John Held, Jr. Papers Archives of American Art Smithsonian Institution Key to the Collection: Correspondence 1976-1995 Part VI Owens, Ashley Parker (Chicago, Illinois) The former editor of Global Mail, a zine listing Mail Art shows and projects, Ashley Parker Owens, became switchboard central for networking information in the early to mid nineties. Owens, one of the most active females in Mail Art, was one of the few women defending me in attacks that I was leaving women out of Mail Art history in my books and articles (see file Jennifer Heubert, USA). I was always loath to get involved in these arguments, figuring that any rebuttal provided unwanted extra attention. "I wish you would defend yourself!," Owens writes in a postcard postmarked 1993. "You are taking a lot of hits lately. Why don't you Xerox your index to hilite all females, send to all those slamming you? I find the whole debate embarrassing. No offense, but I seize power, & don't ask men to give it to me." In August 1995, I stayed with Owens while attending the Underground Press Conference, and we discovered we were both unsatisfied with current living arrangements. After discussing the matter, we decided to move to San Francisco and share living expenses. I moved from Dallas to San Francisco in October 1995. 6 letters 3 postcards 1992-1995 Pack, Tom (Houston, Texas) During the mid-eighties, Pack was one of the most consistent names appearing on Mail Art show documentation lists. An architect by profession, Pack sent out distinctive postcards made with architectural paper that stuck to itself when folded. The filling for the postcards contained the flotsam and jetsam of the Mail Art experience, including perforation holes, which he obtained from me during a meeting in Dallas. 5 postcards 1987-1988 Palmer, J. C. [Rudi Rubberoid] (Bellingham, Washington) The editor of the Rubber Fanzine, and an enthusiastic Mail Artist, this file is interesting for the running battle I had with Palmer about the merits of archiving Mail Art. Recycled envelopes and a battery of stickers and stamps sent by his correspondents, typify Palmer's Mail Art, very much in the spirit of the medium, but one in marked contrast to my own approach. "I was quite amused at your little dig about telling the KC art librarians that my archives were on my envelopes. Pretty well true...the enclosed card came via Mark Rose and demonstrates that I am not the only one to hold those views. Coincidentally, the rubber stamp on my envelope came from the Blaster on the very same day. I am thinking of starting an American branch of Mailartists Against More Archives, or M.A.M.A. not to be confused (Ogodno!) with M.O.M.A." (March 14, 1903 [1991]). In another instance, Palmer writes, "Hopping around a bit, there was one other matter that I somewhat dispute with you, something you obviously take for granted; you write 'And the foundation of most mail artists are their archives.' I could twit you for starting a sentence with 'And", (that's a no-no, Jon) but I won't (hee-hee!) Is a mail artist who does not archive a Bad Artist? Socially Irresponsible? Someone who Doesn't Really Care? Come on...The goal of a True Mail Art networker would be to keep nothing, pass on everything wouldn't it? I realize I am talking to someone that works in a library, but isn't archiving just another one of those hangups? Since when does the artist become also a collector and a private museum? I don't object to someone archiving, any more than I do to someone collecting women's shoes, of fluff; I have a problem with it supposedly being a foundation for most mailartists. Is this really true? Will the mail artists working today have to rent separate houses to hold their archives twenty years form now? I think of a snail, packing around a bigger and bigger shell. Ah, the freedom of being an artist...OK, so I exaggerate; however, I think it is quite possible that archiving and mail art/networking don't necessarily go together. Even, possibly, there is just a little too much archiving going on? That one of the nice things about the mail art concept is its very transitory (sic) nature and the goddamned at-ephemeralness of the whole thing? Burn this...(April 25, 1902 [1990]) Raises interesting ethical questions, doesn't it? Especially Palmer's command to burn the letter, and my decision to donate it to The Archives of American Art. In my defense, I feel it is important to leave behind a record of an art medium all but ignored by the mainstream art establishment. To leave Palmer's valid thoughts out of that record would be to distort the situation. What would burning his letter have accomplished? What possibilities occur when included in these Papers? 