white elephant treasures

Mrpotani found these postcards, which arrived yesterday, at the yearly White Elephant Sale held at an Oakland museum. Both were published by the Lafayette Historical Society in Lafayette, CA. The bottom one shows a local baseball team from the early 1900's. The top one, simply priceless, is of the old post office, circa 1900. Wouldn't you know the site of the post office is now a supermarket parking lot?

amy faust

I don't know Amy Faust but she sent me a postcard advertising her participation late next month in The American Craft Council Show in Baltimore. Always happy to support the arts!

stamps

Another pretty bird stamp from Taiwan and some great elk (you call them elk, we call them moose) stamps from Russia.

sochi railway station

A Russian postcrosser sent this postcard showing the remarkable railway station in Sochi, a resort city on the Black Sea, which will host the 2014 Winter Olympics.

isla magdalena

Inga also sent this blue, blue postcard from her year-end trip to Chile and Argentina. In Chile she visited a penguin haven on Isla Magdalena. The breeding grounds for Magellanic penguins, it was declared a Natural Monument in 1982. These penguins make quite a fashion statement.

pink on parade

My German-Canadian friend Inga sent me a package, using a recycled padded envelope. I like the way someone, either the sender or a German postal worker, marched these pink flowers across the envelope.

Gardens Mailart Call- Castries, France

I'm posting this mailart call that I received in my email today:

MAILART CALL

The Françoise Giroud Library of Castries (France) organizes from December 8th 2009 to January 9th 2010 a Mail art exhibition.
We therefore send out a call for contributions on the following subject : Garden(s).

Please send your work before November 1rst 2009 to the following address :

Art postal – Jardin(s)
Médiathèque Françoise Giroud
15 avenue de la Cave coopérative
34160 CASTRIES
FRANCE

All works will be displayed during the exhibition at the end of the year, as well as on the Library's website at the following address :
http://www.montpellier-agglo.com/mediatheques,
in the "Action culturelle et pédagogique / Art postal" section.

No jury, no fee, no return. Postal delivery only.

what a terrible idea

Yesterday Postmaster General John Potter went before Congress seeking to eliminate Saturday deliveries.

toso

Tono artist Honda Takeshi sent this belated New Year's card with the characters "toso", the spiced sake used to greet the New Year. Something of a sake connoisseur, Honda no doubt had fun making this card. Omedetou! Kanpai!

cny san francisco

Mrpotani sent a colorful, multilayered Chinese New Year's card from San Francisco, which she made using papers she bought in the Chinatown there. Left to right: envelope, inner envelope, and card. She of course used the Year of the Ox stamps on the envelope for sending. I've been using them lots myself but these are the first I have received.

holland

Great design, great colors from a Dutch postcrosser. Love this card!

yoroi

Tokyo friend Keiko sent this postcard of a samurai yoroi.

greetings from palawan

A postcrosser sent this cool card and these lovely stamps while on a visit home to the Philippines. Her German husband took the slice-of-life image and printed the card. Excellent.

never gets old

I made this postcard using a photo I took at the Majestic Clubhouse store at Citizens Bank Park. Some of the women working at the shop used all the pins on the big pin exchange board to make this nifty display.

fragile

Mrpotani sent this muslin-backed postcard. All the coils are dotted with glitter but that didn't come through in the scanning. For being fragile, the card made it through the mail pretty well.

hiroi nobuko

Kyoto artist Hiroi Nobuko sent this postcard. She's having a solo show from February 9 to 20 at Galerie Pousse, a worthy little gallery located a couple of minutes from Tokyo's Kabukiza.

rex ray

Mrpotani sent this cool Rex Ray postcard. The piece is called Untitled Collage #2627 and uses oil, acrylic and mixed media on wood.

c.k.s. memorial hall

A Taiwanese postcrosser sent this glitzy Bollywood kind of postcard featuring composite shots of the C.S.K. Memorial Hall in Taipei. Pretty stamps, too.

happy year of the ox

I made this New Year's card using an image off of an old ema from Tono and part of a Czech-Jewish children's rhyme from By Night Under the Stone Bridge, a magical novel of Prague by Leo Perutz. Happy Ox Year to all!

sticker love

Three-year-old Tuomas (and his mum) sent this "typical Finnish winter view" and lots of sticker love on the back of the card. It came in an envelope with the great stamps shown at top. I hope Tuomas likes what I am putting in the mail for him.

