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Introduction - Anna Banana
Published in 1977 in VILE No. 6

Here we are at VILE 6, and as anyone who has seen previous issues can see, we're going through some changes. We've decided to drop the "LIFE-like" cover format because of the inevitable result if and when Time-Life discovered us. FILE went through it and did not come out the winner, and we see no point in fighting such a battle ourselves. It's hard enough to keep operating without taking on the corporate giants.

The size change, I believe, is an economy measure, but is Dot necessarily a fixed change. That is, by changing the dimensions of this issue, we are opening the door to experimentation in format; although my personal favorite is the 8 1/2 x 11 inch format.

With this issue, edited by Gaglione (1940-2040), we return to the 'theme' issue, in which all material included relates to a theme-in this case, women involved in Mail-Art. Visual poetry is the next theme edition waiting in the wings in hopes of a grant. Future editions edited by myself will probably continue to combine random art news, photos and works along with poetry and fiction because I like the mix.

Since we don't come out often enough (4 times per year) to gain any of the mailing or tax benefits available to 'regular periodicals,' we're feeling more inclined to make each issue a book unto itself, under the umbrella: VILE/ Dossier Editions, but with titles which relate to the content theme. Subscribers would receive two consecutive issues, whatever their theme and format.

This FE-MAIL ART issue, taking its title from a rubber stamp on a postcard by Pat Larter of Australia (see back cover), is not an art magazine in the literal sense, but rather an authentic dossier of documentation of an on-going process. Rather than sending out a mailer soliciting new material, the contents of this issue were gleaned from the bulging files of the P.A.M. (Postal Art Museum) and the Banana Archives located here in Dadaland, San Francisco, USA.

As we have said in the past, mail-art is largely a communications network amongst artists, and while some works are specifically conceived as mail-art pieces, such as the mailin shows, the quick-print little magazines, collages, artwork or photos, or add-to and send-on type pieces, a considerable amount of what gets sent is straight information on what that particular artist is doing in their local scene. Whatever the case, the artist extends his or her audience way beyond the local context by their involvement in the mail-art-network. It is a way of showing one's work that completely circumvents the gallery curator, schedule and commercial considerations. Of course it is not free, but with the advent of quick-printing techniques, a direct-mail audience of 100 to 500 is not beyond the budgets of many artists who have come to prefer a responsive, if distant audience to the fuss and bother of arranging a local show from which one may elicit no responses whatsoever!

As a woman artist who had been trying to flog a more conventional 'art product' (batik fabrics and hangings), mail-art was an exciting discovery. Through this medium at least, I was able to get response and interaction that I had felt lacking in my pursuit of recognition from more conventional art outlets. It soon became apparent to me that what I really wanted from my art was the response and interaction that the mail-art provided, and it wasn't long before I gave up the production of art objects which have to be shown and/or sold before I, as the creator, could feel I had connected or communicated with anyone through my work.

This isn't entirely true, as VILE magazine has become the product of my labors, but as a multiple, it is much more easily distributed and sold than a single length of fabric, into which I used to put the same months of labor.

Another factor which sank the mail-art hook even deeper into my modus operandi has to do with how easy it is to be assertive in this medium. Of course to create any art, one must assert oneself, it is impossible otherwise. But with conventional art productions, one is required to assert oneself twice-once to create the actual work, and secondly, to get that work into some situation where there is at least a potential of response to it. I always found that second part difficult and/or distasteful. One had to became a salesperson or representative of ones works. With mail-art works, once the creation is done, it is a simple matter of addressing and mailing. Of course one has to pay the postage, and there is very little possibility of making any money from such activity; but in my case, at least, it became clear that making money was not why I Idid art' in the first place, although I have never been adverse to getting money from such activity whenever possible.

