Can Mail Art Save a Language?

Wymysorys is a language with less than 100 speakers and classified as critically endangered by UNESCO. The language is spoken in Wilamowice where a group of locals are working to preserve it.  Wilamowice is a town with about 3,000 people in Southern Poland.  

Wymysorys belongs to the Germanic Language Family. But it is not German.  It is believed its origins come from Western Europe when a mix of Flemish and German speaking settlers moved east during the 13^thCentury. Wymysorys’s speakers are ethnically and culturally Polish. For centuries the speakers did not identify themselves as Germans. After World War II they were allowed to remain in Poland but the use of Wymysorys was officially discouraged.
 
My latest series of mail art preserves some Wymysorys vocabulary.  I have included words like brif (letter) mark (stamp), pöstkiöt (postcard) and briftröejer (mail carrier). This might be the first time the language has ever been used in mail art. But no, mail art cannot save a critically endangered language.

Before there was email there was V Mail

Have you ever heard of a V Mailer?  80 years ago, they were a high-tech solution for the U.S. Military. The mailers helped manage and move a very high volume of mail sent to those serving overseas. The way the V Mailers worked is the original copy was reviewed by wartime censors and photographed — then a small negative was transported overseas to be printed at its destination. This enabled the U.S. Military to drastically reduce the weight of all the mail being sent to service members overseas.

 

I was not familiar with V Mail until a friend gave me an old box of unused mailers.  

Currently the anti-democratic regime is actively erasing and altering any parts of our nation’s history that do not fit their white supremacist narrative. Stories are disappearing from many different government websites. This inspired me to start commemorating those stories with a series of American Hero artist stamps.

During World War II, you were not allowed to add enclosures to a V Mailer.  The ones I mailed out this week each include a set of six artist stamps featuring the following Americans:

• Wong Kim Ark
• Private Albert Cashier
• Dr. Héctor P. García
• Corporal Terry Toyome Nakanishi
• Susie King Taylor
• Navajo Code Talkers

Sending mail art that preserves history is just one small act of resistance. One of the ways we can honor those who bravely fought against fascism 80 years ago is to stand up and speak out.

Читаю заборонені книги — I Read Banned Books

A sheet of artist stamps on the way to Ukraine for an artist call for an upcoming exhibit.

 

Blue Heron Lake

To celebrate the renaming of Golden Gate Park’s Stow Lake to Blue Heron Lake I created an artist stamp for this month’s meeting of the San Francisco Correspondence Coop.

Ticket! Ticket!

 In May 1986 I was living in St. Gallen, Switzerland. I took a day trip to Schaffhausen and decided to keep the train ticket.   Recently I sent it to Jack Latteman at Cascadia Artpost for Series 12 of the “Ticket! Ticket!”collaborative mail art project.  Very excited to receive the sheet of artist stamps in the mail.

The California Postal Service?

Start with a stack of old, unused California postcards and then make some artist stamps to add along with the official postage.   And if President Biden doesn’t fire Louis DeJoy soon, we might actually need our own California Postal Service.  If that happens, Huell Howser is going on a stamp!   

October Mail

After a long trip it is always good to get back home.  And the visit to the post office to empty out the box was another treat.  A whole pile of mail was waiting for me and more keeps arriving.  Kathy Barnett’s latest piece is hanging on my door to scare visitors and I am glad to see more responses to the Fluxus High School Yearbook as well.   The mail art shown here includes:

1. MiM – Virginia
2. e. coles – England 
3. Jürgen Greissbach – Germany 
4. Meral Agar – Turkey 
5. Lynne Buckner – California
6. Gregg Biggs – Museum of Unclaimed Ephemera – California
7. Dori Singh – California 
8. Fleur Helsingor – California
9. Margo Hill – California
10. Maria Quiroga – Argentina 
11. Wabi Sabi Sews – California 
12. Mindaugas Žuromskas – Lithuania 
13. Peter Müller – Germany
14.  Valdor – Catalonia/Spain
15. Kathy Barnett – Missouri
16. Lynne Buckner – California
17. Jenny Soup – Oregon 
18. Ryosuke Cohen – Japan

Summer of Fog

My latest artist stamp that I am adding along with regular postage to my outgoing mail. Commemorating our foggy summer and of course Sutro Tower.

