Valentine Mark Herman's Blog (130)

WISH YOU WERE HERE -- NOT! A COLLECTION OF BORING POSTCARDS.... from Val Herman and the Boring Postcards Group

This book nis now wavailable from amazon.com (and various other Amazon European sites). It's author is Valentine M. herman. The price is $46.00, which is a lot, but it contains 400 Boring Postcards and has 250 pages. All Mail Artists should buy a copy of the boo for themselves, their spoused, boy-friends and girlfriends, children, relatives, neighbours and…

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Added by Valentine Mark Herman on March 1, 2021 at 11:15am — 1 Comment

This is my 3000th photo here at IUOMA!

It is also my very first one, posted in September 2010 when I joined IUOMA.

Since then; another 2,999 -- 2.3% of all the photos here.

It's been a long and very enjoyable Mail Art journey.

And the show goes on...3001 et seq soon.…

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Added by Valentine Mark Herman on February 23, 2021 at 4:08pm — 3 Comments

SCRABBLE MAIL ART -- A NEW GROUP

SCRABBLE is one of the world's most popular board games. A game for anyone; family- and people-oriented; timeless; peaceful; social; and a great lockdown activity.It's sold in more than 120 countries, and there are 30 different language available. 150 million sets have been sold worlwide, and…

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Added by Valentine Mark Herman on January 23, 2021 at 9:16am — 3 Comments

DULL AND/OR BORING?

I am a member of the British-based Dull Men's Club (DMC) – which also includes women, and, indeed, claims to have 35,000 + members worldwide. (membership@dullmensclub.com)…

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Added by Valentine Mark Herman on September 22, 2020 at 1:36pm — 7 Comments

PORTRAIT OF MARY -- an add-and-pass project inspired by Yoko Ono that needs a Mary to get it started

Yoko Ono was a supporter, but declined to bcome a member, of the early Fluxus movement. She embraced various dAdA ideas.

Her seminal book Grapefruit (1962) contained many references to the use of the mail to advance conceptual art, including the 'Portrait of Mary' below.

There are 28 'Mary's' currently members of IUOMA (including variations on the name…

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Added by Valentine Mark Herman on July 1, 2020 at 3:50am — 6 Comments

FOR NO IDEA'S MINI MAIL ART GROUP

Hi!

Please look at the Arty Slide International Group which I started in 2012. It was as Mini as I could think of then. We held 2 good Slide Art exhibitions in France. I still have the Arty Slides (somewhere!) that IUOMA colleagues contributed. Bianca has died, alas. I have gained a Stidio and moved to bigger bits of art.

Here is the text that started it all:…

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Added by Valentine Mark Herman on March 28, 2020 at 3:03pm — No Comments

WHAT IS HAPPENING TO YOUR NATIONAL MAIL SYSTEM?

I wonder what is happening to your national mail system?

In my small village in the South of France, there is sporadic delivery of mail. The local Post Office is closed, and people are directed to one about 10 miles away -- but there is a 'lockdown' on almost all travel, and it's far from clear that a trip to this Post Office to send off some Mail Art would be accepted by the authorities (and, if not, would result in a €135/$150 fine).

The only shop that sells stamps in the…

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Added by Valentine Mark Herman on March 19, 2020 at 4:03pm — 28 Comments

Neil Innes, RIP. Doo-Dah and Dada

Neil Innes died just before Christmas.

He wrote the music and many of the lyrics for the Monty Python TV series and films.

He also played in a number of groups, one of which -- a group of art school students -- was the Bonzo Dog Doo-Dah Band (which I remember seeing in a three-quarters empty Civi Theatre in Darlington, England, in the 1960's).

The Band was originally called the Bonzo Dog Dada Band, but no one got the reference to Dada, so it was renamed the Bonzo Dog…

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Added by Valentine Mark Herman on January 2, 2020 at 5:35pm — 1 Comment

BORING POSTCARDS -- FROM ALAN BRIGNALL (for others see the Boring Postcards Group)

1. Heathland Caravan Park, Lowestoft, England -- a remarkably composed Boring Postcard, lots of fields, a bit of sea, but all you can see (if you are in a plane or a helicopter) of the caravans are some white dots

2. Staircase at Hotel de l'Avenir, Heyst-sur-Mer, France -- this hotel obviously had a future as it boast its electric lighting…

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Added by Valentine Mark Herman on November 30, 2019 at 5:27pm — No Comments

BORING POSTCARDS -- FROM KATERINA (for others see the Boring Postcards Group)

1. Workers'Buildings In Plovdiv, Bulgaria, 1965 -- there were lots of workers

2. From the Greek island of Skiathos -- 2 boats and one group of people in the middle of the beach (why are they in the middle of the beach?)…

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Added by Valentine Mark Herman on November 30, 2019 at 5:00pm — 1 Comment

Could somebody please tell me what (if anything) this means?

