I Convocatoria de Mail Art Grupo Correos

Correos (the Spanish postal company announces its I International Mail Art Contest with an appeal to participate through artistic works created by people with Autism Spectrum Disorders, in collaboration to ASPANAES association, as a way to get the social involvement or their problems.

Topic: Children
Format and tecnique: Free
Deadline: September 30, 2013
The work should include: Name of the author, postal address and e-mail address
The works will be exhibited at: http://www.correosmailart.com and in a travelling exhibition in different cities of Spain.
To be sent to: 

ASPANAES

Apartado de CORREOS nº 1

15702 Santiago de Compostela

SPAIN

More information

Postcard from Malta

Sent by Martha (Malta).

I've ever been to Malta, and I've met only one Maltese woman so far. But this little country has always attracted my attention, and I suppose is because of its language, the Maltese, descended from Sicilian Arabic. The postcard shows St Paul's Cathedral in Mdina, the old capital. 

More Laughing Cows

More contributions to VQR Postal Project!

From Eric (France).

From Heleen (the Netherlands).

From Katerina (Greece).

From Mohammed (Oman).

From Mohammed (Oman).

From Mohammed (Oman).

From Raphael'L (the USA).

From Micu (Hungary)

Letterquette

I found this word here. It seems it isn't a common word, but I like it anyway. Letterquette refers to the rules we need to know before starting writing letters.

There are a lot of litterature about these rules, maybe one of the most famous books being Etiquette, of Emily Post (just the perfect name to write about letter writing...). But since I'm an snailmailer, I tend to believe there are not rules when it comes to write a letter. You just need to be kind and respectful. And not forget the motto: To get a letter, write a letter.

More Shakespearian Mail

Handmade postcard with quotation from Shakespeare's play Love's Labour's Lost.

Handmade postcard with quotation from Shakespeare's play The Taming of the Shrew.

Titania and Bottom  (c. 1790). Painting by Henry Fuseli featuring two characters of Shakespeare's play A Midsummer Night's Dream.

Claudio and Isabella (1850), by William Holman Hunt. The picture illustrates a scene from Shakespeare's Measure for Measure.

The postcards and the stamp on Hamlet sent by Laura (the UK).

More Shakespearian mail I have got: here and in the album.

I Wish You Fresh Koffie

Sent to Heleen (the Netherlands).

Also published here.

I Wish You a Good Coffee

I wish you a good coffee every morning
(and croissants if possible)

Little things made life just better

Sent to Dimitra (Greece).

Drawn envelope and collage made of a reused catalogue of hotels and stickers. For the project A wish for Greece. You can still send your contributions, until 1st November:

You are invited to participate in a Mail Art project entitled " A wish for Greece". As my country is going through a difficult time, I would like all Mail Artists to make a wish for Greece or express something through their art for all of us that we here. Maybe art can offer a little bit of hopethat something might change for the better!!! The least we can do is make a wish that this will happen!!!Theme: Your wish for Greece / Size: Free / Media: Free / Number of submissions: Free / No fees, no jury, no returns. / Deadline: November 1^st 2013. All entries will be displayed online: Send your mail art to:

Dimitra Papatheodorou

P.O.Box 3019

26005

Post Office of Gounari

Patra

Greece

Strange Cancellation

This is a strange way to cancel stamps, isn't it? 

Concert in A major per zebra i llop

Sent to Angela Caporaso (Italy).

Altered score with press cuttings and poems, for the project Aristicamente una partitura ('Artistically a mail art score'). Also published in the website of the project.

The lyrics:
1) Poem of Pere Quart written in Catalan: Zebra, pel desert corre la brama que no et saps treure el pijama (='Zebra, it is rumored in the desert that you don't know how to take off your pyjamas').
2) From Roald Dahl's Revolting Rhymes: As soon the Wolf began to feel that he would like a decent meal, he went and knocked at Grandma's (door)...

(Nedless to say I have no idea about scores and music.)

Postcards from Estonia

Sent by Maili (Estonia).

The map of the country.

Sent by Mart (Estonia).

The postcard shows Tallinn, the capital of Estonia. The old town of Tallinn is in the list of UNESCO Heritage Sites. I assure you it is worth visiting. There are a lot of interesting places like the St Catherine's passages featured in the postcard below.

Sent by Tuuliki (Estonia).

And this postcard (also sent by Mart) is really special because it inspired one of my trips (three years ago). As it had happened with Croatia! This is Kõpu lighthouse, in the Estonian island of Hiiumaa. It is one of the oldest lighthouses in the world, having been in use since 1531. Quite impressive! The stairs of this lighthouse are really different from the rest of lighthouses I've visited.

