BRAIN CELL - RYOSUKE COHEN - COMPILATION

Brain Cell #1069 list:

Ryosuke Year of Rat on Brain Cell #1069:

Profilo del poetamailartfluxus cassaglia - Ryosuke Cohen

Brain Cell 1070

Brain Cell #1070 arrived in Spain by 4 February...

arrived in Greece today, 4 March!

Well, the good thing is that it arrived :-)

I received Brain Cell 1074. 

I received Brain Cell 1076 

I received Brain Cell 1077

Brain Cell-1081 arrived!

Participants:

Orion Soup:

Brain Cell ~1083

Brain Cell ~1084

I received Brain Cell 1084 

#1063

Hello all, I'm sorry for how the image posted. I don't know how that happens, but so it goes. This arrived in the winter when we were away in Mexico for several weeks. We arrived home to the pandemic and isolating. I piled all my mail in a small shopping bag and quite honestly forgot about it. I'm now going through the bag and happy to have received a Brain Cell.

13.07.20 Dare Ms. Mim Golub Scalin, ...Everytime I see a Ryosuke Cohen "Brain Cell" Page (Or Fragment there of), I am reminded of the phrase "We are all in this together".Thanx for sharing. SinCelery, Richard Canard

I received Brain Cell 1085

I received Brain Cell 1088

I received Brain Cell 1090 

Sabela and my cat, too,

Brain Cell #1084 arrived today, 1 October, 2020

dated...June 23!

This is the first Brain Cell from Japan to come to Greece since March!

Nice batch of Brain Cells, Mikel!

Remembering Brain Cell #1001, now soon coming #1100 :-)

Arquivos Postais GALERIA AMBIENTE.

salãoARTEcorreios Visconde de Mauá - BRASIL.

Localizarei para novos registros e dados complementares. 

ROTA POSTAL

I received Brain Cell 1096

Brain Cell ~ 1097

Orion Soup:

Address list:

Good to see that something(s) from Greece arrived in Japan for Brain Cell #1096:

but why not for #1097? Strange...maybe Ryosuke has so many stampings that he spreads them across other Brain Cells? Hoping mail art from Japan will come one day here.

Katerina. I don´t received Brain Cell 1097. 

Brain Cell #1095 finally arrived 1 Feb 2021!

with MomKat :-)

Brain Cell #1095 list made 4 November 2020!

Brian Cell #1095 Orion soup by Meral,

arrived 1 Feb 2021!

I received MAGNIFICENT BRAIN CELL

on February 18th 2021 

Brain Cell ~ 1101

Orion Soup Time, by Katerina :-)

The address list. I see that this Brain Cell should have been sent to Henk van Ooijen (I didn’t contribute to Brain Cell #1101, despite of that my address was written by mistake, next to Henk’s name, so I’ll forward it to him).

Brain Cell ~ 1102 

Orion Soup:

Address list:

Brain Cell ~ 1103 

Orion Soup:

Address list:

I have wondered about this too. I have been sending 1 at a time.  Am I doing it wrong?  I saw my image on a post here of a current issue today not sure what issue number it was. There were a few posted here close to each other. 

You may send just ONE or more rubber stamp images on an envelope,

and Ryosuke will print it on a Brain Cell.

He does a Brain Cell every ten days, so I send one envelope with a few rubber stamp images for him to chose from during a month or so. However, in my case, mail has not been sent to Japan from Greece during this Covid Era, so my stampings are not on any Brain Cells recently :-(

Others send their artistamps in a series of 50 or more, and Ryosuke then glues these onto each Brain Cell page...but that for me is a lot to send overseas, so i stay with rubber stampings only.

And just having said that mail is not getting to Japan from Greece...

ha! Now I see that "Orion Soup" arrived by Dec.4,2020 for Brain Cell #1101,

and my "New Year" arrived for Brain Cell #1103, Dec.18,2020. 

Thank you, Heleen for posting these Brain Cells!

I'm amazed when I think of how much postage Mr. Cohen must buy in any given time period! Does he accept money to help out with his project? Also, does anyone ever send him mail art in return for Brain Cell, as we do with other mail art we receive? Thank you.  

Indeed it is amazing! A good question, Terry.

I think many people send him mail art in return, which he replies to by sending a new Brain Cell form...

What I am wondering about, is what he would do with the received mail art, if not sticked to the Brain Cell forms.

Usually I am sending a stamp design (drawn by hand in black and white on a 300 grams water colour postcard-size paper), in an envelope, most of the time a mail-arted (stamped/drawn) one. Who is sending to whom in return remains the question, though mr. Cohen was the first to send a Brain Cell form spontaneously to me, some years ago. At that time I didn’t know about the project at all. And when I learned about it, I so very much appreciated - and of course still do - the fact that he is connecting mail artists of all times and places in such a beautiful way.

I send Ryosuke a piece of mail-art every 2 weeks. Sometimes the braincell's come back in batches....

The mystery deepens! I have never seen a "Brain Cell form"! I have only sent him unmounted rubber stamps which he then incorporates into a Brain Cell. Although on #1103 pictured below, I'm *pretty sure* he took the  red devil girl in the upper right from a rubber stamping I had put on the envelope! (It's an image I found in an old book and had made into a stamp for my private use!) This is in addition to the "Halloween" stamp lower down. I usually include some other kind of artwork, stickers, note, etc in the package. I participated in a few Brain Cells in the 90s and they have always been amazing. A book or interview on his project methods, etc would be wonderful to see.

Here's some info I found on the website https://mailart.pt/permanent_calls :

"Brain Cell is a mail art project begun by Ryosuke Cohen in June 1985. The project is a networked art project where individual artists contribute stamps, stickers, drawings or other images. These are sent through the mail to Cohen, who assembles and prints them as part of each cell. He prints 150 copies (30 x 42 cm) with a small silkscreen system called a Cyclostyle (now out of production). Each participant is mailed a Brain Cell print along with a documentation list of contributors worldwide.

"Cohen keeps a copy for himself. Some of the remaining Brain Cell prints from each edition are assembled into sets of 30 consecutive editions. These set are sent to artists and Mail Art shows around the world."

Thank you, Jeff Bagato, for the information! I find it interesting to hear how Ryosuke Cohen creates Brain Cell. And to think he has gone through this process every 10 days until now, when there are over 1,000! Wow! He is obviously very dedicated to his project. Yes, a book about him and his project would be most interesting.

Thank you, Heleen, Jeff, and Ruud, for your responses about sending Ryosuke additional items and mail art. I appreciate it. I'll do that the next time I send him a stamped image. 

You have all been very helpful. Thank you! 

Speaking of helping Mr. Cohen with postage as mentioned in my earlier comment, I just realized there are no postage stamps on the three Brain Cell envelopes in Ruud's comment below. 

Braincell #398, circa 1997.

Here's an example of the Braincell call for participants, from the back of the envelope containing #398, circa 1997. Different address from today.