17 letters 5 postcards 1987-1995  Paquette, Julie [ex-posto-facto] (Garland, Texas) One of my close Dallas friends, Paquette worked for rubber stamp companies in the area and curated several Mail Art exhibitions. She was the host of the First Annual International Aluminum Frame Lawn Chair Squatter Congress and Symposium and the Mailart Marathon, a review of which lead to a heated controversy (see file Dorothy Harris, United States). 2 letters 2 postcards 1992 Peasley, Julee (Boulder, Colorado) An active participant in the zine scene as well as Mail Art, Peeslee's sent out small glass jars, asking correspondents to fill them with objects from their surroundings. Her zine, McJob, gathered horror stories from around the world about making a living in low-paying positions. Peeslee moved to San Francisco shortly after I did in 1995.   1 letter 1 postcard 1990-1991 Perkins, Stephen (Iowa City, Iowa) One of my closest colleagues in the Mail Art network, Perkins, like myself, is interested in researching the field, specializing in artist publications and zines. He has curated several zine shows (newspaper accounts are included in the file), has co-edited a special issue of New Observations on Copy Culture with Lloyd Dunn (see file United States) and served as a Netlink for the 1992 Networker Congress. He is currently (2000) writing a doctoral thesis on assembling magazines. A talented graphic artist as well, several examples are included in the file. We have traded Mail Art publications over the years, and Perkins includes lists of duplicate publications in several of his letters. 14 letters 2 loose notes 1992-1995 Phillpot, Clive (New York, New York) My Dallas career was spent on the staff of the Fine Arts Division, Dallas Public Library (1981-1995). As such, I participated in the Art Librarians of North America Society (ARLIS), attending their yearly national conventions in various cities around the country. Through this, I became friendly with Clive Phillpot, Director of the Library, Museum of Modern Art, New York, who served as President of the Society for several years. My friendship with Clive was a source of great satisfaction for me, sharing many interests with a person I greatly admired. A specialist in artists' books, Phillpot is the co-author of Artist/Author: Contemporary Artists' Books (Distributed Art Publishers Inc. and the American Federation of Arts, 1998), and just before his departure from the Museum of Modern Art for England, acquired the Franklin Furnace (see file United States) Bookworks Collection. Phillpot also writes extensively on the alternative arts, contributing an essay on Ray Johnson (see file United States) to the 1991 Moore College (Philadelphia, Pennsylvania) exhibition, More Works by Ray Johnson, 1951-1991. Phillpot and I also had a fascination for Marcel Duchamp as a practicing librarian in Paris and New York, swapping information while researching the facts of the case. Clive also reviewed my book, Mail Art: An Annotated Bibliography, for Art Libraries Journal (1992), calling it, "the most comprehensive list of its kind...he has trawled wide and deep to catch mail art citations, from minnows to monkfish to mackerel." It was a sad day for me when Clive decided to return to England to pursue other interests. Being sent publications, information and friendly greetings from the Library Director of MOMA was very special for me. 7 letters 5 postcards 3 loose notes Pittore, Carlo [Charles Stanley] (New York, New York) One of the most active Mail Art networkers of the eighties, Pittore sharply curtailed his activities in the medium, donating his considerable Mail Art Archive (thirty-seven cartons) to the Sonie Heine Museum in Oslo, Norway, in 1990. First contacted by Pittore in 1983 at the urging of Jean Brown (see file United States), Pittore was a bright light in Mail Art; the center of the New York City Mail Art scene. His La Galleria Dell' Occhio, a window gallery on East 10th street in the East Village, was a meeting point, as well as exhibition space  (one of the early East Village galleries), for international and American Mail Artists. Pittore was central to the controversy that erupted in the wake of the 1984 Franklin Furnace Mail Art Now and Then exhibition curated by Dr. Ronny Cohen, and the subsequent Artists Talk on Art panel discussions of February 17 and February 24, 1984, After first encouraging Mail Artists to participate in the Franklin Furnace exhibition (which was to be the first major show of Mail Art in New York City since