Incoming Letters, Outgoing Letters

«Os familiares da metrópole eram as cartas que vinham e iam [...] em papel muito fino preenchido com letras mal desenhadas que comiam linhas a mais, demos uma candeia de azeite ao Santo Estevão para trocar o sono do Manelinho, a prima Zulmira ficou noiva do Aníbal dos Goivos, os recos apanharam a maleita dos ciganos, o Zé Mateus vai ser crismado pelas festas da senhora da Graça, o tio Zeferino morreu do caroço que tinha na cabeça, a geada deu-nos cabo do trigo, cartas com muitos erros que levavam a pensar que na metrópole não havia a régua nem o caniço da professora Maria José, as primeiras linhas das cartas eram sempre iguais e quase sem erros, espero que esta vos vá encontrar bem de saúde, que nós por aqui bem, graças a deus.»

Dulce Maria Cardoso, O retorno

Round Postcards

Three round postcards sent by John (the UK) as contribution to the VQR Postcard Project.

Real Casa de Correos

This building is in the very centre of the city of Madrid (Spain) and its name is Real Casa de Correos ('Royal House of Post'). It was built in the second half of eighteenth century as the first big postal service centre in the country.

It has been used for military, administrative and governmental purposes along the years, and now it is the siege of the Community of Madrid Regional Government.

Snail Mail Hard Life

-La plupart des gens ne sont pas conscients
que la vie d'un SNAIL MAIL est si difficile...
-Mais je ne suis pas mécontent

Sent to Annick (France).

I do not remember how I discovered Annick's blog (Les enveloppes illustrées); through IOUMA, I guess. I fell in love immediately with her collection of snails, one of my beloved themes. So I immediately sent her a gang of snails...

Collage made of stickers, washi tape, rubber stamp (carved by me) and colour pencils. Below the envelope:

Also published in Annick's blog.

Canterbury

Postcard sent by Laura (the UK).

The University graduation procession through the cloisters of Canterbury Cathedral (the UK). I have received more postcards showing the cathedral of Canterbury. I am not sure, but I bet I own every single existing postcard about the cathedral of Canterbury issued in the last ten years. One of my best friends lives there, and she is a big lover of both cathedrals and postcards.

What makes special this postcard, in my opinion, is that is shows real life. This postcard has reminded me that this time last year I was spending my holidays in Liverpool (the UK). It was impossible to enter in the cathedral because of these graduations... (finally we did!).

More beloved views of Canterbury Cathedral (too much?):

At night

As I see the cathedral first time I visited Canterbury.

Eye-bird view

I think this is my favourite

Empty cloister

Todo por la música

Letter sent to Heleen (the Netherlands). Also published here.

Envelope made of a sheet of a calendar. It says Todo por la música (='All for the music'), but I wasn't succesful with the picture, sorry. Here the letter, with press cuttings of a cute animal orchestra I found in a magazine for teachers:

Get You Back to You

Sent by Laura (the UK).

Postcards made on an ad of Twinings. I just love the colours and, specially, the slogans.

Rana

Another frog Received from and sent to Eric Bruth (France), for his project Frogs of the world challenge. Also published here and here.

Romania

Sent by Medix (Romania).

This is the University of Agronomical Sciences and Veterinary Medicine in Bucharest. Universities are a beloved theme for postcards.

I was in front of this door in 1999. I remember the place exactly as in the picture. But I am sure I could not recognize the majority of the spots in the city...

Plusieurs fenêtres

Sent to Natercia Tomé (France).

Collage for the project Fenêtres. I used windows cut from a catalogue of hotels, and I also decorated the envelope with colour pencils. I like the collage, but I am not sure if the envelope is really nice or matches with the collage.

Natercia makes three mail art calls in her blog (les folles enveloppes): windows, benches and green.

Hi

Letter sent to M. Nidham (Oman).

Nice to See

It is always nice to read that people like the letters we sent...

Greek Postcards

I have only received two postcards from Greece so far:

Sent by Angela (Greece).

Sent by Dimitris (Greece).

The first postcard shows the town of Lesbos (Λέσβος), Mytilene (or Μυτιλήνη). The second features the daily life in an island of the Ionian Sea (Western Greece). I have never been to Greece (update!), but I always thought it must be not so different from my home town.

This and this have been favourited many times, among all the postcards I have sent trough the Postcrossing site. And they are not different from the Greek ones!

Sea Creatures on Stamps

Sometimes I wonder who (exactly) decides themes for stamps in each country. I do not know which theme I would choose if I had the chance of designing a stamp. But there are some themes which seem to appear in stamps from the whole world. For instance, fishes (?!). Suddenly I realised that I have received quite a lot stamps with fishes, and I wanted to show some of them here. Believe or not, I had my post ready before reading Viridian's suggestion for Sunday Stamps this week: Sea creatures.

From China

From Greece

From Japan

From Malaysia

From New Zealand

This is not exactly a sea creature, but I considered it was a interesting stamp to show here. It is a hei matau: a bone or greenstone carving in the shape of a fish hook. It is typical of the Maori people of New Zealand, and represents strength, good luck and safe travel across water.

From Philippines

From Philippines

From Poland

From Taiwan

From Taiwan