Dada is alive

Last year dadaStation21 from Austin, Texas, was looking for mail art postcards without a specific theme or motto. However, the word dada provided enough inspiration. Hundred years ago, the European avant-garde took a firm stance against imperialism and chauvinism: John Heartfield’s Prussian Archangel, a dummy of a German soldier with a pig’s head that hung from the ceiling,Continue reading “Dada is alive”

Zerstörungswut

Die Österreichische Post ist das größte Logistik- und Postunternehmen des Landes und das einzige, das Briefe und Karten zustellt. Umso wichtiger wäre strikte Neutralität in Hinsicht auf die beförderten Objekte. Leider ist das nicht der Fall. Die obenstehende – bewusst grob gearbeitete – Collage von Gerald Jatzek wurde auf dem Weg von Wien nach GrünbachContinue reading “Zerstörungswut”

Mail Art in the Cloister

The barn of the cloister in Zehdenick (Brandenburg, Germany) is a well known location for concerts, poetry readings and art workshops. June 12 has seen the opening of a museum about the cloister as well as a mail art show. The cloister was founded in 1250 as a Cistercian nunnery. It became protestant in the 16thContinue reading “Mail Art in the Cloister”

A Card from Down Under

A beautiful card from Tasmania reached us last week. You can see the appropriate title on the left side: Pamela Parks’ collage has traveled 16,216.34 km (10,076.36 mi) in one month to make us feel connected. Thus, it made roughly 540 km per day. Pamela, who has been to Austria, told us that she is a photographerContinue reading “A Card from Down Under”

By Chance

Melanie Reed from Seattle loves to produce hand-crafted media that reveals the three-dimensional process of its creation. Her excellent paper collages Meeting of Minds and Ship of State II reached me, while I was reading a book about Max Ernst who developed the three-dimensonal techniques grattage (scraping the surface layers of paint) and frottage (incorporating the structuresContinue reading “By Chance”

Colorfull Collages

Two wonderful collages from Seattle reached Vienna on the last day of March. They are works of Melanie Reed, titled New Year’s Eve and Object Lesson. Both images – Melanie calls them “unlikely art visions” – show a strong tension between a static central object and a background filled with colorful objects moving in a variety of directions.

Hungarian Online Gallery

Ervin Zsubori, the mastermind behind Arnolfini’s Archives, is a man for all seasons: artist, photographer, economist, sociologist, journalist, poet and more. In the mail art community he is known for his collections on Arnolfini Mini[e]MailArt. He regularly sends out calls for themed calls. They are quite challenging because the solutions have to fill an areaContinue reading “Hungarian Online Gallery”