Podcasts, and on Google Podcasts. The three most-recent episodes of the podcast are shown here — for the full archive, take a look at the weekly podcast page.

Minute/Year is privacy-focused, GDPR-compliant, and anonymous. See full details on the privacy and data page.

Minute/Year, ausland · Berlin, Germany, 2025

Minute/Year, Olin Library · Wesleyan University, Middletown, CT, USA, 2024

Minute/Year, Spektrum · Rumelange, Luxembourg, 2023

Minute/Year, Lely · Berlin, Germany, 2022

Minute/Year, Libken · Berlin, Germany, 2021

Minute/Year, bb15 · Berlin, Germany, 2020

Minute/Year, ausland · Berlin, Germany, 2025

Minute/Year, Olin Library · Wesleyan University, Middletown, CT, USA, 2024

Minute/Year, Spektrum · Rumelange, Luxembourg, 2023

Minute/Year, Lely · Amsterdam, Netherlands, 2022

Minute/Year, Libken · Böckenberg, Germany, 2021

Minute/Year, bb15 · Linz, Austria, 2020

Minute/Year (2016–2019 iterations)

Locations:

The space in which Minute/Year is installed alters each year, and has encompassed a variety of public, private, and semi-public spaces. In each space, the work is installed from January 1. until December 31., and runs for one minute each day during this time. In each location, the work as installed is materially functional — it comprises two speakers, two microphones, cables and mixer, and a small computer that runs each day’s process of playback, recording, and uploading.

The different places in which the work has been installed have had widely-varying social purposes and backgrounds. This reflects a curiosity in how the work will adapt to different spaces, and how these contrasts in both sonic and social space will be reflected over time.

2025: ausland · Berlin, Germany
ausland is an event and production venue for music, film, literature, dance and performance and sound installations. ausland hosts events, rehearsals, recordings, workshops, residencies and other artistic projects. ausland opened in December 2002 in the basement of the formerly squatted house-project Lychi 60, and it is still an independent venue run by a group of curators, artists, administrators, technicians, culture lovers, and DIY enthusiasts, supported by a non-profit association.
All 2025 recordings · ausland website · Map
2024: Olin Library · Wesleyan University, Middletown (CT), USA
Olin Library is the main academic library of Wesleyan University, and is on the southern side of the campus. It was built in the late 1920s and opened in 1928. Minute/Year was installed in the main stairwell on the eastern side of the building, on the second floor (a spot that also happens to be exactly half-way between the art library and the music library, neatly enough). Minute/Year in 2024 was presented by the Wesleyan Music Department, Olin Library, Wesleyan University Center for the Arts, the Office of Academic Affairs, and Wesleyan Music Library.
All 2024 recordings · Olin Library website · Map
2023: SPEKTRUM · Rumelange, Luxembourg
SPEKTRUM is a venue focussing on process-based, experimental and immersive cultural and artistic practices.
All 2023 recordings · SPEKTRUM website · Map
2022: Lely · Amsterdam, Netherlands
Lely is a building in western Amsterdam, designed by modernist architect Ben Ingwersen, and constructed between 1963 and 1969. It was initially a school (the Christelijke scholengemeenschap Pascal, later renamed Calvijn College), and then subsequently a temporary refugee accommodation centre. Since 2016, the building has had the status of being an ‘incubator,’ branded as Broedplaats LELY (generally translated as LELY Incubator)—with living space, artists’ studio space, and mixed-use space combined in one structure. There is some disagreement as to what exact name to use to refer to the building, but the structure is almost universally referred to by its inhabitants simply as ‘Lely,’ and so we follow their example. Minute/Year in 2022 is installed in the main stairwell that runs up the northern side of the building.
All 2022 recordings · Map
2021: Libken · Brandenburg, Germany
Libken is a “thought and production location” (“Denk- und Produktionsort”) based in a DDR-era Plattenbau-style building in Böckenberg, Brandenburg. Minute/Year is installed in a communal living and dining area on the first floor.
All 2021 recordings · Libken website · Map
2020: bb15 · Linz, Austria
Project space, Linz, Austria
All 2020 recordings · bb15 website · Map
2019: grüntaler9 · Berlin, Germany
Project space, Wedding, Berlin
All 2019 recordings · grüntaler9 website · Map
2018: Ladenkino · Berlin, Germany
Independent cinema in Friedrichshain, Berlin. Minute/Year was installed in the front foyer area.
All 2018 recordings · Ladenkino website · Map
2017: Lütticher 5 · Berlin, Germany
Shared exhibition, project, and living space in Wedding, Berlin.
All 2017 recordings · Map
2016: G23 · Berlin, Germany
Private apartment, Berlin.
All 2016 recordings · Map