At the Fluxus Heidelberg Center again

During this week I am at the Fluxus Heidelberg Center again. At the same time the exhibition of the TAM-Rubberstamp Archive is hanging in Moscow. I will find out when I get home in Tilburg again who visited the exhibition and how it was like.

Ruud

Calatog published as PDF-file

On http://tampublications.blogspot.com/ , my other BLOG, you will find the details of getting the .PDF file of the catalog for the exhibition of the TAM-Rubberstamp archive at the L-Gallery in downtown Moscow, Russia.

Ruud

The poster made for the exhibition of the TAM Rubber Stamp Archive in Moscow, Russia. The L-Gallery is a famous gallery in the center of downtown Moscow. The show opens today and lasts for 2 weeks. 

Turk LeClair from USA, better known as Radio Free DaDa, died about a month ago. It is sad to see old friends leave the planet. I found this favorite stamp of him, which he used on lots of his mailings.

Overkill of information

Yes, there it happens again. When I look at the Bloggers that are popping up everywhere I notice that I tend to make a list of those 'privat diaries' of mail-artists. Whenever I get the chance I would like to 'scan' them all to see if there is something new to read and/or see. Did Michael publish a new piece of mail-art? Did Julie write about new fluxus bucks that came in? Did....... And the digital voyeur has to deal with an overkill of information again. This because the list of Blogs just grows too large. The time one has doesn't enlarge........

Natural selection is the result. I only follow the most interesting Blogs, or the persons I feel connected to, or think that they have to tell me something interesting.

Aha. It only happened so fast on this Internet. Normaly with snail-mail it takes months or years to be confronted with "too much" mail. On the Internet it cvan happen in just a week.

The nice thing about the statistics is that one can actually see if there are more digital voyeurs in the Blog-scene.........

Ruud

This envelope I received from Joki. He even designed the special artistamps for my project "TAM is everywhere' which I did in the beginning of the 90-ies. Due to a sailing-accident Joki died years ago. His works are in all those mail-art archives and this image is just to show you a small fraction of all he did. 

TAM-Publications

At my 2nd blog: http://tampublications.blogspot.com/ you can find all information connected to the publications that I issue. There are some publications planned, like the catalogue for the exhibition of the TAM - Rubber Stamp Archive at L-Gallery in Mocsow, Russia and the publication in connection to my 25 years in Mail-Art.

Ruud

Enveloppe I sent to Geert de Decker (Belgium) in 1992, 12 years ago. It was in the Networker Congress Year 1992. Geert published the visuals on his site at: http://www.sztuka-fabryka.be/ , where he constantly lists his latest news. He included two of my envelopes. Check his site to see the rest and his large electronic archive.

This Dutch message was chooses as message of the week at http://de-dienst.nl (government the Netherlands).

Digital art. Actually part of a contribution I made for Galantai's exhibition about the 4th dimension. The fourth dimension being money. Money moving over the time while captured by my scanner. I made a series of digital images. Printed them on a colour-laser printer and made a booklet out of the prints. That was my contribution and was sent out last month. 

Public transport on strike

Well, these things happen too. In the Netherlands the complete Public Transport is on strike. Because I also travel by train to my work therefore I am stuck at home. But because of the flexibility of my work I can also work at home with the connection to Internet. Most of my students are stuck at home as well, but we arranges that everybody can work at home and we keep each other informed through our Online School Platform.

New ways of work. I am now an a break from work, so I am checking my privat e-mail accounts and other stuff....

Ruud

Here is the envelope that I received from Joseph (Josofa), so you can read his contact address as well. 

inside card from Josofa. Actually I am not aware that I am doing a TAM/Trading Art project. Actually I am NOT. But since he likes so much to see back what he sent me, I am publishing this card here. You can reach him at sofaone@unisonmedia.net

Lancilotto Bellini from Italy sent me a few digital images as well. Seems I made this enveloppe back in 1997. Yes, I worked a lot with ink in those years. Thanks Lancilotto!

Yes, always enjoy getting one of Roy's photocards / Photomail. This photo I received today. Funny enough two mailing from NY today. It seems Roy is one of the visitors of my BLOG, so I thought of surprising him with letting him know this way his card arrived and is very much appreciated. 

Back-side of the card I received from Roy Arenella today. yes, he is right. All the painted envelopes he received lately already are digitized on my scanner. 