Ray Johnson's 1970, New York Correspondence School, Whitney Museum of American Art exhibition), Pittore was severely disappointed with Dr. Cohen's installation, which failed to present all of the invited material. In response to this, Pittore wrote, An Open Letter to Dr. Ronny Cohen, which had a startling effect within Mail Art (see for example, see the Gene Laughter file [United States]), taking the curator to task for her insensitivity to the medium. "Because I am so bitterly disappointed and angered by your contempt for, and disregard of long established and unalterable traditions of the multi-national mail artist network, I am making this letter public...Your invitation stated that all materials sent would be exhibited. As you know this is a sacrosanct mail art concept-the primary aspect of mail art exhibitions-and that is that everything contributed to a mail art exhibition is be exhibited. No rejections is synonymous with mail art, especially as the work is given and not returned, and you have arbitrarily decided to reject and edit. That you have decided to disregard this concept marks you as no friend to mail art, or to mail artists, and denies perhaps the most unique and most appealing feature of this universal movement." The bitterness of the Franklin Furnace controversy lead to the unseating of Dr. Cohen as moderator of the February 24, 1984, panel, "International Mail Art: Part II- The New Cultural Strategy." In a follow-up letter (February 25, 1984), Pittore apologizes to Dr. Cohen for the behavior of a member of the panel. "It is clear that we have a profound disagreement about your exhibition. I wanted to stimulate an equally profound debate. The issues that disturbed me disturb a great many artists throughout the world. The vehemence you encountered is a measure of our deep frustrations in the face of a frequently hostile artworld, and is an expression of the idealism that motivates many in mail art." As a result of these events, Mail Art suffered a severe setback in critical acceptance in the artworld.  18 letters 13 postcards 5 loose notes Plunkett, Daniel (Austin, Texas) Throughout my years in Texas, no one was more supportive of my work in Mail Art than Daniel Plunkett. As the editor of ND magazine, a periodical dealing with alternatives in art and music, I could always count on Plunkett to publish my articles. Editorial correspondence takes up a portion of the file, but there are also musings about our travels to mutual friends in Europe, plans for events either in Austin or Dallas, new publications in the field and  Mail Art gossip. Some of the articles I wrote for ND include, "International Mail Art Symposium in the USSR" (No. 14, 1991), "Interview with Al Ackerman" (No. 15, 1991). "Crossing the Cactus Curtain: Politics and Isolation Test the Commitment of Latin American Artists" (No. 16, 1992),  "Picasso of the Underground: Bill Gaglione Flutters on the Margins of the Artworld Helping to Create a Thriving Alternative Culture" (No. 18, 1994), and "Interview with Allan Kaprow" (No. 19, 1995). 37 letters 4 loose notes 1982-1995  Plunkett, Ed M. (New York, New York) Although Ray Johnson (see file United States) was mailing out previous to 1962, It was that year E. M. Plunkett gave his activity a name- The New York Correspondence School of Art- a take-off on the New York School of the Abstract Expressionists and mail-order art schools catering to budding artists. In one phrase, Plunkett crystallized an art activity that had raged in the underground. Johnson adopted the term, using it as the title of a 1970 Whitney Museum of American Art exhibition, which gave the phrase even more currency. None of this was known to me when I first wrote Plunkett on October 5, 1976, at the urging of Kenn Speiser of Bizarro Rubber Stamps, who responded to my request asking for the names of artists involved in the rubber stamp medium. Plunkett returned this letter to me in 1999, and I quote it in whole, because upon rereading the letter, it sets the tone for the next thirty years of  my active Mail Art participation. "Dear Ed, Kenn Speiser gave me your name when I asked him for information on artists working with the rubberstamp medium. I am having a show this December in Amsterdam, Holland, of my own work with stamps, and I have written to the people there telling them that I would try to do some research on the history of rubber stamps in this country and on contemporary artists working within the medium. Kenn tells me that you are an artist and also a collector of stamps made in the 1920s and 30s. I'd like very much to see the results of your work