User:Mujinga/article creation

Mail art is something which a person makes, considering it art, and then sends to someone else through the postal service. The term can also refer to the process itself. The sent object can in theory be of any size or dimensions, although certain postal services have arbitrary limits and most mail art is sent in envelopes (often themselves decorated) or on a postcard (10cm by 15 cm). People also make ATCs (Artist Trading Cards) which are homemade versions of the football club or Cabbage Patch Kids cards swopped by children. Zines can be considered a form of mail art when traded by post.

Techniques

Mail artists work with many techniques which can include pencil drawing, charcoal, collage, oil paints, computer imagery or watercolours. Found art is often employed as a base material. There are also subgenres of mail art such as rubber stamp makers who collect stamps from various sources and even make their own, or artistamp makers, who make fake stamps (which have been known to be sent through the post on letters performing the function of real stamps).

Certain types of project have become common, such as send and return when an artist sends out a piece of art, which the receiver modifies and then sends back, or send and pass on when an artist sends out for example an A4 sheet and asks artists to add a contribution and then send the sheet on to another artist. Ryosuke Cohen has formed his own variant of the former with his Brain Cell project: he asks artists to send him something they have created in 150 copies. This could be in the form of stamps, drawings or stickers. He then creates 150 copies of an artwork collaging all the contributions and sends the completed pieceback to every single contributor. The project began in 1985 and he ha made hundreds of editions.

History

Mail art has certainly been going as long as people have been sending each other mail, but in the 1960s it became a recognised phenomenon. The prolific Ray Johnson with his New York Correspondence School is regarded by some as the father of mail art. Avant garde groups such as Fluxus in the 1960s and the closely connected network of artists involved in the 1970s industrial movement (such as Genesis P-Orridge from Throbbing Gristle and COUM Transmissions) frequently made mail art.

Despite fears that the internet and increased electronic communications would lead to the death of mail art, there are still many mail artists making and swopping objects through the post. In fact, the internet can be a useful tool to find out about new projects to swop with (see addresses at bottom of page).

simon dwyer quote

Trading

Although one must spend money to send the item, mail art is never sold and normally swopped. There is a network of traders and the way to enter it is simply to make something and send it out to people. It is more than likely that these people will then send back something which they have created. Occasionally artists make a mail art call - this is when they request to be sent mail art on a certain theme. An example of this was the Visions of Utopia project, which also featured an accompanying zine as documentation. These calls can be found on the internet or are included in mail art packages. Link title

Zinesters who make mail art

• Gianni Simone
• Mujinga

External Links

• Brain Cell
• Dragonfly Dream
• Mail art calls hosted by Kiyotei