Recent Acquisitions

[David Stafford]

The mailbox was groaning with acquisitions the past three weeks. Lots of artist stamps this time out. You people will have to tell me where you get your supplies. I have shopped at Olathe Post before but I'm not fond of that guy's politics though I'm sure he's a fine fellow. (He likes to hunt him some coyotes.) Nuff of that. Let's see, if there's a theme for this month's offerings it may be "bunch o' stuff" as in a lot of people sent me a bunch of stuff. Starting with...

Check out the stamps on Jay's envelope...a real rogue's gallery fer sure. Jane Russell not included. She's just there to keep 'em in line. Plus Jay's collage work which is deceptively simple. The  one in the ower right reminds me of James Rosenquist. This might be a place to query why so much mail art is like a subway wall where posters pile up in layers like sedimentary rock, layers of commercial crust. Ripping it up and reassembling is good for the soul, it's a spellbreaker of a high order. And here are....

Jay has solved a problem for me. You go to Manhattan and start taking pictures of graffiti and then what do you do with them? Stamps are perfect solution. It's a great little snapshot of Manhattan refracted through these stamp windows. (Graffiti is also a spellbreaker. We need all we can get.) Thank you, Jay.

Dame Mailarta, my Canadian friend, has sent me a Bunch o' Stuff starting with her...

envelope. Clearly the Dame runs with scissors...and rubber cement. 

Inside...a couple of self portraits, one expressionistic and one well...okay, I know the Dame is dressed like a postperson, a Canadian postperson I mean but when I glanced at this as it poured out of the envelope all I could think of was a movie I saw at an impressionable age and have had nightmares about ever since: Helga: She Wolf of the Nazis. Forgive me, Dame...(he gets on bended knee) it was only a first impression. 

Happily, she included this more fetching self-portrait. As well as....

Dame Mailarta is the archivist par excellence and a most generous hostess, sending out the mail art she garners through her portrait series.  In her role as a Spokesmodel for Mail Art she's brought a lot of people into the fold. Thank you, Dame. I will try to put Helga out of my mind.

Angie sent me this postcard of postcards which reminds me of my misspent you in that far off hedonistic paradise.   The couple are so emblematic of California in the 70s, one can almost smell the chlorine from the apartment complex pool where a "luau" is in progress. The cards appear to come from Angie's Famous Reservoirs of the West collection. Thank you, Angie.

The Blessed Father and Mailart are basically tied for the most Bunch o' Stuff. But TBF has the edge because I received two (count 'em) acquisitions in the past couple of weeks. The first was a mini-block of City Heights stamps which I still haven't quite deciphered the import of. Could be an inside City Heights joke. Or it could be Dada...we just don't know.

I suspect before he got the call The Blessed Father had dabbled in the graphic arts. Everything he does is exquisitely executed with muscular graphic appeal. Case in point: his Mussolini stamp in which il duce looks less duce and more ill. The whole thing is an excellent distillation of old stampery without being a pastiche. Bravo!

And then a few days later...the deluge....

According to TBF I'm just 20 bucks away from a hell bypass ticket. TBF, can I pay you in Ruuds? Again check out the stamp artistry here. I'm bitter because that's the kind of finesse I've long aspired to but never quite achieved. I mean I like the stuff I do, don't get me wrong but I would love to have this kind of tightness in my stuff. Not to mention the sly humor that wears well over time.

Finally...I got this from TBF

Man, I feel like I'm on the inside of something. Truly I am blessed. Thank you, Father. (I like the fact that his lil devils have stiff little dicks just like real life).

Also new to my stable of Mail Art friends is xx jones from Vienna...I have to say I am constantly amazed at the facility that so many Europeans have with the English language. Of course, it occurs to me that maybe xx is an ex-pat but I don't think so...check out the handwriting. It just looks European to me.

Enclosed is some bang mail. Wait a minute...I think I just got the pun....Is this a medieval view of Lichtenstein overlayed with a deconstructed Lichtenstein (Roy)? Smiting my brow here....or was this this just a felicitous juxtaposition? "Bang" would be a typical cartoon balloon from a RL painting. Suddenly it all fits. xx should have a lot more free time soon because I just sent her a big wad o' Ruuds, the currency of the creme du creme. Thank you, xx.

Nancy was going to send me everything on her desk at the moment but the fever passed. I did get the wax paper (see envelope, a richly tortured translucent epistolary container.) (Say it five times). (Three parenthetical phrases in a row, the reader is weary). Enclosed in the RTTEC one of Nancy's stellar collages which I'm afraid did not scan well. The fiery red is actually a muted brick color in real life. I know you're not supposed to do this but it put me in mind of a hatchet, a bloody hatchet cutting the sea in two with instructions written in poorly translated asemic text. Thank you, Nancy.

Diane was touched by the plight of the nearly defunct False Eyelash Museum and her gift has buoyed the spirits of Mrs. Neidermeyer, the Museum Director who suffers frequent bouts of depression over the state of the Museum. Upon receipt of Diane's envelope she immediately started creating an ad campaign to boost our profile. Here's the copy from the mailer:  "The Trashlash! It's new! It's Brash! It's Colorful....and Sustainable! A Lash for all Seasons, A Lash for all Reasons. And available EXCLUSIVELY at The False Eyelash Museum." If that doesn't boost donations we'll fold the tent. Thank you, Diane.

Kerri's envelope arrived just in time for St. Paddy's day. You know it's a Pullo by the textured, metallic gloss on the envelope. This one is a great green sea which, again, is unfortunately flattened by my scan. Below are two of Kerri's thoughtful abstracts which conjure seas and islands and I even see an echo of my own latest graphic meme: the drowned building.(I see drowned buildings everywhere these days). Thank you, Kerri.

Lastly but not leastly Skybridge Studios sent me a Medieval Lament....

Actually, it's a couple of recipes from the 1500s. On one side a recipe for ink made from the Hawthorn tree. I have to say on first glance the word "ink" rendered in old English, looked like "puke" to me and this has colored my experience of the text. "When you are going to make puke..." and so on. As with Dame Mailarta I have to apologize to SS for my crude first glance. "A Crude First Glance" could well be the title of my autobiography. Alas, the second and third glances are also ...On the flip side: a lovely rhymed poem recipe from the droll pair: John de Beau Chesne and P. John Baildon. It's the green man recipe for "instant" ink (not puke). Lisa calls this boekie "Elegy to the Tree," possibly the original title in which case the meaning of elegy may have shifted a bit from the 1500s. Or this may be Lisa's title in which case there is a gentle sort of sorrow in thinking about the undervalued gifts of trees and how quickly our fortunes decline in their absence. As with all Skybridge Studio offerings this is lovely, understated and well-crafted. Thank you, Lisa.

Jeezus, that was exhausting...Thanks everybody...now back to making art.

[xx Jones]

thank you for this great posting!

[DKeys]

Great blog!!!

[Suus in Mokum]

Hurra for the mailartists and the guide!

[De Villo Sloan]

Wow David, your presentation to honour these great artists just gets better & better. Fab work all through, IMHO, but 2x wow those Dame Mailarta stamps are the cat's pajamas.

[David Stafford]

Okay, I'm guilty of not reading the fine print: Lisa's boekie belongs to one of Cheryl Penn's book invites of which, I guess, the theme was Elegy to the Tree: Ink....