Moan Lisa looks back on old staples - Neoism and Punk(ture) (Iowa City, Iowa, USA)

[De Villo Sloan]

Mail-art by IUOMA member Moan Lisa (Iowa City, Iowa, USA)

June 24, 2913 - The ever-changing and evolving Moan Lisa stepped out of a recent Fluxus preoccupation briefly with this Neoist-inspired piece I am thrilled to have received.

Neoism in the 8os and 90s took an inherently anti-art stance and was aligned with the Punk and industrial music scenes with which it was contemporary. This musical comparison, hopefully, illuminates Moan Lisa's mail-art with its menacing (this piece can cut you if you are not careful) metal teeth and obsessive repetition. Here is the full, large postcard-size piece:

Neoism is still a presence in the mail-art network, from which it sprang along with similarly aligned efforts such as the Church of the Subgenius. Generally it is referred to as "post-neo" these days. For instance, visual poet Jim Leftwich (Virginia, USA) is a proponent of Post-NeoAbsurdism, which is producing, in my estimation, fabulous work on many fronts including performance art but far removed from the days when tentatively a. convenience's dead animal rituals scared even the police in Baltimore.

This is a link to the Post-Neo Absurdist Anti-Collective:

http://postneoabsurdism.blogspot.com/

Here is the reverse side of Moan Lisa's piece which is even more minimalist:

And a close-in on the Neo moniker:

Moan Lisa has a definite skill for locating radical movements of the past (via the Eternal Network), locating their concepts and approaches, and updating them. Ultimately, Moan Lisa synthesizes all these influences into something that is uniquely Moan Lisa.

As ever, many thanks to Moan Lisa!

[De Villo Sloan]

Always nice to hear from another Moan Lisa fan.

[Amy Irwen]

great blog DVS.....love Moan Lisa's work *!*

[De Villo Sloan]

Yes, Rebecca, it is very clever. We are seeing a profusion of staples over glue lately for some reason.

[Rebecca Guyver]

Great blog and love the punk feel of the staples!