Mail art to South Africa

A hand-made card and other bits of mail art will hit the mailing system today on its way to South Africa. It is in reply to the great work from Petropetal (what a curiously dichotomous name) which arrived quite spontaneously a few days ago.

reply for Marni

After receiving a beautiful piece of art mail from Marni in USA, I was moved to make a little drawing to send in return. I hope she likes it as I have absolutely no idea of what tickles her fancy.

"and save"

 Postal art as a congratulatory card for a fabulous exhibition by Cathy Mc Cue Boes in Bundaberg. For a good look at the exhibition 30 Years in the making, check out the blog by Doug Spowart.

A special card for Claire Dinsmore from the IUOMA group also made it to the mailbox today as well as a little card for Robyn Foster.

asemic writing out

A little asemic writing page from my diary for Cheryl Penn in South Africa. Cheryl is a very active collaborative artist book and mail art worker. I love her direct, spontaneous work and enjoy doing collaborations with her and her colleagues.

New Artist book arrives

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I have just received this great little book "A Definitive guide to the structure of ASEMIC WRITING" from Cheryl Penn in South Africa . We are in a collaborative project together but I had no idea that this was the focus of her book so it was a lovely surprise especially as I have been brought back in touch with this genre through IUOMA recently. 

The cover is made from a cut up painting #72 "The Authentic Massacre of the Innocent Image Series". This is made using acrylic paint,oil paint,varnish on paper pulp and sgraffito. The little book was made for "An Encyclopedia of Everything. a collaboration of book artists and is in a hand altered edition of 10. May/June 2014.
The book uses collage, asemic text, photocopies, Hand stamped drawings and mixed media painting.
The size of the book is A6 closed and has 32 pages fastened with a single 3 hole signature stitch knotted on the outside with long threads hanging.

The images are photocopied in B&W on thick paper and hand coloured using pen, ink, paint and stamps. There is one page for every letter of the alphabet to contrast with the asemic writing that has an alphabet that varies and is illegible but gives hints of possibility of handwriting - a bit like a doctors scrawl. There are references to medical diagrams, musical notes and computer altered text. The drawings have a wonderful spontaneous feel to them, giving their mysterious message in a light open ended manner.

Shellie Lewis sends me a full envelope.

I have only been a member of IUOMA for a couple of weeks and out of the blue comes this great envelope of mail art that  Shellie Lewis has made. There appear to be many different genres of mail art, envelope art being one of them. Shellie's is quite restrained as many come covered in stamps (rubber) and sometimes calligraphy. This envelope contained a lovely little ATC (Artist Trading Card for the uninitiated). The cards are always the same size6.4cm x 8.9cm.

This ATC is called "Gilded Owl" and the last in an edition of 6 made in 2013. Shellie Lewis has also included a couple of little zines: "Surviving Winter"  and "Everyday is Earth Day". I won't even try to define zine but only give you a rough idea of what they are. They are also popular with mail artists. The ones I make are quite different from most zines, more fine art flavoured. Most zines are cheap, photocopied booklets or pamphlets around a particular theme or passion (again here also there seem to be many genres eg music zines,political zines,gay zines etc).

June mail art

"fete" by Mim Golub Scalin

Heleen de Vaan

"Potat" Julie Davis

envelope from RB

Thomas Brown

envelope from Thomas Brown

Torma Cauli

Torma Cauli

Vizma Bruns

Vizma Bruns

Since joining IUOMA I need to be able to keep track of my mail as I'm forgetting who I've sent what, so here goes my first attempt by posting the mail that's come in this month. As new work comes in I will get more information on each piece of art posted as well. Vizma Bruns was my first contact and her response triggered further attempts by me to reach other mail artists. Who knows where this will all go ?