Rachel

From Rachel from the Netherlands these great drawings arrived, with greetings from Purmerend thanks to this friendly turtle.

And a Jellyfish:



some Octopus tentacles?



And a funny bird and sunny quotes on the envelope:



Thank you very much, hartelijk dank, Rachel, ben er heel blij mee!

Alex Witter

Collage / drawing of a Human being.

Created and sent by Alex Witter from the Netherlands.

Alex has a cool mail art project: Black and White. You can join and send your contribution before September. See for information and the address to where to send your mail art to at Alex' site.

Thank you very much, hartelijk dank, Alex!

Ruud Janssen (8)

Nowadays it seems that many people consider the digital world as the real world. So the time might be ripe to consider computers (and smartphones and so on) as living creatures, too!...?
Anyway, this artwork by Ruud Janssen looks very Human. A good alibi to post it here!

The, er, how shall we name him/her, came in an envelope, decorated by the General-President of the International Union of Mail Artists (IUOMA) himself. Such an honour!



And the front side pretty and interesting as usual. Thank you very much, hartelijk dank, Ruud!

Amuldo (5)

Happy New Year wishes from Amuldo!



A Bird, Cst, Llama, triangles and Christmas tree. They came in this great envelope:



And inside the envelope also a triangle,


which, when unfolded, shows this interesting call for mail art. Almost four weeks left before the deadline of Amuldo's TRAssshART project:



Thank you very much, hartelijk dank, Amuldo!

Ruud Janssen (6), Cavellini

I was pleasantly surprised and felt very much honoured when I opened Ruud Janssen's wonderful painted envelope.
Among nice sheets and ephemera he also sent me this sticker, showing a Cow. A special one: this one had been created by Cavellini, who gave this sticker to Ruud in 1991.

On the envelope Ruud added a matching postage stamp:



I can't remember having seen Cavellini's Cow before, but I must have been unconsciously inspired by the shape of this cow when I created my own Cow recently. Later I learned of Rocola's Bull stamp, but that is a different one.

Thank you very much, Ruud, hartelijk dank voor deze bijzondere verrassing!

Ruud Janssen (5)

Last year there was a 'Big Draw' event in the Amsterdam Rijksmuseum, where we had the opportunity to draw after real models. Among them there was Ina, who wore a large green dress, and I drew her a few times. One of these drawings I turned into a postcard, to send out to other mail artists. The title of the drawing is 'What or whom is she staring at?", and I hoped my colleague mail artists would add their ideas to and pass on or returned. And they did!

This addition has been created by Ruud Janssen. He got this Cow stamp from Robert Rocola. Great to see what she is seeing. Thank you very much, hartelijk dank, Ruud, for sharing with us!

You can see more additions, by various mail artists, in the 'What or whom is she staring at?'-IUOMA group.

Louiza

Gisteren kwam ik de jonge kunstenares Louiza tegen. Zij tekende voor mij dit bijzondere dier. Dat verzot is op wortels.
Mooi getekend! Dankjewel, Louiza!

Yesterday I happened to meet the young artist Louiza. She is seven years old and she drew me this beautiful wonderful animal. An 'eenvarwor', and as you can see this animal is fond of carrots.

Pepijn de Jonge (2)

Few months ago I received wonderful artwork by Pepijn de Jonge.

And now I am surprised by another piece of mailed art, including a very original drawing of an extraordinary - and musical - animal. Who is wishing all of us a happy 2016!



Thank you very much, dankjewel, Pepijn!

Snail Mail Snails - 2015

Today is 21-12, which means the last '21st' of this year. Time flies...
Also 21-12 usually means the shortest day and longest night of any year.

About one year ago I sent Mail Snails to several mail art friends to wish them a Happy 2015.
I've sent these on postcards, to keep it that way or to colour, and to keep or to send it to whoever they wanted to send it to.

To my surprise I received some of them in return, via snail mail or email, and I love the way all artists added their 'handwriting' to the Snail Mail Snails!
Also a few mail artists, who hadn't received an original card, printed the snail and coloured and sent them.
Thank you very much, all of you!

The one above not only was coloured by FinnBadger, but also has been turned into an envelope. Which I think so suitable: FinnBadger has a mail art blog on Envelopes!

Here some other great contributions:


From Bruno Chiarlone


From Suus in Mokum


From Ana Marta Austin


From Dean (here in process)


From Katerina Nikoltsou


From Richard C.

Thank you very much!

P.S. I've received a few more coloured Mail Snails, but in the past year some of them crawled away to some hidden place. I'll post them as soon as I'll have found them back...

Nico van Hoorn (6)

This atmospheric picture arrived in time for Halloween, but I just was a little late in posting. As I have not been growing up with this celebration I didn't know exactly what day it would be (now I know). 'Halloween' is introduced in our low lands since a few years, and it seems to become common. Although many (elder) Dutch, me included, consider this a commercial and americanization thing.
But I have received more pieces of Halloween mail art, also from countries where it is commonly celebrated. From Thom Courcelle I learned that 'All Hallow's Eve' is more than 'trick or treat' (see for instance this blog post and this one - I received this mail from Thom, too), and that it has a long history, also according to wikipedia, and there are even Gaelic and Welsh (so: European) roots.
And little by little I am starting to see the good, interesting things in it. For example this picture!

