Trifold

Carroll sent me this intriguing piece. She had written her letter on the back, writing about how fortunate for the mail art that it was cold, so wouldn't stick. And the blackened edges were reminiscent of the fiery scene of the stamp. 

I carefully opened it, to reveal this impressive beast. It doesn't fit on the scanner, so you'll have to make do with this photo. It is much more vibrant in person. And a very clever way to send art.

Euro day

Some mail days are better than others. A few weeks ago I received these three fantastic envelopes all on the same day.

Eric wished me Happy New Year with this envelope

and card.

Eva sent me this as a thank you for participating in her open mail art call: Oz Postal Project.

And Philippe sent me this - incredible modern art disguised as an envelope. The metallic ink/paint doesn't show its full glory in a scan.

He included two postcards featuring some of his amazing envelope artistry. If only I could outsource my mail art to him!

Wilt & art.

Cathy's basketball Christmas tree made me think of these two envelopes.

One for her...

And one for Steve D.

Mountain man/city boy

Eva blogged about this kickstarter project, and I decided to take part. I donated at the level where you are able to send postcards to, as well as receive from, MM/CB.

This was sent on Dec 13, and arrived ini just 10 days from Lima. It is an original photograph taken by MM/CB.

For some reason this project makes my own life seem a little bit less significant, a lot less adventurous. Is it weird to live vicariously through postcards from South America? I found it tough to write a response. I wrote it on New Year's Eve, wondering what he was going to be doing. In the end I reminisced about my own trip to Peru a few years ago. Nothing like December 31st for looking back to the past.

This is a digital photograph I took with my phone at an Alt J concert. I often take phone pictures of light effects, looking for something interesting to emerge from random (and sometimes not so random) snapping. The exit sign kept distracting/attracting me as it shone through the lights.

Mail Art Calls - Parallels, Angels & Demons, Twisted, Malerwinkelhaus, Spirit of the Forest.

For Parallels, in Siberia, made from postage selvage (thanks for the link, Eva!):

And one made of the stick-on mail barcodes the post office uses.

For the 'Twisted' call, a photograph manipulated in photoshop

This one had its own misadventure, and was delivered to me, even though my address was on the back, scrawled in my bad handwriting, and in the 'wrong' direction. I reposted it inside an envelope.

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For the 'Angels & Demons call. The images were taken on my cell phone the same night as the blue image above (lights were part of the band Alt J's concert performance). All the pictures include the exit sign which was distracting/fascinating me through the lights.

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And, spurred on by the beautiful artistamps that are the documentation for the Malerwinkelhaus call blogged by Eva, I sent these in. Jean had suggested this one for me ages ago, and I had set it aside. Nothing like leaving it to the last minute.

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Spirit of the Forest, to be displayed at the Mercury Theatre in Colchester in February, coinciding with a performance of Hansel & Gretel.

Three gnomes, a grasshopper and a minizine walk into a bar...

Not really. They did fall through the mail slot, though.

Steve liked my envelope that I sent him that he used it as a template to send me an envelope from a magazine page. I can now add him to the list of people who've done this!

His Gnome Post artistamps are great. there was a bonus one on the back.

And inside was this hilarious minizine. Front page:

A selected double page inside.

Erni Bär & Bläck Friday

Over at IUOMA, Erni Bär had favorited one of my triangles, so I sent him one - my first mail art to Germany.

He sent me a package, which looked like this:

And contained this framed collage, or gluepic as he calls them. It was wrapped in a poster he had altered - I'll blog that one over at IUOMA.
I can't believe he was so generous!!

I had been shopping at a well-known US store the day after Thanksgiving (I have only ever ventured out twice on that evil day) and the bag made me think of him, so I sent him a piece I call Bläck Friday. I hope he likes it.

Update: I think this one went missing in the mail, sadly.

Update 2: the circular Global Forever stamps fit the theme of Sunday Stamps this week.

Chicago collage

Inspired by Pamela's New York trip, I hoarded some things from a Chicago trip, and used them to make a digital collage when I got home.

The base was a great graphic of downtown Chicago from the in-flight magazine.

I cropped the image and resized it, then printed it out onto a sheet of perforated, ready to mail postcards from USPS.

I then worked on the next layer - a scanned-in set of cards for things I didn't do when I was there. Thought about doing them, but ultimately didn't.

Since the downtown graphic was bright and colorful, I set the layer to black and white, and removed some sections. Then sent the postcard sheet through the printer a second time for the black and white layer. This gives a different result than just creating the image digitally and printing once. This is the result - 4 postcard-sized sections. 

I also created a second set, using 'things I opened in Chicago' as the black and white layer. 

I played with the colors of the downtown graphic for the second set.

Triangles 283-286

Original envelopes 74 and 107 - houses

To Kathie M, for the 'hot mess' collage, one of the original envelopes from 20 years ago.

To Jean W.

From Richard B

Richard B sends really attractive envelopes. This latest of his uses his trademark script for the address, and elevates the rest of the envelope to a new level with his freestyle for my name and Finnbadger. That, with the abstract background, is like a piece of modern art. And the stamp is a beauty, too, being quite large, even for a commemorative.

Winter exchange part 3

This beauty arrived from Candy. The design is taken from one of her paste papers she made, and the snowflakes are embossed, which adds texture. I love the way the serifs on the first 'i' and the 'l's form a diagonal, echoed in the flourish on the 'h'.

This is what the scanner thought of it on first scan. Really crazy how it likes to invert the colors when it senses certain ones. It left the snowflakes silver, though.

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Cathy sent me this outstanding take on a Christmas tree. So many clever things going on - the small basketballs as ornaments, Wilt placing the treetopper, the tree itself, and the ornaments with my name that reflect the ornament stamp.

And the note inside has amazing cutout-snowflake edges - delicate, too, you can see where it tore during scanning.

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This envelope from Christy is one of the most beautiful of this exchange. The colors of the vintage stamps are perfect for the envelope and script. Thank you.

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Poets & Insults

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The English language is full of colorful insults dating back centuries - just look at Shakespeare for some creative comebacks. This set of three 20-year old envelopes (from an article on English usage, if I remember correctly) has a few of them.

Stamped with my three remaining poet stamps - I have no idea if any of them used any of these words, though.

Envelope 118 sent to Karen I.

Envelope 119 sent to Karen N.

Envelope 116 sent to Jean.

Jean's came with an interesting liner effect.

Spontaneous envelopes - 207, 351 & 565

CJ had commented on the rowers from envelope 208, so I sent her its companion.

I sent this one (similar to one I sent to Petrolpetal) to Kyosuke in Japan.

And on Eva's blog she wrote about a calligrapher's 'confuse the mail delivery system', aka 'Annoy a Postman' so i sent this is as my request to put Ohio on the map. Not sure if Schin is still running this project, but I thought this was a fun envelope to send regardless.