Panmag
Panmag is a zine from New York, New York.
Mail artist and Ohio native Mark Bloch, first created the xeroxed zine Panmag in 1979 when he was living in Orange County, California with the first issue Number 391, a tribute to Francis Picabia's zine of that name, 391. Bloch's next issue was Number 451, published in conjunction with an art performance at a bookstore in Laguna Beach called Farenheit 451. Issue Number 452 followed with most of the same material. Panmag then appeared with an issue Number 2 published in conjunction with another art performance-- this time at Saddleback Community College in Mission Viejo in which Bloch dressed up as Guglielmo Achille Cavellini the legendary mail artist and the master of self-historification. Bloch gave a lecture on mail art with Barry Berg of San Clemente who contributed vintage mail art material for this new edition of Bloch's zine which was distributed to the attendees.
From there, Panmag went on to become one of the more well-known mail art zines, in spite of its sporadic publishing record and constantly varying format. Bloch started the number sequencing over with Issue 1, an 8 1/2 by 14 inch twice-folded issue about the Last Mail Art Show when he moved to the Lower East Side of Manhattan in 1982. Panmag continues to be published today, some 39 years later-- both online and on hard copy in both open and limited editon formats. Recently Bloch released number 57 as part of his website Panmodern.com. Most issues of Panmag deal with the mail art scene but Bloch was also involved with early experiments in cyber-space, video and off-beat music which are covered in some issues.
Bloch wrote a column "Net Works" for Factsheet Five from the late 1980s under Mike Gunderloy until 1992 and reviewed mail art for the only edition of that zine of zines published by Hudson Luce- Issue #45 in 1991. Bloch also has a video program on Manhattan Neighborhood Network called Panscan TV which he considers a videozine.