and the products of your hunt. Have there been any articles published about the fields of inquiry I have mentioned? I know of a limited edition book distributed by Multiples, Inc. (NYC) entitled "Stamped Indelibly" and edited by William Katz, and a new book being put out by Parisol Press, also of NY, but I could stand more information on the subject. Has any of your work been reproduced anywhere? Have you developed a particular style? My work, for instance, is done by stamping out serial or overlapping designs, inking over with a crow quill pen, and then coloring in. I hope it is convenient for you to answer the questions I have posed, and anything else you might have to say on the subject would be greatly appreciated. I get down to New York every once and awhile, and I'd like to call sometime and see if its' convenient to meet. If any time is better than another please let me know. " 8 letters 1 postcard 1976-1994 Porter, Bern (Belfast, Maine) A legendary figure in Mail Art, Porter was the first American publisher of Henry Miller, a scientist working on the Manhattan Project, author of a work of found poetry for Something Else Press, and much more as he mentions on this postcard. "Kindly include me in your Mail Art Survey and Book because: 1) I invented Mail Art in Porter Settlement, Maine, 3 years before Marcel Duchamp invented it in France. 2) 3000 mail art specimens went from me to Jean Brown now to Getty. 3) My collection of world mail art posters in Special collections of MOMA, New York. 4) I take part last 10 years in 4 to 8 mail art shows a month. 5) I travel world wide 2 to 4 months a year meeting mail art artists in person. 6) I made legal in Maine the national Postal Art Association of America, Incorporated. 7)Colby College Library keeps a record of mail art shows I have contributed to. 8) I am a figure in the world mail art scene." 1 postcard 1988 Printer Matter, Inc. (New York, New York) If I could take just one store with me to a deserted island, I'd choose Printed Matter. I remember fondly traipsing down to Lispenard Street, just below SoHo in the late seventies, whenever I went to New York City. I'd spend hours there, catching up on the latest artists' books and periodicals, chatting with the staff; like a kid in a candy store. In this file you'll find odds and ends, such as sales receipts for purchased items and notices of payment for publications I made available for sale. 7 letters 2 postcards 1981-1992 Private World (San Francisco, California) One of my favorite memories of Inter Dada 84 (see file United States), was meeting my correspondent Private World, who came dressed in a rag suit of many colors. The work in this file is a collaborative oversized painted postcard created by Private World and Horseman of Ceres, California. Very much in the style of Al Ackerman (see file USA), the postcard is a gem of Mail Art creativity. 1 postcard 1984 Pyros, John [Epistolary Stud Farm] (Tarpon Springs, Florida) An active Mail Artist in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, before moving to Tarpon Springs, Pyros circulated a letter in 1986 stating, "Miscellaneous archival mail art materials available to responsible private or public art archives" (December 2, 1986). I think this was the first time I had ever seen Mail Art offered for sale. Archives themselves are controversial enough in Mail Art circles (see files Harris and Palmer, USA), but their sale can be even more confusing. Nevertheless, an avid collector, I was intrigued and opened negotiations with Pyros about obtaining the material. Although Ruth and Marvin Sackner (see file USA), had already picked off some of the finer items, I was very satisfied with what I received, and some of these materials have found their way into these Papers. I was disturbed, however, when sometime shortly after, Pyros offered to sell me the contents of a Mail Art show he had curated. I quote from a letter I wrote him February 10, 1987 (which Pyros returned to me), about this offer. "John, I'm a little upset about your offer to let me see the materials from the Crime and Punishment show. It's one thing to sell off an archive because you have no room. Alot of m. a. people wouldn't even suffer that. I personally have no objection to it.  