This envelope I received today from E.F.Higgins - Doo Da Postage Works today. The envelope contained a booklet of his 3rd International DOO DA STAMP INVITE project with lots of artistamps in them. A nice addition to my TAM-Archive. 

Links and New updates for you

A good set of links for visitors here: To find updates I am responsible for on the Internet go to : http://www.fluxusheidelberg.org/updates.html where the information for the Fluxus Heidelberg Center (Germany). There you can -for instance- find the latest calendar-drawing by Litsa Spathi at: http://www.fluxusheidelberg.org/sep2004c.html.

Some find it difficult to see how things are interconnected. Once again an explenation. The Fluxus Heidelberg Center was founded by Litsa Spathi and me in 2003.There we work together to document out Fluxus-activities. This isn't a mail-art activity. My mail-art activities are mostly documented at: http://www.iuoma.org/ and on that site there is also a list
with updates to guide you through the latest additions at: http://www.iuoma.org/updates.html. As for my partner, Litsa Spathi, she has her own site as well located at: http://www.geocities.com/nobodypress/

And what is this BLOG located at http://iuoma.blogspot.com all about? Quite simple. Here I tell you about how all things that are happening in my life come together. I could tell you for instance where I work by pointing you at: http://www.baroniecollege.nl , where at one of the departments I am responsible for the development of educational material and am coördinating several things. Or I could direct you to the thesis by Michael Lumb at: http://www.fortunecity.com/victorian/palace/62/index.html which I put online ion 1998. Unfortunately I don't have the access-codes of that site anymore, because the mailing-address of Michael Lumb has changed again and I would liked to have changed that.

As it is clear to me, I am fully interlinked on the INTERNET. How to keep track of it all. It is just a matter of investing time and keeping an overall view of the whole structure. In the publication I am writing for that 25 years in Mail-Art, I actually devote a chapter on these sites and their structures.

For people who want to know about mail-art project, I can direct them to 2 links. One is an overview of projects that anybody can place (YOU TOO), located at: http://forum.onecenter.com/iuoma/ and the other link is the IUOMA-group located at: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/iuoma/ where you first have to become a member. There the IUOMA-members exchange messages, photos, files, polls, and lots more.

Ruud

This emvelope I sent to Jonathan Stangroom several years ago. Thanks to Syl it is now returned in digital format to me. I will use these returned digital files to illustrate the publication that will be issued on occasion of my 25 active years in Mail-Art. 

This button was made by me somewhere in the early beginning of the 80-ies, might be 1982. I just sent two of them to the Museum of temporary art, and one is now located in compartment #11. Have a look at the museum at http://www.museum-of-temporary-art.com/ and find out how lovely this museum is.

A recently painted series of 2 envelopes that will go out this weekend to Heidelberg. A typical sample of the series I made these last weeks. 

A sample of a Fluxus Buck that I designed for Julie (ex posto facto) and sent to her back in 1996. 

Julie online

Yes, another mail-artist online with a BLOG. have a look at: http://jjsblog1.blogspot.com/ and find the start of Julie's BLOG. She started the Fluxus Bucks, and now you can observe her daily writings online and react to her personally.......

Ruud

Mail from Micael Leigh

Today I received an e-mail from Michael Leigh (UK), check out his BLOG at http://flobberlob.blogspot.com/ as well. He has now also a statistical programm installed, so will know who goes where and from where and so on.

The image he sent me was of a large envelope I sent to him somewhere in the middle of the 90-ies. I have a visual memory, so actually remember the envelope. Even when I send out thousands each year. The envelope was larger than his scanner, but still it is nice to have this flash-back. I will use this scann for sure somewhere in a publication.

Michael wrote he found the envelope by chance. probably because of its size it was easy to find.I will now have to return the favour. I will have to go through my archive and have to find some of Michaels collage-works. I must have lots of them somewhere, but finding things in a huge collection isn't always easy.

But Michael, I will go for it, and will find something for sure!

Ruud

Envelope Ruud made in the 90-ies and sent to Michael Leigh, UK. Returned in digital form in October 2004 to Ruud Janssen. 

After publishing the text below I took a photo of my laptop on which I work. The photo was taken with the MC60 phone/camera. I instantly e-mailed the photo to my e-mail address, went to my e-mail program and downloaded the image. Then Converted the file from BMP to JPEG file, and uploaded with Hello to my Blogger. That is how it works and it means I can instantly publish images from wherever I am with the new digital phone/camera MC60. Isn´t that a luxury..... This test shows it works.