I liked how the ratio of what I put out was balanced by what I got in-a marked improvement to me over the days of producing precious art objects-AND-I was getting in stuff I wanted! In 1971-2, the Banana Rag flourished, and I built a lot of connections through this publication. Then in 1973 came the move to San Francisco, and my introduction to more sophisticated techniques of production through a job with a commercial printer. FILE magazine, no doubt inundated with Quikkopy mail-art started getting both selective and snotty about the quality of works there were receiving and publishing. Understandably so, but none-the-less, their position inspired me to create VILE as an alternate sounding-board/reflector of what was going on in mail-art.

In five issues, we've come a long way ourselves, and have certainly become a lot more selective than we were in our initial issues-if for no other reason than the sheer volume of submissions-it is impossible otherwise. After doing the first three issues myself, I was happy that Gaglione (1940-2040) wanted to do an issue. His No. 2/3, the special Double International, was the first 'theme issue,'. with its focus on mail-art works from foreign artists. In No. 5 (Vol. 3 No. 2), I finally realized the level of technical expertise I initially aspired to, but with a mixed bag of postal and performance works, along with poetry and fiction, which comes not from the mail-art network, but from small-press, literary people, mainly through Len Fulton's 'International Directory of Little Magazines and Small Presses.'

This current issue is broken down into three major sections, Postal Art, Post-Card Art and Correspondence Art. The easiest to identify is the postcard, it being a long established format of which we have many proponents ranging from one of the founders of Berlin Dada, Hanna Hoch, through~contemporary mailers such as Angelika Schmidt, Irene Dogmatic, Pauline Smith, etc.

Born in 1889, Hoch was the only woman involved in the founding of the Berlin Dada group in 1918. She and Hausmann were among the first artists to use photomontage, for which her work is mostly noted. At 89, she is still an active artist, as the postcard on page 88 announces her 1976 exhibition at the Musee d' Art Moderne in Paris.

Angelika Schmidt is noted for her one-ofa-kind collages, in which she employs rubber stamps, while Irene Dogmatic's are mostly photomontages of herself in various identities, printed up in editions of 500. Dogmatic and Pat Tavenner (Mail Queen) did a number of collaborations in this format during the peak of Pat's involvement in mailing ('73-'75 approx.). Ruth Rehfeldt in East Berlin specializes in concrete/visual poems, and has employed the postcard as a means of distributing these works.

"Correspondence Art" is another easily described phenomena-letters, Some are written as communication, some purely as art, such as the letter by Marian Palla of Czechoslovakia, whose letter is to be seen on page 91. There are a number of more decorative letters, which also contain straight communications, such as that from Ms. Zazu Pitts, concerning the change of the name of the gallery which she jointly runs, Ms. Pitts. I haven't heard what the new name will be, but apparently prospective new members were not joining as 'Ms. Pitts' was considered to be obscene!

What we are calling "Postal Art" is everything that is neither a letter nor a postcard, but which we have received via the mails. Top on the list of items that are classified as postal-art, are those mail-art mags, quick-print editions of 100 to 300, on an 81/2 x 11 or 14 inch sheet, folded twice or four times-such publications as Irene Dogmatic's 'Star Spanieled Bonners,' 'Rover's Romances,''Canus Book of Dog Records,' 'Collected Barks,' etc., some eleven editions to date, in which the material was collected via the mail network; Lisa Baumgardner's 'Modern Girlz,' Rhoda Mappo's 'Road Map, and my own 'Sometimes Yearly Banana Rag.'

Next in this category are the invitations to participate in various mail-art shows and/or publications-such as 'The Money Show,' organized by Meredith Rogers of the Ewing Gallery at Melbourn University in Australia, the'California Dada' show held in Sidney's Sculpture Center-a collaboration between Betty Kelly, gallery curator, Terry Reid, glob-trotting art entrepreneur, and myself and Gaglione at this end. Ula Rbaczeh, founding member of CommonPress, is part of a group called Uni-Art, in Poland, who organized the 'Circle '77' show in November '77, and the 'Xmas Mail-Art Show' in December. 'SWANK' was a New Year's Eve mail-art show in San Francisco staged by Sabrina Ott and Ms. Elaine Neour. All mail received was opened on New Year's eve. Aside from these mail-art shows, there are mail-art works which involve persons responding to an initial mailing by an artist. Ashely Walker's MALE/ MAIL ART Show in Texas, January '78, is of this type.

