April first and no foolin’ around: today kicks off National Card and Letter Writing Month! Fire up those fountain pens and get your postage in order: you have thirty days (that’s all of April!) to celebrate.
In the third grade, I was taught cursive writing by Mrs. Hall. I’ll spare you the details of being a little kid left hander (yeah, they tried to “change me over’ to right-handedness…) but suffice to say that learning cursive at an early age helped me later on. How so? Well, my best friend and I developed our own alphabet/code based on our newly-minted knowledge of cursive; passing notes in Mrs. Hall’s class became more fun than ever!
I’m always turning to interesting letterforms for inspiration; luckily, there’s a steady stream of contemporary calligraphers such as Thomas Ingmire and Fung Ming Chip who serve as sources of amazement. It’s a good (lesson (in design and skill) that is often overlooked: pattern, form, and repetition are some of the best teachers.
So what am I up to for National Letter Writing Month? Well, in addition to the usual mail art making-and-sending schedule, I’ll be trying my hand at a couple new techniques…
…most notably, edge bordered stationery! Has anyone else tried this out? I imagine it’s a relatively simple process; in the video below, our friends at Crane and Co. make it look absolutely effortless! I’ll give it a whirl, and report back to RLD readers; perhaps you’ll see the fruits of my labors in YOUR mailbox!
Additionally, I have a brand new typewriter that I’ll be figuring out:
…and I’ll be brushing up on my sketching skills for a project which shall (for now) remain nameless. There are postage stamps (of a sort) involved, as well as PVA glue and exacto knives.
What will YOU be up to, for National Letterwriting Month? Is there a project you’re spearheading or an idea you’d like to share? If so, let us know in the comments!
In all things postal –
–JH
Wow and it is National Poetry Month also! Two of my favorite things poetry and letters. So, I have a few plans brewing to combine the two—-poetry and the post! thanks for all the inspiration!
Cathy —
And I think this month also celebrates haiku in some way, but I can’t quite remember how, off the top of my head…
–JH
I will be writing and over due letter to D’s cousin, she was so nice to write and I haven’t had the time but I will make it this month. That video reminds me of my short stent as front desk at a high risk mortgage company before the crash, yes, at one point I was part of the problem and didn’t even know it. All I can tell you is go WITH the grain. lol Can’t wait to see how it turns out.
Miss Rose —
HA! “going with the grain” is the mantra for so many things in my life, not just books and bookbinding! 🙂
–JH
Hinchcliff you the best-and even a very decent art-ist!
in the mail from me asap-
PUTIN ON THE RITZ…
have you seen my taking(s)on the wondraful Clintons?
since im now know as an ANTI-WAR mailartista-look for me in
your letter box
auf wieder sehen
Prinz Otto Sherman
They both make it look so easy! I really want to edge border everything now.
Seven Hens —
IKR?! One of us should perfect the technique (or at least learn it) and then share with the Co-op… 🙂
–JH
Happy April and Letter Writing Month! That edge border thing seem like a great op to mess up A LOT of envelopes to me… 😉 But pretty if you manage it. I’m making postcards for the postcard swap I’m arranging this month.
I think this spring is my mail art time!
[…] « no joke! april is national letter writing month… […]
Greetings Jennie-
I’m very new to the party. My activities this month are: 1) I’ve discovered this genre officially (with half the month gone already), while having been a creator of individual & one-off Cinderellas for a very long time and not knowing a) they have a name and b) there is a community of aficionados of mail art; philately I knew about… and now a door has been flung open to a whole new world!
2) I shared my discovery and inspired a friend to identify, acknowledge, and locate a piece of previously received happy mail and appreciate it all over again. Most interestingly, there was a funny typo in the name on it that was not previously recognized, so…
3) I requested a piece of mail art be created & sent from the typo’d-named individual to myself, with a stamp from the muscle cars series that depicts (very nearly) my own first car. Yay!
4) Had a conversation with daughter about mail art & James Cline; she said her friend – they went to art school together – is going to Burning Man this year so I asked daughter to ask her friend to find Mr. Cline and send me mail art from the event bearing the cancellation of their post office – so something to look forward to is in the works.
5) I created some Cinderellas just for daughter bearing our own special term of endearment.
6) I’m busy creating a correspondence kit of large stationary for daughter’s friend, to assist her artistic endevours @ said BM event; 24 envelopes made of sketch paper and 24 blank cards for her & her friends to use (inspired by the blog post on the correspondence kit provided @ the Smithsonian’s Nat’l postal museum opening event, through which I found this genre, your SF event, your blog & of course your book & you; YAY!). I’ll request a series of 6 or two series of 3 for daughter & me from artsy friend…the rest are intended to be a nice gift of incentive for completing the request. I’m considering making a bank journal for her to fill & keep from the event to complete the kit. Artsy friend lives in Washington state, so you may meet her @ your next Ex Postal Facto event, I’m WRITING HER A LETTER to link her up to the blog posts about the 2013 event for references on mail art & James Cline.
7) I met PostMuse on an on-line art community site, and saw her photo later in the post about the Smithsonial opening, where you were also featured …so I checked her bolg out also. Her ‘adopt an orphaned postcard’ project interests me, so I requested 3 postcards. As soon as they arrive I’ll pen a personal anecdote about the places on the cards, buy some beautiful stamps, and send all on their way to her pronto.
8) I bought a set of postcards to send to PostMuse for inclusion in her project.
9) I noticed a request for submissions to a local art show…I think I’ll either create & enter a piece of enormously oversized mail art with the biggest Cinderella I’ve made yet, or decorate the largest mailable envelope (having just bought a nearly full box of 12″x15½” gold clasp daddies at a thrift shop for next-to-nothing recently without a reason at the time 😉 and send it in. Whichever I decide to do, it’ll be addressed to MAIL ART LOVERS, of course.
Though not totally specific to letter writing, I’m having good fun with the concept of mail this month…I can’t thank you enough for asking!
PS…Correction: it’s the 2014 EPF event link(s) that I’ll send to Artsy Friend, in which James Cline is featured…*thanks* Jennie, for having him on your panel & making the videos available, and also for including his photo in full Burning Man Postal Regalia.