Locked down in Sicily!

It's so exciting to be on David's Christmas list! I am terribly sorry to hear that he has been 'trapped' in Sicily since lockdown. But this armchair sleuth notices a few inconsistencies. When we lived  in Rome we discovered that you can only buy hiking boots in season and there are no footpaths. I find it difficult to imagine they could scale that balancing rock without appropriate footwear.

But I am happy to hear that they have found gainful employment… the thing is you need a work visa to work in Italy and there is an enormous bureacracy to get the papers.  I wonder how they got around all of that? In two years I never could.

Happy New Year, Patti and David! Wherever you are, I hope you are plugged into the news.  This world is insane! This is a great card , hearkening back to the grand tour and burlesque beach.

 

Pachyderm from History

Ted Trager's postcard arrived towards the end of November.  I remember reading it in the kitchen and swooning.

For me, mailart is communication: visual and textual. this piece also told a story and had historical significance. the way the text sits on the page, the variety of text AND WHAT IT SAYS combine to say something poignant. and then Ted also types my name in red and the stamps are perfect too. 

So zoom in, read the text and then tell Ted why you love this!

 

Loved up by Birthday Mail Art

Caroline Fish

I turned sixty at the end of December and some of my wonderful Suffolk artist friends sent me exquisite pieces of their work to cheer me through my tier four 'special day. Aren't I lucky!

Jo Hollis

Jane Lewis

Jane has given me many cards over the years.  This one was actually for Patrick's birthday and our anniversary (October). Jane posted another beautiful card (below) on my facebook page which was remarkably in sync with the kitchen festivities I awoke to!

What's Cookin?

It's always fun to get mail from someone new and Kathy qualifies with this particulalry fun mailing. My 86 year old mum was alone this Christmas and she told me she was getting tv dinner. what I imagined was something like this! Kathy's wonderful business card, that looks a bit like a matchbox, took me back to my childhood, or perhaps from the files of Madmen. We ate a few tv dinners and as I recall, my favourite was turkey.

Fluxus bucks come in all sorts of shapes and tenders.  My favourite was the Fluxus Covid Bucks.  One day it will be a collector's item, surely.

Who is in the chicken suit, oct 2020.  (with moving body parts!)

In England, on top of Covid, we have bird flu.  Luckily the chickens at the chicken farm are now under cover.

You can never have too much input on colour mixing. Fab!

Thanks so much for getting in touch and I will try to send you something very soon!

 

Post Democracy, just Ask a Cat

There are many questions I'm sure you might ask a cat.  I once read a book about a dog who could think like humans. and I know a Holstein is a cow, not a cat… i taught agriculture in Kenya. I don't know about the comic cat.  In fact, I don't know much about cats but that's OK.  I guess I could ask Cascadia Artpost!

I don\t know much about how to save our Democracy or if we are entring post-democracy, post-capitalism. I do know that Jonny, our daughter's bf, worked at Verso and they publish some great books. I wonder if he's read that book? 

You'd think that 42 days after Cascadia sent this post that something would have shifted. Yes, he has been fired but we are far from having him accept the outcome, I have the sense that our Democracy is going to hold and that the dark will lighten. Hopefully as he wanes so will the grip he has over his followers.

I guffawed over this! Nice one, Jack!

So sorry it has taken me so long to share these wonderful postcards!

 

Trashcan Pamlimpsest 1-4 Ted Trager

Pamlimpsest: a manuscript or piece of writing material on which later writing has been superimposed on effaced earlier writing. 

something reused or altered but still bearing visible traces of its earlier form.

Always delighted to receive a series.  These curious, graphic palimpsests arrived on different days. they feel like a cross between billboard and vintage political propaganda.

Thanks so much, Ted.

 

Encarted: 18 years of Aristide 3108's son, Edmund

Aristide 3108 makes wrapped, enclosed, besoke and original ATCs to mark events and people.  Here he is marking his son, Ed's 18th birthday. One of the three ATCs in this mailing is an original.  I believe he makes a big image and cuts them into ATCs whch he mails out. Aristide's work is beautifully graphic.  This piece is also haptic.

Lucky Ed.  Lucky me. Enjoy, and thank you, Aristide!