This is from the introduction to the 'My Passport'  Mail Art call:

"Author’s note: “The present work is an exploration and development through analogue synthesizer of an imaginary whistle of compound sharpener and decomposed in the form of an oscillated…
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Added by Valentine Mark Herman on November 28, 2018 at 6:42pm — 5 Comments

"I refuse to join any club that would have me as a member" (Groucho Marx)

A few years ago I formed an association of contemporary art called ASAC, was the first President, organised a couple of international art exhibitions and then resigned. I am about to be thrown out of the association because I am critical of the way it has subsequently developed -- and you would be too. So now ASICK rises from the ashes, and here is a non-poster of it's…

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Added by Valentine Mark Herman on October 23, 2018 at 4:07pm — 4 Comments

Thank you Katerina!

I am having an exhibition in March called 'Carrés/Squares). Everything in it will be...you guessed it...square(ish). 70 different sorts of works are going to e in it, including these square collections of 51/2" Floppy Disks that were very kindly given to me by Katerina a while back. Square Floppys on lil Square canvasses. Mercy Buckets, Katerina!…

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Added by Valentine Mark Herman on January 18, 2018 at 3:13pm — 7 Comments

How many photos should be posted at any one time or in any one day?

I think the number should be FIVE.

Any more, and the occasional photo or two that a person posts just gets lost when another person posts 30 photos, and then another person posts another 30, and then....etc.

Adapting John Lennon's words: "Give photos a chance."

Peace.

Added by Valentine Mark Herman on January 1, 2018 at 11:56am — 7 Comments

SILLY STAMPS -- an appeal

This is an appeal for 'SILLY STAMPS'.

What, you might well ask, is a 'Silly Stamp'?

A 'Silly Stamp' is an officially issued postage stamp that, when you look at it, makes you think, "This is silly!''

And then, ''What on earth is going on here? What could its designers have possibly been thinking when they came up with this image?"

"And, given that postage stamps (like coins, banknotes, flags, etc) are important vehicles for promotong national…

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Added by Valentine Mark Herman on March 2, 2017 at 9:22am — No Comments

SEX BOMB SABOTAGE!! Featuring New Boots and Lacey and Sexy Panties.

Bonjour!

Season's Greetings to y'all.

Great Big Collage #17 is a Special Herman End-of-the-Year Multi-Piece Great Big Collage.

Here it is:

Superbe, n'est-ce pas?

OK, so now you might be asking why 'Sex Bomb Sabotage'? Well look closely in the top left hand corner and you will find this:…

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Added by Valentine Mark Herman on December 26, 2015 at 4:22pm — 2 Comments

A Great Gig Collage Tribute to San Marino, and/or How I Would Keep My Children Quiet for 15 Minutes When We Went on Holiday

The Family Herman used to go on holiday from the South of Holland (Maastricht) to the South of France (Argélès-sur-Mer). The journey would take about 10 hours fast driving. Cries from the children "Are we nearly there yet, Dad?" would break out before we had even left the drive of our house -- which was only 4 yards long (the drive, that is, not the house). The journey to France would take us through Belgium and Luxembourg before we got to France. I would manage to keep the kids quiet for…

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Added by Valentine Mark Herman on November 8, 2015 at 4:14pm — 3 Comments

Dr Dolittle, what goes on in French pharmaceutical laboratories, and Sir Alex Issigonis who invented...

..the Mini.

Car, not skirt.

But he might have invented that too.

What he did say that is 'relevant' (I use the word with some hesitation here) is that "A camel is a horse designed by a committee".

Thank you, Sir Alex.

And now this Great Big Collage (# 15 in the series, in case you have lost count) is about animals -- animals of the "Pushmi-Pullyu" type (supposedly, a gazelle-unicorn cross with two heads) of Dr Dolittle.

I managed to sneak a…

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Added by Valentine Mark Herman on November 7, 2015 at 5:30pm — 1 Comment

"Let there be light, and there was light" (Genesis 1, 3)

And then, many years later, Coca Cola came along.

And there was Light.

(Or even Lite in some markets)

And there was Zero.

And there was Life

And there was even Cherry Cola, as in.....

"I met her in a club down in old Soho/ Where you drink champagne and it tastes just like cherry cola/See-oh-el-aye cola."

(It was originally Coca cola, but the Coke people wouldn't let the kinks call it that -- but…

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Added by Valentine Mark Herman on November 5, 2015 at 3:52pm — 4 Comments

'THE MAGIC FLU(^)TE' -(Great Big Collage #14) -- although there is neither magic nor a flute......

Bonjour!

I play (badly) rock'n'roll guitar.

I play (slightly better) the alto recorder.

In France, the recorder is known as the 'flu(^)te à bec'. [The ^ is supposed to go over the u, but I can't seem to manage that].

There is another type of flu(^)te, a 'flu(^)te traversière'. This is a flute -- the type of flute that Wolfgang Amadeus obviously had in mind when he wrote 'The Magic Flute' opera ('obviously' because he didn't mess around with…

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Added by Valentine Mark Herman on October 19, 2015 at 4:12pm — No Comments

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