Reed Altemus
Wed, 20 Sep 2000 19:44:39 -0700
Hi Sol Sol Nte wrote: > Hi Reed, > > Sounds like you had fun at Wexner. Yeah, I did. Saw old friends and met new. Drank, ate, looked at art, browsed the bookstore (of course considering that I had no money at all because the plane ticket had cost me $430 this was a moot point), did a lot of rubberstamping Saturday, and then sort of a relaxed dinner on Sunday after the Panel Discussion. Met Judith Hoffberg (listowner here) and Anna Banana, Alice Ames, Honoria was there oh the list just goes on and on... > > > You wrote: > >The mail art show was relegated to a back > concrete hallway where it was displayed on both > sides. < > > I get the impression you feel that the concurrent Mail Art show was sort of > pushed aside. If that's the case it's very disappointing since in many ways > In my opinion, they could have given the wall dedicated to a massive looming Barbara Kruger graphic about art consumerism to the mail art show and that would have been justice. > Johnson owes much of his later career to the many mail artists whose > activity promoted him as an artist. I think Ray Johnson would have just been > another Pop Artist if it wasn't for the thousands of artists who > corresponded with him and made mail art into a movement for Johnson to > preside over. Well, it did keep him busy- 4 hours per day from what he said in one of the videos that was playing. > > > Reed also wrote: > > >Mark showed me his mail art archive and some > collaborations > he had done with Bern Porter- I preferred that to anything I saw in the > Ray Johnson show.< > > Obviously I haven't seen the show but I do have the DeSalvo book that > accompanies it. Is the show stuff the same as what's illustrated in the > book. Or rather what, if anything, did you find lacking in the Johnson show? Sorry, I don't have the book so I've no answer for you here. Oh, OK now I remember the high point: the high point for me was the video of Ray Johnson reading from Walt Whitman with two Reeses Cups crammed in his mouth. Hilarious gag. (pun intended) Reed