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Mail Art-how did you start?

Dragonfly Dream
Mail Art-how did you start?
June 04, 2001 03:53PM
<HTML>OK, so let's discuss mail art. ~~~~With thanks to Honoria for her fine dedicated research project~~~~~

How did you get invloved?

For me it was way back when I was a kid, I had some penpals in wonderful places like Trinidad and somewhere in Europe.
But there was always a language difference which made it hard. So I remember drawing pictures instead. But as we were kids other things and adventures came along and the pen pals dissapeared. I also recall sending myself a cool decorated postcard form The Galapagoes Islands. There was this signpost and mailbox thing set up for folks to take an addressed postcard out and send it to the person from your home and to add a postcard into the box for someone else to draw out. Neat idea huh. I remember it took close to a year to recieve my postcard back to me mailed from someplace cool. My next involvement was simply to my mother from camp in Maine. I would decorate my letters and envelopes big time. I was into doing birds at that time and came up with really wild ones. The idea was that my love was flying home to mom. But it wasn't until the early 80's when I found rubberstamps that I really started mail art. I bought some rubberstamps and began making postcards. I don't quite recall but I think I saw a publication that asked for correspondants to send each other art cards. (Was Rubberstamp Maddness publishing then?) So I sent cards out to folks I didn't know in the hopes I'd get some fun art in return. At this time I also started a greeting card company with my friend Jennifer and we sold in the Boston area and in Martha's Vineyard. We called ourselves Jen-et-Al as she was French born. We were making fun hand rubberstamped cards and were selling pretty well around town. But the production was hard and tooks it's toll. We quit, divided up the rubberstamps and went on with our lives.... It wasn't until 1994 when I got my first computer and signed up for AOL that I found the mail art forums. The rest is herstory! I found artoposto and a world filled with mail art, artistamps and serious fun. artoposto and the others encouraged me to find my mail art identidy and Dragonfly Dream was born, off and running making artistamps and mailing to everyone I could.</HTML>
honoria
Re: Mail Art-how did you start?
June 04, 2001 11:20PM
<HTML>Amazing. I think mail artists are born to the medium. I love mail. About 20 years ago I joined a pen pal club. Due to the enthusiastic group of corresponents in the Letter Exchange organization I finally found enough letter writers to make me and my mail box happy. I decorated the mail that I sent out of course. I also organized little collaborative projects such as collecting quotations about art through the pen pal club and making little books to send back out full of the quotations I received. One of my pen pals, Kevin, suggested that I send something to Ryosuke Cohen in Japan. When I received my first Brain Cell I looked at the list of names and addresses from so many countries. Then I looked back at the brain cell and I thought, "This is the tip of a very interestng iceberg." I knew that if there were so many locations represented in the one brain cell list there must be a pretty large number of participants in whatever it was that Brain Cell represented. I was still very mystified. The Brain Cell was a clue. My pen pal never introduced me to to mail art as an art movement or as a network. He just said, "Send something to this Japanese address." After thinking about the implications of my first Brain Cell I decided to send mail to every person listed in the countries of Japan and Italy just to see what would happen. And to this day I am grateful for the random way I bumped into the mail art network and how at home I've felt in mail art ever since.</HTML>
David Cammack
Re: Mail Art-how did you start?
June 05, 2001 01:01AM
<HTML>I'm 60 years old and completely new to this. Never did it as a kid or anything like that. Never went to art school and never was an artist. As soon as I feel like I'm part of some Mail Art Network or whatever, I'll quit for something else........

David.</HTML>
David Cammack
Re: Mail Art-how did you start?
June 08, 2001 06:53AM
<HTML>OK, OK, here's the real story.....

A couple of years ago, I was producing a "zine" which featured my photography/art/ ideas. I was surfing the net, looking for ways to promote this zine, when I found a publication called Unbrella. At the same time I came across a group called the ISCA--International Society of Copier Artists. The ISCA, as a group, publishes a xeroxed assemblage "book" three times a year, and a "box of books" once a year. So I got involved with xeroxing and mailing my artwork to this group. So I was a mail artist before I really new it.

