Xx Jones's Blog – November 2012 Archive (28)

Laurence offered some tea, and a really nice package with tea & art arrived. At first I will show you the envelope cut open.

Unfortunately my French is very, very rusty, and I have not decyphered the text fully, but I do like the image of the painting very much. A kitchen window, an open book, some autumn birds - it sets the scene for a homely cup of…

More of Art Tower's sweet characters - robots and ladies. And tangerines!  My favourite is the girl with the big heart on the envelope! I love the fountain pen hand writing. Thank you Mr.  Art Tower…

I sent Torma Cauli an altered postcard from Vienna, and was surprised to find it blogged on his website already a few days later. Oh well, after all Budapest is only a few hours distance from Vienna. But then, really quickly, I also received a postal response: a fascinating haptic collage mounted on a card from the Goethe Institute. Wonderful! Thank you, Torma!…

A double surprise in my mailbox - on two days in a row - came from Moan Lisa. I got what I understand to be a lovely personal message on this postcard. And I got a large recycled envelope with some cool stamps from Russia. I take the medals as an award for my outstanding work at the Moan Lisa Art Academy! Inside the envelope there was a family collaboration piece of mail art. It features a little rat or mouse painting and reminds me of a favourite - the classic picture book Frederick by Leo…

Sometimes mail art provides real challenges, or puzzles to solve. It took me a while to put this one together, possibly because I got Card No. 2 before Card No. 1. Only today I realized, hang on, two cards from Texas, there may be a connection and now it makes all sense. …

Today is William Blake's birthday. Maybe you would like to add something to the William Blake group to celebrate. It's kinda lonely there :-)…

My submission for Assignment No.3 Moan Lisa's Art Academy.

Last but not least here is the second installment of the mail art I got from Erni Bär this week. Erni is getting a lot of coverage these days so I am not going to overdo it. But then, blimey, this is one productive mail artist! 

The envelope features lots of Erni stamps, but also the "E is not dead" stamp.…

I was just having a little internal mail art crisis of faith - thinking about what crazy stuff I got myself into here, sending absolutely ridiculous things through the post. Do you ever get that? And then I found this letter from Ruud in my mailbox, with sheets to send in with samples of rubber stamps for his archive.  I have not sent anything to Ruud yet, waiting for the…

An unexpected laminated card came from Pedro Bericat, and I am still mystified what this slightly crumbling object between that plastic covering is. It seems that Pedro wants me to record some sound of silence. I have not had time yet to check out the website, but I will. Thank you, Pedro! Coming from Austria it will be tempting though to add a bit of Sound of…

Maybe I shocked Barry with my enthusiasm but I really do like his art - you have to check out his website: http://www.barryhall.co.uk Barry was nice enough to send me another crow on a…

Well, I was told by a senior IUOMA member that self promotion is important in the art circus, so here I am reporting a bit more about my recent work.

Today I received mail from Erni Bär and it was quite a package. I did not get the time yet to study it all and blog about it, so I will do it in installments. Erni had lost a bet and honoured it by sending me this altered dollar bill by E. Here is a small assemblage to say thank you! :-)…

A beautiful card from Carina made my heart skip a beat. It is a photo transfer - I am still mystified as to how this is done - and a wonderful juxtaposition of what looks like a Chinese factory worker making what - orange rugs? opposed to a bunch of white men in suits in what could be courtroom. They are looking at something or somebody outside the frame. I…

Somewhere I read a comment by Diane Keys that she does not like still lives with flowers and fruits and finds them boring. So when I received Diane's minimalistic postcard I thought of a special surprise. I went out and bought the ingredience to arrange a little still life especially for her. It is loaded with mail art related symbolism, such as BANANAS and TANGERINES.…

I can see that Mail Art can become quite addictive. You do not need to receive big parcels, even a small envelope like Suus can raise the serotonin, dopamine or whatever hormone level and soon you are hooked. You send out more mail so that you can have more mail art highs. Is there a disclaimer somewhere that warns people of the dangers of mail art addiction?…

The postman rang my doorbell while I was in the shower. I clambered out of the bath and got dressed quickly and the postman apologized because the mail did not fit into the mailbox. God knows what he thought about the piece of mail art, which I was to receive from Erni Bär. I had been awaiting this with trepidation as he had announced it a few days earlier including some ominous remarks.…

Today was a great mail day! Katarina sent me a wonderful little handmade book about autumn. …

Having joined Moan Lisas Art Academy is an adventure. So far the assignments have been challenging. I considered not submitting anything, because I did not feel inspired. But then I thought I had to come up with something, anything. And…