Dateline: 1991-1992
“The Land The People 500 Years Later” was a 1992 postal art exhibit, open to artists worldwide. The exhibit offered an alternative narrative to the official ongoing Quincentennial celebrations.
I had no idea what to expect when the call was issued. I typed up a press release, made copies and mailed them off to colleagues and various publications.
Sending things in the mail is an act of faith of course. Artist friends and I used to send off things to one another, a shoe, a banana, toast. Anything that we could put a stamp on - write the address in ink see what happened. The wild part is almost everything made it through - even the toast - albeit in a special postal bag.
For this exhibit I was delighted to receive works from dozens of artists around the world. Going to the mailbox was an adventure. Magazines, posters, stickers, original works of art and slides arrived as the deadline approached. The work was organized on poster boards then exhibited throughout 1992. Local cafes, art spaces and businesses lent their window spaces for temporary exhibits. Friends and I reproduced and distributed works in "zine" form and mailed out to all the project participants.
The slide show component of the exhibit was shown during local events throughout 1992 and 1993. The show was shared by myself, and colleagues in a number of cites. We distributed materials via the postal service. Each image neatly organized into slide pages with notes. The show would be exhibited then passed onto the next person on the list. Somewhere along the way it vanished.
Documenting this body of work has been interesting. I found an old slide projector, cleaned it up and took digital images of slides. (They didn’t turn out as nicely as hoped so I'm looking for new options.) Once I can find them, the slides themselves are in fairly good shape, a few of the cardboard frames needed repair. The first half of my career was documented in slides, newsprint and photographs. Transferring all of these materials to a digital format is an extended process. My plan is for all of my archives to eventually become part of various larger collections.
Images include a mix of drawings, paintings, collage and text art by; Ernest Victor, Rabascall, Rogelio Lopez Cuenca, Roberto Bedoya, Karen Atkinson, Michael B Schwartz, Guillermo Deisler, Huna and Bruno Capatti and others.
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