I started receiving Unbrella and read about mail art calls and last summer sent off my first couple of mail art pieces to projects in Canada and South America.

By the way, all the mail art calls I've responded to in Unbrella, that promised documentation and publication on the web, have proven to be unreliable. So I don't recommend Unbrella at all. Not for mail art anyway.

Towards the end of last year I was finding out about artistamps and found the AML(great group, check them out at Yahoo).

Without the internet I would never have found out about any of this. We have a big book store in the city where I live and they have a great Art section, but mail art can only be found on the web.

David C.</HTML>
craig purcell
mail art start
June 08, 2001 03:52PM
<HTML>Ten years ago I made up a project where six architects would send numbered, pre-stamped and pre-addressed 4"x6" watercolor envelopes to each other once a week for a year. I had no previous exposure to mail art and only became aware of it a few years after. I did collect stamps as a child.

At this point in time I am trying to get a similar process going on the internet with no postage rwquired and instant documentation to all. Mail Artists seem wedded to the mails.</HTML>
honoria
Re: mail art start
June 08, 2001 05:41PM
<HTML>I disagree with the comment that mail artists are wedded to the mails and therefore are not responding to Internet opportunities. If you search for mail art on the web you will find many examples of creative combinations of traditional and electronic mail projects. Perhaps there is not a groundswell of support amongst traditional mail art makers for exchanges of emails with graphic attachments. There is no reason to expect artists of one medium to suddenly switch to another medium just because it's there. You may find more success if you attempt to develop a network of electronic artists to exchange emails and graphic attachments. You may want to send printed graphics through the snail mails to build some experience with the pace and response levels in traditional mail art. By participating in both dimensions you will have more personal experience to use in comparisons.

Since I work with a computer all day it is very nice to use traditional art tools to make mail art. Even though I have experience in both electronic and mail art, I have no desire to enter into an exchange of electronic mail graphics. A computer mediated exchange would seem more like my work than my art to me. I like to dance in the garden, paint by the pool, take walks and collect random things when I make mail art. Even though I do have a laptop I can take outside it would be very restricting to be chained to a mouse, touch pad and pixel placement in the production of mail art.</HTML>
crazyre\'
Re: mail art start
June 11, 2001 10:26PM
<HTML>"Mail artists seemed wedded to the mails"

Yeah well....hence the term "Mail" art.

It's all about the process, just as yours was when your project with the envelopes was conceived. Everyone has their own reasons
for participating in projects that occur. I occasionally submit electronic submissions, but it seems rare in comparison to the physical participation in mailart calls.

crazyre'</HTML>
Merlin
Re: mail art start
June 12, 2001 09:23PM
<HTML>Fascinated by touching real art sent to me by mail,
touching real bodies and souls in life I met personally,
making real x-hibitions in museums and performance there,
performances and painting together at the beach in the sun,
sharing more than digitally files,
even once felled in love with an lesbian girlartist -
after she lived together with two men similar-

and -- much more - my priority in ar+ x- change will be
not virtually only!!!

Personally contact and physical x-change is much more pure,
you can touch it, you can smell it - one teached me to handle
(I do not know the word - making plastics with earth - burning it)
after this I made bronce-plastics, others - ....

Sharing home and food - is more than sending some substring
on a messageboared I think - but this is important too -
it is not the center - it is any haircell - even located above
the brain-cells - it is one bodycell of the organism called
Mailart - the cells of heart are changing every day.. and...
it is very difficult to understand this kind of growing organism.

Or dying Organism?

However, sharing art and thoughts digitally online only is not
mailart - maybe another kind of fast (later cheap) communication
but it is not mailart. (read above - not the speed is interesting,
the soul is, i saw paintings from Van Gogh in Original - not allowed
to touch but from this time on I understood - and my heart
never will forget - how and what he painted - his soul)

This is one! part fascinating "mailartists" so they seem to be
married with this Idea.