Summerful Mail

There has been plenty of fun and fabulous pieces of mail art arriving all summer.   Prints, postcards, artist stamps and more movable pieces from Kathy Barnett.  I need to make a video one day of her work. This is a list of the artists shown here: 

1. Valdor – Catalonia/Spain
2. Morgan – Canada 
3. Peter Müller – Germany
4. Eberhard Janke - Germany
5. Richard Baudet – France 
6. Kathy Barnett – Missouri
7. Gregg Biggs – Museum of Unclaimed Ephemera – California
8. Jennifer Utter – California
9. Fleur Helsingor – California
10. Pamela Gerard (California)
11. Margo Hill – California
12. Serse Luigetti – Italy

June Mail

The postal box has been full every week when I head up to Clayton Street.  June has been a good month for mail art.   There was even some mystery mail from Portland, Oregon. No idea who sent it, but I do love it — and it so happens I am currently working on collages with old yearbooks myself.   Here is a list of the artists shown here:  

1. Lynne Buckner – California
2. Jennie Hinchcliff – California
3. William Mellott – Taiwan 
4. Dori Singh – California 
5. Fleur Helsingor – California
6. Mindaugas Žuromskas – Lithuania 
7. Jerome Jacobs – California 
8. Meral Agar – Turkey 
9. Marina Salmaso – Denmark
10. Katerina Nikoltsou - Greece
11. The Sticker Dude – New York 
12. Jon Foster – North Carolina 
13. Valdor – Catalonia/Spain
14. Gregg Biggs – Museum of Unclaimed Ephemera – California
15. Kathy Barnett – Missouri
16. Anonymous – Oregon 

Listopad

It’s November, or in Polish, Listopad.   The Polish name for November literally translates as “leaf fall.”  There is this subjective phenomenon where you can learn a word in another language and somehow find that word quite appealing.  Listopad is one of those words for me.  I like it so much I was inspired to carve some rubber stamps and then use them to make a new series of artist stamps.

10 Years of the S.F. Correspondence Co-Op

The first time I went to a San Francisco Correspondence Co-Op meeting was the group’s first anniversary party — back in 2012.  Here we are nine years later, and the co-op is now 10 years old.  We missed having our party in 2020 and finally had out first in-person gathering this weekend, safely, outdoors in a quiet, financial district park.

Every time we meet, one of us does an artist stamp to be shared with co-op members.  Many keep their stamps in special passports.   For our 10^th anniversary we did something different.   29 other co-op members sent me artwork that was then turned into a set of two commemorative sheets of artist stamps.  Here is our very cooperative effort.

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.

Eyes in the Mail

In a bit of shared artistic vision, some of the mail art I recently received featured eyes and I just emphasized eyes in my holiday mailing.  Ans Theo Nelson is turning some of the mail art he receives into small, one-of-a-kind zines and then redistributing the work.  As I have been filling art scrapbooks  with mail art, this idea is tempting. I love maps and I love public transportation, So Karen Clowney Scott’s bear made out of New York City MTA Maps is perfect. And, it is always a treat to get an envelope of mail art from Cuan Miles.

1. Debra Mulnick – Idaho
2. William Mellott – Taiwan 
3. Samantha Price – New Hampshire
4. Lubomyr Tymkiv - Ukraine 
5. Robin Sparrow — New Zealand 
6. Karen Clowney Scott – New York 
7. Theo Nelson (Republic of Whimsy) – Canada
8. Cuan Miles – South Africa

Fall Mail

 

Returned from some travel to see a great deal of mail art waiting for me.   Some very small mail art from Amy Irwen, Kathy Barnett sent a movable little frog, and Mindaugas Žuromskas is stenciling paper made from receipts that have been pasted together.  Here is some of the recent mail shown:

1. R.F. Côté — Canada
2. Fleur Helsingor - California 
3. Peter Müller – Germany
4. Lubomyr Tymkiv - Ukraine 
5. Jokie X. Wilson – California
6. Amy Irwen – Minnesota 
7. Bonniediva – Illinois 
8. Sally Wassink – California 
9. Ed Giecek – Washington State
10.  Kathy Barnett – Missouri
11.    
12.  Charles Kremenak – California 
13. Keith Chambers – California 
14. Mikel Untzilla – Euskadi/Spain 
15. Mindaugas Žuromskas – Lithuania 

Summer Mail Wrap-Up

 

 

 

A summer of making art and travel is wrapping up and it is time to review some of the recent mail I have received.  I love those big envelopes of collages and prints from Eastern Europe sent by Virgo and Mindaugas Žuromskas.  An envelope and note from Egg Mail Art curator Eva Mosonyi even had a Hungarian postage stamp which featured some eggs she made (I am impressed).  And how did Thea Hollister know I have always loved the Eurythmics?  This Summer’s mail art included the following:

1. Marina Salmaso– Denmark
2. Fleur Helsingor- California 
3. Virgo– Russia 
4. William Mellott– Taiwan 
5. Bonniediva – Illinois 
6. Wabi Sabi Sews – California
7. Gregg Biggs – Museum of Unclaimed Ephemera – California
8. Mindaugas Žuromskas – Lithuania 
9. Heather Ferguson – California
10. Dori Singh – California 
11. Eva Mosonyi– Hungary
12. Peter Müller – Germany
13. Thea Hollister — Washington State 
14. Maria Quiroga – Argentina 

Post-Vacation Summer Mail

I returned from a trip to Mexico to find a post office box stuffed with fun things.  Including some zines that will force me to work even more on my Spanish.  I truly appreciate the way Valdor compiles the mail art he receives and sends out these zines.  It’s a lot of work, not to mention the cost.  Kathy Barnett continues to outdo herself with these interactive, moveable pieces.  The most recent is like a school cafeteria lunch at the aquarium. The latest characters from the Museum of Unclaimed Ephemera arrived, they were a bit roughed up by some postal machinery.  And some of my Surreal Baseball pieces are returning to me with some re-working.  This Summer’s mail art (so far) includes the following:

1. Dori Singh – California 
2. Gregg Biggs – Museum of Unclaimed Ephemera – California
3. Lorella Castagnini – Italy 
4. Fleur Helsingor- California 
5. Carolyn Oord (aka Kerosone) - Québec/Canada 
6. Bonniediva – Illinois 
7. Debra Mulnick – Idaho
8. Orlando Nelson Pacheco Acuña  – Chile 
9. Sagebrush Moderne – California 
10. Kathy Barnett – Missouri
11. Peter Müller – Germany
12. Valdor – Catalonia/Spain
13. Serse Luigetti – Italy
14. Mindaugas Žuromskas – Lithuania 

Winter Mail

A rainy winter day is perfect to sort through some of the mail art I received over the holidays.  The recent batch includes collages, ATCs, amazing envelopes, post office postcards, a pair of duck footed kids (love those) and Sally Wassink’s fantastic 2019 calendar – this year in a stamp format.  This is a list of what’s shown here:

1. Sagebrush Moderne – California 
2. Kerosene– Québec, Canada
3. Katerina Nikoltsou – Greece 
4. Jokie X. Wilson – California
5. Maria Quiroga – Argentina 
6. Kathy Barnett – Missouri
7. Peter Müller – Germany
8. Sandra Lefever– Florida
9. Fleur Helsingor– California
10. Serse Luigetti – Italy
11. Melissa Wand – Wisconsin
12. Sally Wassink– California 
13.  Donna Stroud – Washington 

Remembering Santiago Maldonado

Just received a set of artist stamps from Samuel Montalvettiin Argentina  The stamps commemorate the disappearance and murder of the young activist Santiago Maldonado who was demonstrating for indigenous rights in Patagonia.  You can read more of the story on Amnesty International’ssite as well as a BBC article.

From Zero to Infinity

I sent some mail art to Pier Roberto Bassi for his From Zero to Infinity Mail Art Project. A month or so later I received a poster and Sheet #17. It is a set of artists stamps featuring my work and the other latest respondents.  A very cool project – you can check it out on Pier’s blog.