But to sell the contents of a show is another (thing). Especially when you did so little on your documentation for the show. (Would be another thing if the participants had received a well illustrated catalog, with essays, addresses, etc.). No, this just smells of rip-off to me personally. And as much as I'd like to obtain the material (which I probably already have - but don't mind the dups). in all good conscious, I'll have to pass. If you want to send it to me for the Modern Realism/Jon Held Jr. Archives, I'll reimburse you for postage...On the whole John-I'd be careful of informing too many people about selling the contents of Crime and Punishment. It wouldn't sit well with many mail art people" (February 13, 1987). 8 letters 1985-1989 Ram Cell (Chapel Hill, North Carolina) As one of the few Mail Artists with a perforator (A wedding gift from my second wife, Paula Barber, it came from an old print shop in Texarkana, Texas.), I offer to perforate artist stamp sheets for Mail Artists, with the understanding that I keep one of every ten perforated for my Archive. Most think this fair enough, and I receive much new work from this practice. The service has been advertised in several Mail Art zines, and sometimes, out of the blue, I'll receive work from an artist that takes me completely by surprise. One of those surprises was Ram Cell, who composed his stamp sheets on the computer, printing them out on a color laser printer. Taking it to a whole different level than most computer artists, I have a wide selection of work from this talented artist in my collection. 1 letter 2 loose notes 1994-1995 Random, Steve (Greenfield, Massachusetts) Meeting at Jean Brown's (see file United States), Random and I continued corresponding until his exit from Mail Art. For a time, he was very active, attending many of the New York Mail Art get-togethers. Random writes of attending a Ray Johnson (see file United States) Roof Event, with Carlo Pittore (see file USA), including a Random Sample containing a piece of the roof on which the performance occurred. 4 letters 2 postcards 1983-1984 Reingold, Howard (Sausalito, California) Editor-in-Chief of the Whole Earth Review, and an authority on "virtual communities," Reingold published the article, "Art that Networks," by Chuck Welch (see file United States) in the Summer 1992 issue. He replies to an inquiry of mine by stating, "Although we have no plans to run another piece on fax/mail art in the near future, the subject is of continuing interest." 1 postcard 1992 Roc(k)ola, Robert (San Francisco, California) A performance partner of Bill Gaglione (see file United States), who also worked in the rubber stamp business, Rockola was a member of the Bay Area Dada group, a prolific collagist, rubber stamp artist, and producer of artist postage stamps. I've had an up and down relationship with him over the years, being dropped from his mailing list in 1988 for being, "an envelope stuffer." Roc(k)ola often takes his correspondents work and recycles them by rubber stamping over the original. He is also noted for creating the first Mail Art Bull rubber stamp, in which the artists' correspondents are listed in sections of various animals and objects (see file Corbett, United States), a take-off on a sticker first circulated by Cavellini (see file Italy). 6 letters 7 postcards 1 loose note 1984-1993    Sackner, Ruth and Marvin (Miami Beach, Florida) Legendary collectors of historical and contemporary verbo-visual works, The Ruth and Marvin Sackner Archive of Concrete and Visual Poetry is one of the great collections of this material in the world. Spurred on by their admiration for Jean Brown (see file United States), the Sackners are one of the few collectors actively seeking works in the Mail Art field. When I moved to San Francisco, the Sackners contributed funds for me to rennovate the storage space, in which my Modsern Realism Archive is presently housed. Bibliographies of The Ruth and Marvin Sackner Archive of Concrete and Visual Poetry are one of the great reference works covering Mail Art and related mediums. 2 letters 1989 Scarecrow Press (Metuchen, New Jersey) A publisher of bibliographies for libraries, Scarecrow Press was the publisher of my book, Mail Art: An Annotated Bibliography. The Dallas Public Library had previously published, A World Bibliography of Mail Art, which was an unannotated version of the latter work.  Published in an edition of 800 copies, the 534-page cloth bound book includes some 2,000 sources of information about Mail Art from 1955 to 1989. The file includes the book contract, editorial correspondence received during the preparation of the manuscript, post-publication correspondence, and several copies of my letters to the Press. 