I am still married with ?cause - read above- the touchable
and invisible at once in same time - meeting people personally
- from Japan - in europe - only some words in english, but---

this is really braking borders I think---

This one and Those touching my life I want to touch too.

not by e-mail atouchments ownly - so

I declare myself married to mailart while typing this message.

Your

Merlin

postscriptum

x-cuse my rather poor wisdom about language! maybe misunderstandable?

art is my language.</HTML>
Dragonfly Dream
Re: Umbrella
June 09, 2001 09:44PM
<HTML>Regarding Umbrella, this is a great zine produced by a long time mail art woman. It is NOT the zine\'s fault if folks don\'t do documentation. Also, please remember sometimes docs come late. I know as I am very late on getting one of mine out....</HTML>
David Cammack
Re: Umbrella
June 11, 2001 02:03PM
<HTML>Seems like this "zine" is more focused on expenive artist books, than mail art.

I don't see why the editor being a "long time" mail artist or "woman" would make any difference.</HTML>
Dragonfly Dream
Re: Umbrella
June 11, 2001 04:55PM
<HTML>well heck, it's called track record. Just do remember that sometimes life interrupts and folks don't get doc out in a timely fashion....and yes, some folks don't do it at all.</HTML>
crazyre\\\'
Re: documentation
June 11, 2001 10:35PM
<HTML>In regards to your documentation concern. The fact of the matter is that Mail art is suppose to be stress free, that there are no rules. In speaking to Ken Miller recently, he told me that it took Ray Johnson a year to respond to his original mailings. It's true that while some documentation is never done, it would also be true to say that some resond quickly, some docs never make it to their destinations because of their countries censorship, some actually do get lost in the mail and some is still yet to be produced. Documentation can be formal, it can be elaborate. It does take time to respond to each participator and cost money to get the documentation sent to it.

As far as to the publisher of Umbrella, she has been in the network for many years. Yes, she focus' on art books, but that's her deal. Many old timers will agree that the publication is worth every dime and well presented. Don't get so hung up on the small aspects of the documentation. The real joy should be in the fact that you participated in a project where you were able to create some wonderful works....

I wish you better luck in your future projects,
love,
crazyre'</HTML>
Merlin
Re: documentation / Shame on me!
June 12, 2001 08:00PM
<HTML>
<font color="red">

<strong> <b>
Once the very famous Fluxus-Artist Ben Vautier from France sent me
an mailartinvitation called "Nothing".

He wrote: You are invited to send Nothing to me no restrictions...
you will get nothing back.... etc... ppp....

A typically Fluxus-project and I am very shure he had got a lot of
art about Nothing he worked with in his own art - correctly because
he promised nothing.

But if any mailartist promises some documentation - he should send
it out sooner or later.

This keeps mailart alive - all this adresses and feedbacks are
the backbone of this body creating new contacts in a continuing
flux of artcells creating new crosspoints.

For me I put my force into bringing animals 98 online first - needed
one year to complete it, then I got health and lifetimetrouble -
ill , some died, some nearely in my family - and I found not the
force to start it again, - one documentation - the restart ...


I tried to hold the line - contacts digigally this time.

Now I am working again for it - trying to include animals from
1993 - first big Museumshow - to 1998 - restarting the project
to- 2001 - including all the strong artworks that reached me
between.

It will become the complete archive of ANIMALS IN MAILART
from 1990-2001 - and noone I met there will not become included,
also Craig Purcell is one I think! Ar?nt you

Some nonwritten rules ever had been accepted in mailart.

Greetings.

Mailart is not fineart
it?s the artist who is fine.

In mailartists I trust -

I have had mailart correspondence with
friend very personally - 500 artworks some added and sent back
five times - maybe 300 participants -

after some years he had two little daughters, struggling for job,
needing lifetime for family - he never had been able to send any
mailart out again.... but sent me a piece made out of tin - he
noticed the names on - very unusually documentation...