'Second Coming' is the title of a purely postal-art work, which had its beginnings in Venice, where Jan Van Raay distributed 100 numbered postcards of her own design in postcard racks throughout the city. Each card was addressed to her home in New York City, and bore the following message tin English, German and French): "This is an art process. This card is free. Please return it (or a substitute) to the artist with any message. Thank you." On her return to New York, Jan did a xerox booklet of the 38 original cards that were returned, along with 9 other responses. The booklets were then mailed out to all participants.

Within these postal works, many mediums are employed, but one of the most consistently used, is the rubber stamp. Images as well as words are employed in this fashion, and these are used pictorially, decoratively or structurally in collages and letters. One artist who creates a great deal of her imagery through rubber stamps is Leavenworth Jackson, whose imagination brings forth whimsical and surrealist scenearios using rubber stamps and a few drawn lines. She has put out several limited edition books of these works, of which we have two printed editions, 'Perseverance Furthers,' and 'This is a BookBookBookBook ... etc.' which seem to be part of a series entitled 'Clown War 12-A, 12-B, etc." Formerly of San Francisco, Ms. Jackson has moved to New York, where she art directs Liberty magazine and still has time to have her works appear in the New York Times, Village Voice and various other periodicals.

Annette and Aart of the Stempelplats Museum (of rubber stamps) in Amsterdam have begun putting out a publication, 'Rubber,' which features works by whatever artist is currently having a showing of their work in the gallery.

Others whose works fall within the category of "Postal Art" are those who are engaged in 'body art' on the home front, but use the mails as a method of distribution. Cosey Fanni Tutti of COUM in England is such an artist, putting her own image in many contexts-in this issue, in a piece entitled 'prostitution, which caused quite an uproar in the English Art School where it was shown.

Irene Dogmatic is another body artist, creating photographic images of herself as a punk-rocker and general tough, 'lady bigfoot,' Wonder Woman, etc. Many of these images find their ways into her postcards, but she also distributes them as xeroxes, such as the photos on pages 19-20, and in her little mags, as mentioned earlier. While Ms. Dogmatic is currently pursuing an active role in the punk-rock movement, having formed her own band, she assures us that rather than abandoning her work as a painter, the punk-rock involvement has simply supplied her with more varied imagery for her paintings.

And what else could you call Ms. Pitts "Armpit of the Nation" show, but body art? .... whether or not you like it. Likewise, the photos in which Hissie, of Chicano Cinema appears, are definitely of the body-art variety, creating a scenerio through costume, make-up, lighting and dramatic arrangement. These are photos in and of themselves, rather than photos of a performance one might have seen. There was no performance, but rather a photo session in which the images were created.

Branching out from the breakdown of categories in this issue, I would like to speak more generally of the women who are represented, and of the sorts of things they are doing besides that which appears on these pages. Many, for example, are involved in the production and/or editing of publications large and small, creative and documentary. Amongst the better known of such women are those who were involved in Fluxus activities back in the 60's-such persons as Allison Knowles, whose books were published by Something Else Press, and whose "House of Dust" project is included in this issue; Yoke Ono who participated in the Fluxus kits-a sample page of which is to be found on our page 41-2; and Mieko Shiomi who assembled an international book of spacial poetry from contributions from the mail-art network. Of these women, the only one still known to us to be active as an art mailer, is Allison Knowles.

