Only a few people are as applicable to the definition of “media artist” as Miriam Moné. Nevertheless, the true nature of the native Styrian’s creative work is extremely complex and hard to define. Caught up in the ingenious world of graphic design, visual art, performance art, poetry and music, Miriam Moné, also known as mimu, is repeatedly willing to break out and draw from new creative spheres.
In school, her art teacher soon discovered her exceptional creative talent, which pretty much mapped out her future path. She soon changed schools and went to the HTL Ortwein for “Graphic Design”, followed by studies in architecture. She then left her hometown to study “Digital Arts” at the University of Applied Arts in the Austrian capital city. Mimu now lives and works in Vienna, but is always on the go to new places, new people and new sources of inspiration. Numerous participations in exhibitions and projects took her to Italy, Bulgaria and France. Just recently mimu was invited to the small town of Tercé in France, where she presented songs from her debut album at the “La Carriere du Normandoux”- Festival.
As already mentioned, Miriam Moné is difficult to categorize. Besides her affinity for graphic and visual design, she also indulges successfully in various music projects. As mimu at nite, she ventures towards folk and experimental emotronic. Equipped with an accordion, laptop and a crystal clear, sometimes seemingly fragile, voice, she pays homage to the sonic minimalism. Rhythm and melody move significantly and deliberately into the background, inviting listeners to rather listen to the unique poetry of the artist. “Unpredictable phrasing and introspective lyrics, sometimes muttering, sometimes clearly accentuated, like as a salty finger in the wound of perpetual life. Word games and structures. Patterns and norms. Sublime love and terrible war”, is how Miriam Moné describes the creations of her nightly alter-ego. Mimu has a lot to say. Her stories are embedded in metaphors and flowery language, sometimes backed with exterior field recordings stored on her laptop, which highlight her work in a rather unusual way, letting the listener experience dogs barking and cities whispering in a very different context.
Miriam Moné is also known as mimu.merz, experimenting in the fields of electro acoustics, improvisation, live processing, and primed instruments. Furthermore, mimu collaborates with the equally well-known electronics musician Clara Moto and is occasionally represented as a vocal component on her albums “Silently” and “Polyamur”. Miss Moné also supports the Vienna-based music collective Ritornell.
It is easily explained where mimu gets all of her inspirations and influences. She describes herself as a so-called “found-footage-collector”, someone who spends hours roaming through the World Wide Web, searching for specific data, keywords, images and digital waste. Driven by the mass of “on-demand” material, the creative process of Miriam Moné’s work has no end. Between 2001 and 2008, mimu was able to establish herself as an extremely successful VJane, accompanying electronic acts like Modeselektor, Ellen Alien, DMX or Squarepusher on a visual level. Mimu still has enormous potential to surprise us with new exciting projects in the next coming years. The first album “Elegies in thoughtful Neon” is already completed and has received financial support by the Austrian Music Fund for the production process. The artist was also able to receive support by the funding committee of the SKE austro mechana in the form of an annual scholarship for 2011, together with Philipp Quehenberger.