I know about what happend there - just an artistlive - normally.

We once planned to make a ORIGINAL book about our common
yearly Performances and Mailart at the artbeach there - I made
hundreds of lasercopies in colour , originals - and more for it.
This special iIdea died. . . but I am not angry about him.

Mailart and projects are always a gift first, what somewone
wants to send is a gift too, if everything is well, it will become
a gift for the visitors of a big show or project - sometimes in
museums too - and a gift sent back in the kind of a documentation
and or originals and or catalogues and.....

All the years from 1990 on - my xperiences had been, everyone
gives what he is able to give - the more you give the more you get.

(sometimes I?ve got much too much back - a flood of art and
thoughts and contacts)</b>
</strong></HTML>
Merlin
Re: Mail Art-how did you start?
June 12, 2001 08:26PM
<HTML>In 1985 - ever very interested in art - I started to study history of modern art near my job at night (modern art means from 1890- to...).

So I met the sourcecode of fluxus too, ideas, concepts of hundred
years and how to draw and to paint.

Found some friend , artist and painter too, we sent us artmail ... and..

In this time I started to send out my art for free - to adresses picked
out from phonebooks trying to create a kind of chain or art network
giving artworks for free - etchings, paintings, drawings, linocuts.....
asking for sending something back or if not interesting something
forward to unknown people - including my Idea - from hundred s
sendings I never got any answer.

1990 I red about some review about an hidden avantgarde news-
paper and found the way to order one - and international adresses,
doing this what I tried to start..... you know how happy I?d been?

starting sharing tons of letters and artworks from then on just
stumbling into the 2cond worldwide mailartistscongress.

My best teacher in this time had been Peter W. Cowfman from
Switzerland that sent me an original documentation printed book
including original layouts - he did never use again and.......

a big archives is grown filled with lifes we shared - including
one mailartlove - we met personally and lost again and .....

1993 I saw the chance to start a big officialy Museum Show at
the Zoological Museum and Institute of Zoology - my workingplace.

I did it and ONE YEAR I presented officially entries from 300 artists
mayby 500 items to all the people visiting, the students, the
people working there!!!

(had some trouble / struggle because I showed every! work - it
may be critical, politically, painting from a 5 year old child or
sexual, or anything else! One rule of mailart - no censorship)

After this time I showed the works in different places in the building.

1998 I restarted the theme and I am still showing actual works
there - even it is not an "official" Museumshow anymore.

Your work is at the walls there! But more impressive it will become
to put all this (Your artworks) from 1993- until today - online
in Internet too.... I think - --

Question!!!

Would it be ok. to post the adresses of the artists online too???

Your

Merlin</HTML>
Merlin
Re: Mail Art-how did you start?
June 12, 2001 08:48PM
<HTML>While making mailart very active - Museumshow and more,
I once stumbled into an Exhibition about Japanese Visual Poetry.
Official one organized by the State of Hamburg.

Whow! I shouted my friends on this walls, Ryosuke Cohen (sent
him thousands of originals) .... maybe 30 percent of japanese
Mailartists I knew.

In my hometown!!!!!! I?d been glad - studied the collages and
commonartworks -

My face in it my logo my mono my name.........

Me - !!! shown in an official artexhibition - made from Japan
in my hometown!!!! None there knew me - just a visitor!

Did you ever went to your local Museum seeing your face
near Van Gogh - Andy Warhol and Ray Johnson?

I could write more about, but
the question had been: "how did you start".

Maybe you will understand if this kind of personal life-connections
that happend all over this years - I met a lot of people from all
around the world- always will be a part of the heart - also the
our language - any kind of art - is - a special one?

your

Merlin

also it gave me power to survive in very bad times-
while others near me died.

Love to you and - forgive me if I censored in the boards
once I started - and e-groups - (I started not) -
if I did - It was FEAR if I did.

your

Merlin</HTML>
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