If it's information you want, the best allround source we know is Judith Hoffberg, with her new newsletter, 'Umbrella,' which spans the art and literary worlds with apparent ease and agility. A librarian and former editor of the Q 'ARLIS Newsletter,' and enthusiast for new developments in the field of books/art, Judith embodies the most unique combination of skills,knowledge and connections I have ever met. An insomniac and avid reader, she's in touch with what's going on in more circles than anyone I have ever met/read. The $12.50 subscription fee to her bi-monthly newsletter is a steal when you consider the concentrated shot of information it brings you.

Besides her activities as art/book information specialist, Ms. Hoffberg is also the instigator and co-curator of a gigantic show of artist's books-Artworks and Bookworks, shown at LAICA (Los Angeles Institute of Contemporary Art) from Feb. 27 through March 30/78. There are over 700 artists participating in this show, which will also be seen in San Francisco at the SF Art Institute, in New York at Artist's Space, and in New Orleans at the NO Contemporary Art Center. The latest word is that the show will tour Australia.

Another woman coming out of solid academia, with news of current activities, is Howardina Pindell, whose recent article "Alternative Space:Artists' Periodicals" appeared in the Print Collector's Newsletter Vol. VIII No. 4, Sept/Oct '77, detailing the explosion of artist's periodicals from the beginning times when the Futurists and Dadaists employed the printed medium, up to current works and times. It is understood that Ms. Pindell is in the process of expanding this article into a book on this subiect.

A regular newsletter of information on shows and performances is by Annette Baach of Koln, Germany, called Baack'scher Kunstaum, which covers activities in her gallery, and which is sent out on an international scale.

Those interested in archiving their works should keep in mind the following two archives: Jean Brown Archive in Tyringham Massachusetts, which collects early Dada, Surrealist and Fluxus material, along with contemporary postal works. Visits to this archive are limited and should be arranged in advance, by letter. Franklin Furnace is another archive of contemporary art publications, under the directorship of Martha Wilson. Located at 112 Franklin St., in New York, the archive is open to the public during regular business hours. The existance of these archives, along with a newish bookstore called Backworks, run by Barbara Moore, which stocks only Fluxus documentation and other early mail-art works, give evidence of the growing number of artists involved in publication as a medium of creative expression.

Other publications with women at the helm as editors, producers, publishers, either by themselves or with a partner or group, continue to proliferate. Sometimes they are oneshot efforts, such as Rabbit Pellets by Smart Sue, who, since her first effort, has dropped from sight. Others continue on a regular or irregular basis.Jeanie Black was among the early mail-art book collators, putting together several editions
of '8 x 10', an unbound portfolio of works in which the contributing artist sent in 200 copies of their piece(s), and Ms. Black collated, packaged and distributed the assembled works as editions of '8 x 10'. Another collation publication which is still in operation is 'Geiger'-a magazine of experimental poetry from Italy which is co-edited by Guilia Niccolai.

Beth Anderson of New York produces 'Ear' magazine on a monthly basis, covering news an experimental music, sound poetry, new music, video and all creative developments related to sound. 'Soft Art Press,' a quarterly mail-art magazine from Switzerland which reproduces postcards, rubber-stamps and mail-art notices, etc., is produced by Noemi Maidan.

Janet Schmuckal, of the Museum of Temporary Art in Washington D.C., is the editor, producer of 'Mota,' which covers activities in her gallery, and has eleven issues out to date. A new venture,'High Performance' magazine, is coming out of Los Angeles, under the editorship of Linda Burnham, dedicated to "providing a chronical of performances produced each year in Los Angeles and elsewhere, and as an exhibition space in which performance artists can present documentation of their works.''

Barbara Radice is the associate editor of DATA magazine, a slick international art magazine from Italy, which is bi-lingual (Eng. and Italian), and has a policy of running a feature story in each issue on art activities outside of Italy. For example, in their No. 26, there is a story on the Australian Biennial, and No. 27 features the California art scene in articles by Lynn Herschman and Carl Loeffler, both from San Francisco.

Another beautiful edition which has come out in the last year, is a catalogue to the show "Premiere Fete de la Lettre"-a visual poetry show in Paris held in November '76. Both an organizer of and contributor to the show and catalogue was Joan Rabascal, whose work appears on page 33.

