Mail art

Mail art is an art movement founded on the principle of sending small works through the postal service, so that the post becomes both a means of distribution and a part of the work itself. Participants exchange postcards, collages, stamps, drawings, small objects and conceptual messages, forming a global informal network of collaboration beyond galleries, the market and curatorial control. The origins of the movement are associated with the American artist Ray Johnson, who in the late 1950s began the mail exchanges that later became known as the New York Correspondence School. Mail art flourished in the context of Fluxus and the Conceptualism of the 1960s and 1970s, attracting artists with the idea of democratic, accessible and anti-commercial exchange. It played an important role for artists in countries with limited creative freedom, including behind the Iron Curtain, where the post allowed contact with the international community. Mail art stresses process, communication and network rather than the unique precious object, and is regarded as a forerunner of the networked art of the digital age.