19 letters 2 postcards 11 loose notes Smith, E. Z. (Fresno, California) A photographer also active in Mail Art, Smith sends a postcard with a photograph of Judith A. Hoffberg (see file United States), editor of Umbrella, taken during my Los Angeles performance tour in 1991. Another postcard features Ray Johnson (see file United States) in sunglasses. On the verso, the card read, "Mail Art Legends #1. Ray Johnson is the undisputed father of the modern mail art movement. From his opulent Long Island estate he has inspired a generation of networkers. His personal fortune stems from the invention of the unique line of instruments that bear his name. Shortly after WWII he sold the Ray Ban Co. for a tidy sum to Bausch & Lomb." 2 postcards 1991 Solarz, Barbara (Culver City, California) A talented computer artist, who produced some excellent artist postage stamps, Solarz also composes her letters on the computer to great effect, typified by this example. Her correspondence discusses the problems of sending Mail Art to Cuba and the fact that, "feminists can be sexist." 1 letter 1994 Solomon, Norman [Mr. Postcards] (Berkeley, California) A graduate of Black Mountain College, who settled in New York around the same time as Ray Johnson (see file United States), Solomon writes, "I  met Ray in 1950 at Woolworth's, as stated. I last saw him Oct. '66 when I left NY...During those 16 tears (sic), I made hundreds of photographs of Ray, enuf for a bk!...1980. I see. I thought that Ray had mentioned your name to me in the late 50's-early 60's. Was it your father to who he was referring? Ray knew, always, a lot of people...Ray and I (Norman Solomon) are about the same age. (Also Miles Davis, Marilyn Monroe, Fidel Castro, etc.)...Promptness is everything. Extra points for immediacy of response. Nobody lives forever" (June 23, 1994). Photographs of Ray by Norman Solomon were included in the 1999 Whitney Museum of American Art, Correspondences exhibition. Solomon is credited with coining the word "moticos", the name Johnson gave his collages in the fifties. 2 letters 14 postcards 1990-1994   Sondheim, Alan (Dallas, Texas) The author of Individuals: Post-Movement Art in America (E. P. Dutton, 1977), this well-travel art educator was my next-door neighbor in Dallas in the late eighties, while teaching at the University of Texas at Dallas. Sondheim conducted an interview of my Mail Art and performance activities for the Dallas ARTS Revue (Issue 31, 1990), and asked me to participate in a special issue of Artpapers (March/April 1990) on "Noise Culture," for which I wrote the article, "Postal Static: Mailbox Magic & Madness." Sondheim became increasing dissatisfied with the traditional art scene, writing from Buffalo, New York, that "The radically of art has just about disappeared, from my viewpoint, and I'm rapidly losing interest. Hallwalls in that sense ruined me. The curators are yuppies; everyone is self-congratulatory about culture and the institution's intersection with the same. I'm beginning to doubt the whole vehicle/validity of culture at this point-not that it matters to anyone but myself. I was brought up, like most of us, on the idea that civilization somehow resides in its productions, artproductions. These seem a very poor reason today" (October 27, 1988). 2 letters 1988-1989 Sperling, Roberta (Corvalis, Oregon) Before the publication of The Rubber Stamp Album (Workman Publishing, 1978), by Lowry Thompson (see file United States) and Joni Miller, finding visual rubber stamps was a real adventure. I had obtained my first visual rubber stamps in Amsterdam, Holland, but there were very few companies producing or selling them in this country, and finding them was word of mouth. When The Rubber Stamp Album appeared, listing thirty such companies, the field exploded. Keeping up with the interest in the field, author Thompson began publishing Rubberstampmadness magazine. Several years later, she sold the magazine to Roberta Sperling and Michael Malan, then living in Ithaca, New York. The growth of Rubberstampmadness, paralleled the growth of the field as a whole. Today the magazine claims some 20,000 subscribers. I have published articles, and appeared in news stories and features, throughout the magazine's history. Some of the articles I've had published in Rubberstampmadness includes, "On the Road with Jon Held at Interdada 84" (November/December 1984), "Mail Art Face to Face" (July/August 1987), and "Mail Art Today: The Eternal Network" (May/June 1989). The file includes editorial correspondence from editor Roberta Sperling, who has provided one of the most consistent forums for Mail Art over the past twenty years. 12  letters 2 postcards 5 loose notes 1994-1993                                                                                                     Continue to Part VII