La Mamelle's big International Rubber Stamp Show in April-May '76 would never have materialized without the enthusiasm and organizational work by Carol Law, herself into multiple images for years, including those made by rubber stamps. Besides organization and enthusiasm, Carol contributed an article to the show catalogue, and a number of works to the show. A long-time enthusiast of experimental media, Carol has participated in many mail-art shows utilizing black and white and color xerox technology.

Betsy Davids is another Bay Area artist involved with multiples. She and her partner Jim Petrillo of Rebis Press specialize in the publication of limited edition, fine art books, such as her own 'Bathtubby' which was also a performance piece), or Johanna Drucker's'As No Storm, or the Any Port Party.' Besides their unique books, which are truly 'art objects,' with their covers of wood or mylar or leather, Rebis publishes many comical and/or satirical broadsides, written by Betsy.

A newcomer to the women's publishing scene is 'HERESIES: A Feminist Publication on Art and Politics,' started in New York in 1977 by a collective of 23 artists and writers. Whether or not they will connect up with the mail-art network is yet to be seen, but they were in attendance at the first Associated Art Publishers Conference/Convention held in San Jose in October '77.

Another woman who has been consistently involved in the mail-art network in the past few years, is Pauline Smith, with her'Adolph Hitler Fan Club,' and more recent 'Corpse Club. Because of the controversial subject matter, she has been harrassed by British authorities, postal and otherwise. My view of her use of this theme is that it reflects what she sees happening around her, rather than it being a policy she advocates. Upon the occasion of a train wreck, caused by a bomb which split the cars open "like peeled bananas," Pauline sent a postcard with the headline to me, for my banana collection. A day or so after 'she mailed it, she returned home to find the British Bomb Squad ran-sacking her apartment in search of a 'bomb factory.' They found none, so left her alone with the mess. She has since moved and things seem to have quietened down, but not' Ms. Smith-her mailings keep coming.

In postal art, one is not limited by age, as the network has witnessed in the works of May Wilson of New York, who is still active in her 60's, and the works of Ms. Generality (Canada's answer to Mae West), who has likewise passed beyond the realms of postcards, stamps, rubber stamps and the likes. May Wilson is better known for her assemblages, rather than her mail-art, but that is probably because those works are more showable/saleable, while the mail-art is more a communications process for her-or at least, an art form which is given little recognition in the major art media.

There is no censorship in mail-art, except on the receiving end. What gets kept by other correspondents or collectors and librarians, depends a lot on their situation. Some keep everything, some recycle and send on, some edit and file ... but from the sending end, the whole thing is wide open.

Having expanded on the individuals in this issue, I find myself reflecting on what the overview reveals-that women have moved into the medium of publication, either on the smallpress level with general distribution within a limited audience, or on the even smaller level' of'quikkopy' artist runs, to put their work out specifically to those in the mail-art network. There is an over-lapping of works that are distributed in both circles, but generally those publishing at the small-press level are not directly involved in the mail-art network, although they may do a good deal of their sales and promotion via the mails.

The other overlap I've noticed is that of women whose performance works have found their way into this issue on the basis that they a) sent a notice via the mails, and b) are women. Such a show is "Art Action by Women" at the Target Gallery in Oakland, being put together by Jill Hoffman and Lucy Childs. The show will consist largely of women performers, but will have works by women on the walls, including a xeroxed edition of this issue.

Inclusion of these works demonstrates the diversity of mail-art, and of the women artists represented here, who seem to be aware of the dead-end of specialization, and who are determined to spread word of their local activities to a broader audience.

In fact, that seems to be what it's about for ALL who are involved-it's a reaching out to interested persons wherever they are. Persons who will appreciate and respond to one's works are much more stimulating for the artist than a passive public which doesn't understand or care.

Copyright © Anna Banana - a_banana@sunshine.net 
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