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> contents / Art is stamps / Guy Bleus / 1 During their whole life some artists or networkers have been
obsessed by specific artistic medium - as to me a painting, a photograph,
an installation, a performance, an artistamp, etcetera are nothing more or
less than opportunities to hold a concept, forms to contain substance or
content, incarnations of ideas- from a philosophical point of view i was
always fascinated by the essence of things - what are the conditions
"sine qua non" to indicate a certain thing - for instance, what
"is" an artistamp? - what are the necessary attributes and what
can be missed? - is this text an artistamp?- certainly not- but why? - are
the perforations, the glue or the dimension the necessary conditions? -
the question of definition is not as simple for an artistamp as it is in
the case of "art" - the paraphrase of a statement by don judd:
"if somebody calls it an artistamp, than it is an artistamp" may
sound good, but it doesn't work. Perforations & glue: not every "perforated" image or
object can be called an artistamp - & not every "gummed"
image is a postage stamp- even the combination of the two doesn't please -
since some artistamps are gummed & not perforated, others are
perforated & not gummed. A postage stamp or an artistamp is "meant" to be sent -
therefore the (hidden) "intention" is the point at issue, is the
quintessence of an artistamp- artists'stamps are a part of communication
art and/or mail-art- but the meaning is in the use- for instance, using
artistamps for fax communication is rather meaningless- because electronic
mail art doesn't need a postage stamp- unless the meaninglessness (of the
artistamp in this context) is the (new) meaning. It's a platitude to say that postage stamps are the most distributed
works of art in the world- everyone can buy these little multiples - in
plastic arts (from dada to post-neo-dada) postage stamps have been used in
collages, assemblages, etc. - also ex-libri can have the "shape"
of a postage stamp- maybe ex-libri are related to Books, as artistamps are
related to philately. Philately is not an artistic activity- mostly it is a kind of
investment: collecting monetary values- yet the postage stamp as a postal
value is an anachronism (probably maintained by philatelists)- on the
other hand the artistic & intrinsic values of the postage stamps are
not explored completely- the research of the correlations between postage
stamps & artistamps, between creative philately & artistamps, new
horizons can emerge. As far as I can remember my first artistamps were the futuristic
"interplanetary" postage stamps, meant for the use of the
autochthons of the planet mars and the visitors or tourists from earth- I
designed these postage stamps during the period that the question
"whether there is or isn't life on mars" was a very hot issue-
that was in 1977 when I also designed the identity cards of the red
planet- on the postage stamps of mars there was the image of the greek god
of war,"mars" the second series of mars-artistamps had the
capital letter "m" it was the same emblem as the "m"
during a Belgian promotion campaign for milk. i've never made a complete list or chronology of my artistamps - but
maybe it's a good idea to do so some day- the first artists'stamps that
have been called the "miniature paintings" did never really
interest me - since reduction is not a technical problem anymore, I don't
see (for myself) the need to work on such a small basis - I admire the
devotion of these miniaturists but I can't see meself as a medieval monk -
likewise I never really liked in the mail-art network the colorful
postcard or artistamp reproductions of paintings or collages above the
aesthetic aspects I prefer the conceptual elements of an artistamp - the
use and misuse of the artistamp concept in the process of communication. The artistamps I liked the most to make were my "scents
stamps" in the late seventies & early eighties - it were perfumed
postage stamps and artistamps - or postage stamps and artistamps to be
perfumed by the receiver or addressee - together with Vittore Baroni, we
made the "gloomy-scent stamps series (for best results scratch and
sniff in total darkness)" - they were published by near the edge
editions (sheet b&w n.1/1983) - the perfumes added a new and
unexpected direction to the artistamp communication. Another series that I appreciated were the artistamps to write a
complete letter on - the artistamp as the container of the whole
information : "write your letter on this stamp" - so the
envelope became useless - the only thing one needed to post was the
postage stamp - it is a pity that this artistamp couldn't be issued by the
bel Postage stamps have often played an important role in my
performances - E.G. The destruction of full sheets of postage stamps &
artistamps, real identity cards and real Belgian money via a paper
shredder - meaNwhile, I was wearing a suit of authentic Belgian paper
money (of 5o francs) that I removed and set on fire - the performance During another performance in 1986 I was wearing a complete suit
made of official Belgian postage stamps (50 cents value) - I cut my
moustache in the shape of an angular artistamp - enlargements (a3
photocopies) of Adolf Hitler's moustache were hung on a wall and covered
with postage stamps - it is an historical mistake to believe that hitler's
moustache was real - it was fake, because it "was" a postage
stamp - one can verify it through a magnifying-glass - then the hair on my
upper lip was shaved and replaced by a real postage stamp - like hosts,
postage stamps were placed under the noses of the public - after this, I
covered a naked girl with strips of postage stamps - the strips looked
like feathers - from the photographs taken during this performance, new
artists'stamps were made & sent through the mail-art network. Destroying to create - since the early seventies I love to tear to
shreds official (cancelled & uncancelled) postage stamps from all over
the world - at first to make collages, later on to create with the tiny
paper pieces new artistamps - a series of these artists' stamps was edited
in 1988 - I do the same activitity with official For the hungarian project "world art post" of artpool
(Budapest) i used an earlier concept (april 1981) of a performance where i
was stamping my own body - so the idea was that i myself (= the image on
the artistamp) cancelled the artistamp - in other words, it was the
ultimate act: the artistamp that is cancelling itself Until today i curated three artists'stamp exhibitions - the first
one "philately and mail-art" in "de media" in Eeklo in
1986 - the second one "kunstenaarszegels" was held in "Il
Ventuno" in Hasselt in 1988 - the third one "the artistamp
collection" in the Begijnhof, Centrum voor Kunsten in Hasselt in
1995. A fascinating phenomenon of the conceptual aspects of artistamps is
synchronicity - mail artists or networkers living thousands of miles from
one another and having at the same moment the same idea to realize a
specific artistamp - it is always a pleasure to search all these
resemblances and coincidences in the catalogues of artistamp projects. When a work of art becomes the subject of a postage stamp or an
artistamp, this means an official or semi-official acknowledgement that it
is well respected art - so there is no doubt about it : art is (postage)
stamps, art is artistamps! |
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