Is Mail Art the Original Detox?

Sometime in the late 19th Century an artistic movement emerged - Mail Art. Cornered Space Alien will not “look up” the exact year, that’s just way too much digital mind static (to paraphrase our friends at Ditox). Someday, somehow we’ll get the year down.

Anyhoo, George Howard got the ball rolling with art on envelopes and over time other artists including the like of Ray Johnson got on board.

But why did they get on board and adopt this unique medium?

The Middle Man. It’s always the middle man. In this case it’s museums, curators, appraisers and a agents. The group Ray Johnson assembled couldn’t stand them and not for monetary reasons. Middle Men distort, bastardize and otherwise ruin the artistic experience for all. The “Correspondence Movement” (as the artistic group was called) were on the case.

They mailed art to one another and of course it was often forwarded to non artists as well. This initiative freed them from the toxic influence of the Middle Man. And, freed non artists as well.

Can the Teletype Club honor this movement, “revive it”, augment it a bit and free all people of the scourge of the Middle Man? We like to think so