On the Ides of March, while we were holed up in South Georgia, Mark and I received an invitation from Pulp Gallery to participate in an online art exhibit.
It was not curated or juried, everyone was welcome to participate and would feature envelopes as the art form which must arrive at the destination through the mail. Deadline, May 13th.
Sounded like fun and so up Mark’s alley where he was drawing pandemic postcards daily. True to form Mark whipped out a couple of great envelopes within an hour, filling them with copies of the pandemic cards and a small donation for the gallery and dropped them into the mail. Done.
True to my form I pondered the idea. The bottom line was that the submission must be mailed. I walked around the idea, procrastinating until May 6th when I sequestered myself in my studio and gave it a try. I opened up a legal-sized envelope as a pattern, pinned it to the leg of an old pair of jeans, and cut.
Jean envelope back
Pulp gallery envelope
Pulp Gallery
An aside- I collect old jeans. I do so because I repair my own and other people’s jeans. It was one of the first ways that I made money from my sewing machine. I was 18 and at home with a new baby, married into a construction crew who were constantly wrecking their jeans- with both wear and tear. At a buck a patch I cleaned up and became a bit of a hero. Loved making my own money.
So, back to the present, I spread out my options, taking a pocket here and a belt loop there. Assembling, ripping out, redoing until I had it- an American made, 100% authentic, upscaled denim envelope. Embroidered the address on the front. Sewed on a Levi’s patch for the stamps. Took it to the Post Office and out it went.
Subsequently, I created a few more envelopes. Two oversized versions of ink paintings I’d made in Georgia, a box from announcements for a show at the Big Red Frame. I started putting things into my envelopes- feathers from the beach, a pair of dice earrings, a photo of a quilt made long ago. Moral of the story- Take the opportunities that present themselves and always push the edge of the envelope.