Can you make rubber stamps with rubber bands?

Yes!  With some inspiration from the Rubber Stamp Museum blog, a bag of rubber bands and some wooden blocks I was ready to get stamping.  The first batch was dropped off in a mailbox this afternoon.

Mary Fields Artist Stamp

When the San Francisco Correspondence Coop meets every month, one of us always creates an artist stamp to share at the meeting.   This month it was my turn.   When I first read about Mary Fields online, I knew I needed to do a stamp.  She was the first African-American woman to work for the U.S. Postal Service, and that is just a piece of her remarkable biography.

A Trip to Stockton

I am a big advocate of visiting museums when I travel, and I always seek out lesser known museums in smaller cities.  Sometimes I have to remind myself there are smaller cities right near San Francisco.  Stockton is a little more than hour’s drive.  Yesterday was my first visit to the Haggin Museum.  

It’s a hidden gem and right in a lovely park in the center of town.   The Haggin is both a history and art museum.   Much of the collection was saved by happenstance when the family moved from their Nob Hill mansion prior to San Francisco’s 1906 earthquake and fire.  And now it is safely in Stockton for everyone to enjoy.  Most of the collection reflects the taste of wealthy, late 19^th Century Americans scouring Europe to fill their mansions.   From across a gallery I immediately spotted that blue.  I strode across the room to confirm it was, yes, a Jean-Léon Gérôme. 

The Haggin Museum’s collection of J.C. Leyendecker’s work is what puts them on the map.  It was the first time I had ever seen his paintings in person.  They were reproduced millions of times in advertising, magazine covers and prints.  As is so often the case with most painters, no print or online image can quite do Leyendecker’s work justice.  His paintings glow and the thick brush strokes want to pop off the canvases.  It is also easy to speculate that Leyendecker’s work influenced Wayne Thiebaud.

Now, I have to wonder, what is hiding out in Modesto?

No Plastic – Try Wax Paper!

I am trying to use less and less plastic, especially products in single-use plastic containers.  Sure, you can put it in the recycling bin, but there is such a glut of plastics, they end up in a landfill anyway.

I though the best way to respond to a “No Plastic” mail art call  was to create some mail art using wax paper.  Wax paper is old-fashioned, biodegradable/compostable and can often be used in place of plastic bags and wrap.  

A Catalog of Collage Objects

Like any collage artist, I run the risk of becoming a hoarder.  When you make collage, you are always on the hunt for objects to use.  Boxes of collage fodder begin to fill up and then, when are you going to get around to using it all? MUNI passes going back to your 1990 arrival in San Francisco, Czech matchbox labels, vintage cigarette cards purchased in New Zealand 25 years back, fortune cookie fortunes from years of lunch specials. It all just keeps accumulating. 

My collage work has evolved.   Nowadays I tend to make my own material by painting paper, cutting and reassembling.  I really have little reason to save these things anymore.  In an effort to thin out the hoard I have been creating artist books and then purging, recycling, donating and giving away the rest.  

My latest effort is a A Catalog of Collage Objects  where each pair of pages is dedicated to 19 different ephemeral objects.  Some of the highlights are show here.

Oh Rats!

It’s time for some Year of the Rat mail art — postcards with hand carved rubber rat stamps.  Happy New Year!

A Handful of Mail

Hands are a recurring theme in and assortment of belated holiday mail as well as some new year’s greeting which arrived in the last few weeks.  They include a piece from Peter Müller which had an enigmatic material glued to it.  Most of it cracked and fell off in transit.  Also, there was a mucky rendition of the swamp from Rebecca Guyver.  A photo and card from Sacramento artist Cherie Hacker. The lamp and table have been photographed in different settings since 2003.  And final, after seeing my post, Katerina Nikoltsou was inspired to make some aerogram-inspired mail art herself.  She started with color copies of original aerograms.  Ones she had mailed to an aunt in Chicago years back.  I am wondering if an aerogram revival is at hand — at least for mail artists.   

The mail shown here includes:

1. Peter Müller – Germany
2. Sally Wassink – California 
3. Maria Quiroga – Argentina 
4. Debra Mulnick – Idaho
5. Rebecca Guyver – UK                                
6. Fleur Helsingor – California 
7. Jennie Hinchcliff – California 
8. Kathy Barnett – Missouri
9. Cherie Hacker – California 
10. Katerina Nikoltsou - Greece