25-YEARS Publication

The 25 years in Mail-Art cellebration is next year. For that occasion I am writing a publication. It promisses to be a thick one. The first concepts indicate that it will be over 100 pages long. As illustrations I will use the images I receive from the Mail-Art network for which I asked. I will keep you informed. The book will come out somewhere in 2005.

Ruud

Photo via MMS - It works!

With my new MC60 I just sent an MMS to my own e-mail address, and it works!

Let me explain the specifics. The MC60 is just a mobile phone with digital camera. An MMS is a Multimedia Message Service (which can be a text with audio, picture of video). In the internal phonebook of the mobile I added my e-mail address. Took a photo, and sent it to the e-mail address. Voila. A photo just arrived.

For future communication this has a nice swing. When I am at my P.O. Box and find a letter, I could take a photo of it while holding it, and e-mail it to the sender. That way he gets an instant reply.

Yes, the new communication forms make life a happening on its own. Life is in a Flux.

Ruud

Taking photos while on the move

For years now I have a digital camera. I have taken thousands of digital photos every year, and now there is a new digital gadget that entered my home: A Siemens MC60. A beautiful design, especially because of the Cross in the design. Remembers me of how we play with that cross at the Fluxus Heidelberg Center (http://www.fluxusheidelberg.org), where we already published about 400 of our photos. Mostly photos taken while Litsa Spathi & I were on the move for a performances somewhere in Europe.

Now I will find out how this new toy works and if I can publish the photos it takes. I van actually send them straight away to someone with the same MMS - possibility.

Ruud

my new MC60 mobile phone with camera. 

Visitors to this BLOG

Never knew there were so many visitors for this BLOG. The statistical programm is now running for about 6 hours, and besides my 8 hits to test the HTML-code, I noticed when I looked at the list these six hours later, there were already 30 hits registered. These programms also show from where the visitors come. That will be the funniest part. It seems a lot of people go from BLOG to BLOG. Yes, an interesting way to go through the diaries that people leave on the internet. One just has to click on the "next blog" item, and one is in someones elses life.

A fascinating aspect of this BLOG-thing. Also one can look at the profiles of the persons who produced the blogs. The interests are gathered in lists, so you can find easily blogs of people with the same interests.

Therefore I hope all mail-artists put in their "interest in"- part, the subject Mail-Art and/or Mail Art (yes, the programm sees these as two different words), so the interested people can go from Blog to Blog. Michael Leigh even made a list of BLOG's on his BLOG, so the circle of contacts he is communicating with is available for all visitors.

New ways of communication are blooming....

Ruud

Statistics

More and more mail-artists start their BLOG. It is funny. The mail-art turns really into communication-art and all forms are integrating. The snail-mail and e-mails are comined in these personal BLOG's where others can leave their comments as well.

Because it is 'booming' buisiness, I am also interesting in how this development goes. Therefore - after searchib the structure of the BLOG- I added a statistical attachement to my blog so I can see who came, from where, and how many there were, etc.....

You can actually also access these statistics because they have a link at the bottom of my BLOG. Are there many visitors? I will have a look in the next weeks & months.....

Ruud

First contribution. The TAM-Bulletin sent to Clemente Padin in Uruguay, 1985. 

Clemente Padin's first contribution

When I asked of digital files made of my older envelopes I knew that I would be in for a surprise. Clemente Padin, Uruguay, sent me a scan from a TAM-Bulletin that I issued back in 1985. Actually this is the first time I see how these bulletins arrived at the receivers end. The TAM-Bulletin send without envelope with 120 cents on postage on it. It was # 064 of 300, and I will surely use this image in the documentation I plan for my 25-year celebration in mail-art.

Michael Leigh suggested that we should exchange digital files of the envelopes we have from eachother. A nice thought, but when I think of what I have here in Tilburg I musn't think of scanning it all. I did promiss him though that exchange is no problem, but to stirr things up a bit I sent him a digital image of an envelope he will only get in a few days.

I like to play with these communication-forms. Mail-Art for me is more Communication-Art as I wrote once. The fact that a digital image is so quick doesn't make the digital form better. The acrylic painted envelop Michael will get has a specific structure and feel. Than I can only sent by the trdition mail.......

Ruud