UNDERGROUND ART

Well, the bug finally bit and I am returning to my "artistic" beginnings and first love:  zines and mail art and artist trading cards (ATC).  Maybe large watercolour paintings will follow in time.

Mail art is usually decorated envelopes but can include postcards, package wrapping, faux postage.  If you have to mail it to complete the creative experience, it is mail art!

Artist trading cards is a conceptual art movement initiated by the Swiss artist M. Vanci Stirnemann in 1997.  Any medium is acceptable but the card must be 2.5x3.5.  Artists trade or swap these mini works freely with each other all around the world.

This may be difficult from Dominica because the postal mail is weak and material (envelopes of varying sizes and paper) are not readily available. But this only adds to the challenge.  I may end up making envelopes!

Zine ( pronounced ZEEN; short for magazine or fanzine) is a small-circulation self-published work of original or appropriated texts and images, usually reproduced via photocopier for circulation. Zines are usually the product of a single person. 

As a distinct form, zines originated in the 1930s in the United States when fans of science fiction began to publish and trade their own stories. In the 1970s, when punk rock music emerged punk zines appeared. The Do-It-Yourself ethos found fertile ground in zines.

Many major libraries house collections and archives of underground art, especially zines.  Toronto, Vancouver, Halifax and Regina are notable. there are annual conventions now in some centres.  Does that render it no longer "underground"?

SO…IF YOU WOULD LIKE TO BE ON MY MAILING LIST, SEND ME YOUR EXACT POSTAL ADDRESS.

Some of you are already on of course: Judy, Peter, Sarah, Jennifer D...son, Ann S., Barry, Loni, Lene.

Art supplies are always welcome: Prisma coloured pencils, fine tip black drawing pens .03, washi tape, origami paper, envelopes of any size or paper

Several of the early ones are lost