amy wilson

I picked this postcard, advertising a new show by watercolor artist Amy Wilson, up at the Hunterdon Art Museum. I was at the museum to see a show which is soon closing and had time for only a quick walk-through of Wilson's work, which incorporates text and mixed media.

het wijnhuis

A Dutch postcrosser sent this folksy card for the Grand Cafe named Het Wijnhuis (Wine House) in Zwolle.

fish bones

Another groovy postcard made from a lineoleum block print by Sandy Sapienza.

nancy middlebrook

Weaver Nancy Middlebrook sent this postcard to announce that she has a piece in a juried show opening soon at the Allentown Art Museum. Congratulations! The piece shown here is called Cinco de Mayo #1.

music queen

Sandy Sapienza sent this regal postcard, which she printed on antique paper using one of her lineoleum block designs.

the ox comes sailing in

This New Year's card arrived yesterday from my old post office in Ayaori, with a calendar put out by Japan Post. The calendar shows nostalgic images of Japan painted by Harada Taiji. A couple which feature mail carriers would make super postcards. Maybe even better, the calendar images are part of a stamp series which will debut in March. Please stay tuned!

ouro preto

A Brazilian postcrosser sent this postcard of Ouro Preto (Black Golden), a "masterpiece of Colonial Brazilian art & architecture" and a UNESCO World Heritage site. Good stamps, too.

good timing

What timing! This marvelous handmade postcard arrived today from a Chinese postcrosser with a little message about the new president, on the day he is inaugurated. The sender does not tell me where the photo was taken but she writes that the shopkeeper where she bought it took the photo and made the card. Timely greetings from somewhere in China....

railway journeys

My kind of ad card. Check the publication out at www.irtsociety.com.

Cloth & Paper Experiments

Sleigh Ride (experiment #1)
Couple (experiment #2)

Eiffel (experiment #2)

Jacqueline shared her techniques for making paper & fabric postcards a few blogs ago. I decided to experiment on my own. The Sleigh Ride represents my first pass, using an image from an old Russian postcard, printed from my cheap inkjet printer. That first batch was difficult because the inkjet ink runs when it gets wet. I had to work very quickly with matte gel, muslin and the print before the image washed away. I sprinkled fine white glitter over this card. This was one of the very few that didn't end up with an ugly crease running across from bubbles underneath the paper. "Couple" and "Eiffel" represents my second batch. This time I went to Office Depot to use their xerox machine to make copies of an old photo and postcard. It was much easier working with them because I didn't have a "bleed" problem. However, I still managed to get an ugly crease running down the Eiffel piece. For both images, I placed hairnets and airmail stickers over the image. After playing around with different materials to add to the composition, I decided that the delicate hairnets integrated well with the images. After the gel dried, I painted. The Sleigh Ride was the only one in the first batch that I painted in more than one color ink - yellow and indigo. Eiffel was painted with watercolors. The red heart at the bottom came out too faint so I added some red ink color to it. The couple was painted in watercolors. Once the paint dried, I painted over the couple with a wash of metallic bronze ink. I also painted over the second batch with matte gel but that was a big mistake. I covered the tops with wax paper and weighted the cards so they would be flattened but all that did was keep everything moist and unflattering. I ended up airdrying the cards. For more examples, see http://mrpotani.blogspot.com/.

shrinking mail service

It's Martin Luther King Day today and there is no mail. A bummer but it's a holiday. What's perturbing, though, is that the U.S. Postal Service has announced cuts in postal routes and changes in others. These moves are being made to pare expenses in the current recession, which has resulted in a marked decrease in mailings, hence revenues, generated by the finance industry. Here in the Lehigh Valley, five routes have already been eliminated and 84 others altered. More changes are on the way, including new faces among carriers. New people mean a lack of familiarity with the routes and the customers on them. For customers that means a lack of trust, which is the real bummer.

more year of the ox

My friend in the Ayaori post office sent this welcome greeting card for the Year of the Ox.

views of chemnitz

A German postcrosser named Sandra sent this cool card showing architectural impressions of her city of Chemnitz.

stamps galore

From top to bottom: Finland, Germany, Japan, Germany, and Japan. I uploaded them while listening to Mozart's Piano Concerto No. 9 in E Flat.

two from mrpotani

Mrpotani sent two postcards from her recent trip to Los Angeles. The top one, a true treat, shows PCH Sunset by Ed Ruscha, a work made with acrylic and pencil on lithograph on paper. The bottom features the LA airport, though Mrpotani and her husband drove down to LA.

year of the ox 2

A Chinese postcrosser named Yong-lin, who works in radio, sent this cute New Year's card and pretty stamp.