De Villo Sloan's Blog (1,209)

Mail art by IUOMA member barbargirl (Key West, Florida, USA)

August 20, 2018 - barbargirl sent me this lovely and beautifully composed, post-card-size collage.

IUOMA-Ning is experiencing yet another wave of new talent. These artists are enriching the network and we are seeing distinctive talents and approaches emerge. I think of barbargirl as part of this new new wave. With time, perhaps I will be able to learn more about her and her…

Mail art by Annette Kesterson (San Francisco, California, USA)

August 14.2018 - Longtime correspondent Annette Kesterson sent me this wonderful postcard-size piece I am absolutely thrilled to share.

I adore this colorful, lovely textured abstract art that keeps the action in painting. (This seems a little different from classic AK, but then again she is eclectic.) Annette Kesterson suggests in this piece (see below) speed and…

News of a book of Ray Johnson interviews (compiled from multiple authors) is circulating among networkers and might be of interest to IUOMA members. Here's a link with more info:…

Mail art (Artist Trading Card) by IUOMA member Gerda Osteneck (Regina, Canada)

August 6, 2018 - Gerda Osteneck has officially been named a Legend of Trashpo by none other than the Queen of Trash herself: Diane Keys. Many networkers know that Gerda Osteneck’s art also transcends Trashpo. She does excellent work in many different genres, including the ATC (Artist Trading Card). Gerda Osteneck has mastered several aesthetic…

This great article with pics is circulating about a mail art show at the Smithsonian:

https://www.smithsonianmag.com/smithsonian-institution/collaborative-mail-art-puts-post-postmodernism-180969783/#BkDCsLZYGfDxq1qL.01

Included is a Ray Johnson piece to our own Richard Canard (Richard C) (Richard in the…

Mail art by Derya Avci (Elazig, Turkey)

August 3, 2018 - I have not received much mail art from Turkey. So this piece by Derya Avci is a thrill, although I do not believe she is an IUOMA member. Maybe she will be! 

I hope you will share my view that this work could easily be at home in an art museum or a very fine gallery. Derya Avci is a subtle and skilled expressionist painter. Yet the work is also very much in the…

Mail art by IUOMA member Ruth Giles (Tunbridge Wells, Britain)

August 1, 2018 - Networkers often ask me, “DVS how is mail-arting in the Digital Age different from back in the Golden Age of Snail Mail Art when you sauntered down the winding trail under a sky so much more expansive and blue than it is today?”

This wonderful package from Ruth Giles in Britain gives me a perfect opportunity to offer an example of the difference…

Blocks an artist’s book of concrete-visual poetry by IUOMA member Rebecca Resinski (Conway, Arkansas, USA)

July 25, 2018 - Rebecca Resinski is an Asemic Front contributor, and I am thrilled to be able to share her artist’s book Blocks, a superb collection of traditional concrete poetry released under her Cuckoo Grey publishing imprint.

I emphasize the artist’s book…

“Homage to John Gayer’s Outgoing” by IUOMA member Richard Canard (Carbondale, Illinois, USA)

Visual poetry by IUOMA member Chris Wells (Columbus, Ohio, USA)

“Sunlight through trees on water” by IUOMA member Rebecca Resinski (Conway, Arkansas,…

Mail by Stephen Perkins (Madison, Wisconsin, USA)

July 19, 2018 - Stephen Perkins using the moniker Janet Janet was a central figure in the great mail art surge of the 1980s. Those who participated or have studied correspondence and zines from that era are likely to recognize the Janet Janet persona even if they are not familiar with Perkins, who has also achieved a distinguished career in the above-ground art world.

Janet…

Mail art by IUOMA member Yayoi S.W. (Kirkland, Washington, USA)

July 18, 2018 - Yayoi S.W. is creating wonderful art and sharing it via the Eternal Network. She is receiving rave responses. Because her work is often image-text and/or asemic, she has captured the interest of the vispo and asemics communities as well.

I’ve already been thrilled to include her work in the Asemic Front mail art call. Her asemics are becoming, in…

Mail art by IUOMA member Bonniediva (Gurnee, Illinois, USA)

July 15, 2018 - To be honest this lovely collage with verses was never “lost” as much as it was “misplaced.”  But making lemon juice from sour cherries, I squeeze this into an opportunity to share a hitherto unseen piece from mail art friend – the ever-exceptional – Bonniediva! The collage is vintage October 2017. And a fine harvest indeed!

 …

Mail art by IUOMA member DharmaDaDa Neil Gordon (Torrington, Connecticut, USA)

July 10, 2018 - Trashpo (and the accompanying DKult of trashpoets) has been a network activity for about a decade. (Opinions differ – of course – about where and when Trashpo started.)

The popular consensus is that Trashpo began with postings by visual poet Jim Leftwich (Virginia, USA) on Fluxlist in 2007. Diane Keys (Illinois, USA) brought Trashpo to…

Cover of Tom Hibbard's new book Transcendent Topologies: Structuralism and Visual Writing published by Luna Bisonte Prods. Cover art by John M. Bennett and Jim Leftwich. Book design by C Mehrl Bennett and Tom Hibbard

July 5, 2018 - Today I received a copy of Tom Hibbard's book, which shows the intertwined nature of the visual…

Beans zines (issues #3 & #4) by IUOMA member David Alan Goldberg (Charlotte, North Carolina, USA)

July 4, 2018 - Prophets of doom in the 1990s announced the birth of the Digital Age marked the death of mail art. Here in 2018, mail art is thriving and defying the old prediction. The current network requires integrating the digital and the snail mail postal system. A few Old School folks object (see the Retired Mail Artists group on…

Mail art by IUOMA members (top) Erica Durante (Waldwick, New Jersey, USA) and Jay Block (Bridgewater, Massachusetts, USA)

July 2, 2018 - This blog is a serenade to the popular postcard format in contemporary mail art and a chance operation gathering of some great mail art recently (and not so recently) received. Both Jay Block and Erica Durante are faithful postal friends who brilliantly play the postcard like a plaintive violin. Here are…

Mail art by IUOMA founder Ruud Janssen (Breda, Netherlands)

June 27, 2018 - Ruud Janssen – already a contributor to the Asemic Front call – sent this fascinating correspondence art package. A main preoccupation of the piece is exploring asemics and the way signs and symbols are expressed through various modes. These range from “obsolete technologies” to the digital realm and are all addressed in this multi-faceted work.

Ruud…

 Add & pass sent by IUOMA member Debra Mulnick (Boise, Idaho, USA)

June 20. 2018 - I have referred to the present moment in the Eternal Network as the Platinum Age of the add & pass (a&p) because I have never received so many of these pieces from so many different people at one time in various states of completion (and even decomposition).

I gather others are receiving them too and launching their own. (I also include the…

Mail art by IUOMA member Lisa Fraker (Blue Ridge, Georgia, USA)

June 18, 2018 - Not long ago, Lisa Fraker’s debut on my MinXus-Lynxus blog created a sensation. Here’s a link:

https://minkranch.wordpress.com/2018/05/06/minxus-mail-bag-rabbit-print-by-lisa-fraker-blue-ridge-georgia-usa/

The new piece…