REVIEWS: INTERNATIONAL

Mario Ishikawa, Torneio Democrtico, 1980, photocopy, polyptych with six parts, each 13" x 8".
12 4

BATALHO DE TELEGRAFISTAS

reased, stamped, taped, and Xeroxed, the works

in this exhibition of mail art arrived at Galeria
Jaqueline Martins like messages from the distant past. Since the 1950s, beginning with American
artist Ray Johnson, a pioneer in the genre, artists have
been sending work around the world, sometimes in the
form of exchanges between individuals, but more often in response to calls for submissions on particular
themes.
Send your contribution as soon as you can. No deadline, no limits, read one such call, displayed in this show
of under-the-radar art. Works in the exhibition ranged
from Moyra Daveys 2013 folded, stamped, franked, and
posted photographs of a model of the Museu de Arte de
So Paulo, to Xeroxed and original pieces from the archives of Brazilian artists Gasto de Magalhes, F. Marquespenteado, and Luis Guardia Neto.
In some of the works, addresses and stamps were
used to lovely effect, as in the 1970s correspondence

of Mario Ishikawa. In FedEx Medium Kraft Box 2004

FEDEX 155143 REV10/04 BP, Standard Overnight,
Los Angeles-New York trk#798399701913, May 1516, 2012, Standard Overnight, New York-Los Angeles
trk#793880921605, August 8-9, 2012, International Priority, Los Angeles-Sao Paulo trk#770402083028, June 24- ,
2014 (2012), a contemporary piece by Walead Beshty,
a large copper cube, sent unpackaged and unprotected
from the United States to Brazil, shows all the dents
and scratches left by its global peregrinations.
Other works concerned themselves with censorship.
A set of 1988 faxed photos by Edgard de Souza, faded
by time, show a naked man in classical poses. In Almandrades Psiu! (1973), made during Brazils long military
rule, a sealed envelope held to the light reveals a single
word printed on a card inside: psui (shhh). From the
vantage point of our own age of Internet surveillance,
fast-fading faxes and gummed envelopes suddenly
CL AIRE RIGBY
looked like good ideas.

COURTESY THE ARTIST AND GALERIA JAQUELINE MARTINS, SO PAULO

GALERIA JAQUELINE MARTINS, SO PAULO

JULY 4 - AUGUST 16

NOVEMBER 2014

Untitled-3 2

10/8/14 2:50 PM