You might ask 'Why is this posted on an Animals blog?', but I can reassure you. There is a Human person flying on a broomstick, and perhaps you cannot see it, but there is a black cat on this broomstick, too.
In the woods you can (or cannot) see Bats fluttering, and behind the Pumpkin there's a Spider. Among the trees there are even more Spiders, with itchy spiderwebs. And in the trees the Owl howls, so do the (Were)Wolves in the back. Can you see and hear them now?!



Nico added some of his famous abstract / constructivism art.



Thank you very much, Nico!

Nico van Hoorn (5) & Jaap-Aap (3)

Some months ago I bought my very first Instax camera. I still didn't try it, and then suddenly Real Instax photos landed in my mailbox. The senders being no one less than Jaap-Aap and Nico van Hoorn!

The postage stamp was a special one, too: showing Bob Bear, one of Jaap's and Nico's friends.



Here are more great Instax pictures, showing some other friends:





And a print. I feel spoiled!



Thank you very much, hartstikke bedankt, Nico en Jaap-Aap!

Pepijn de Jonge

Pepijn de Jonge is a Dutch illustrator whom I got to know via Instagram.
He has published several books and went from the Netherlands to Vienna by foot.
He is creating a great serie of atmospheric illustrations for a book-to-be (please let him know if you happen to be or know a book publisher! :-) ), named 'A Concert for the Moon'.

He surprised me by sending this drawing, which I think is part of that serie.

On the envelope he added this nice artistamp:



Thank you very much, superbedankt, Pepijn!

Annabel Magan

Awesome cat drawings by Annabel Magan from the Netherlands!

I felt even more honoured when I opened this envelope and saw this drawing of a famous rock singer Annabel had sent to me (guess who - I think it is clear for the 30+ among us, or for the 30-minors too, as this singer and her band are coming to the Netherlands for a concert this year, exactly in a month).



Annabel has created many great line drawings, which you can see on her IG account.
I did not know that she also designed other kinds of illustrations until I saw this 'Mik in West' design on this map which she included also. No need to say that I feel double, no, triple lucky, as I always like to see drawings of animals (including men) and love maps, too! Thanks a lot, super bedankt, Annabel!

Zahra

I am very pleased to have received this beautiful and original pen drawing by Zahra from the Netherlands. There are a lot of hidden treasures in this picture. The Butterfly and the heart are clear. But did you notice a snail (intended or not - I love it!)? And words, in different alphabets?

Zahra wrote that this is her first work of art, but I'm sure she has made many more art work in previous years, so this might be the first official one. I'm happy and feel honoured to have received this one, and am looking forward to seeing more of her drawings!

Thank you very much, hartstikke bedankt, Zahra, ben er heel blij mee!

Frank (from Nijmegen)

I was wondering whether I would post a regular postcard here or not. In fact, the drawing itself concerns a regular (printed, bought) postcard, made by Johanna Basford, issued in 2014 by Thoth Publishers. But the colouring has been handmade by a good friend, so I decided: Yes!

Frank and I played guitar in Below the Mole in the late eighties. Below the Mole was an important band in the Nijmegen music scene (although almost no-one knows that :-) ). We started with two guitars and drums. A bass player joined only after years. We existed for 4 years, until our drummer Rob left to Amsterdam, and in those years we had 10 public concerts in total.
Below the Mole was an underground band, not only musically seen but also literally: we rehearsed below the (former) Post Office near Nijmegen Central Station. Alas this post office and the cellar rehearsal rooms don't exist anymore.
However, to my surprise the concert hall Doornroosje has been moving last year to this location. As many others do, I'll miss the old, cosy Doornroosje and its former location. In those days I've put a lot of footsteps there, volunteering at concerts and by drawing concert flyers (and did the typography, in a pre-computer era!). And I gained some hearing loss by the noise (be warned if you enjoy music, too!).
Post Office, rehearsal rooms, concert hall.. Maybe the circle should be full this way.

So this postcard not only reminds me of the good times we shared - Frank, Rob, Arnold (and temporary Miesjel) were more than family to me - but also gives me the opportunity to share a tiny little postal and pop history of one of my favourite cities, Nijmegen.



Frank sent me this card last week for my bithday (good day to not send it on my birthday itself, because that is not a public day :-) and he added that this alas isn't a Mole. Never mind, I think it great (and will share a coloured version of our logo below). Thanks a lot, dankjewel, Frank!



Nijmegen Central Station in 1977. The (now disappeared) large building on the right was the former Post Office.



Some BtM songs:
Blue Hour
Turquoise Cloud
An evening at night (featuring Miesjel)

Miranda Vissers (2)

The Chameleon always is an amazing lizard, by it's ability to change colours.
Miranda Vissers created an even more amazing Chameleon. Or would it be a 'Butterflies Animal'?

Thank you very much, dankjewel, Miranda!

Nico van Hoorn (3) & Jaap-Aap (1)

Recently I drew the two famous fellows Jaap-Aap and Edmund, and sent it to Jaap-Aap and Nico van Hoorn.
And very soon after, Nico sent me Jaap-Aap's kind reply: a view inside of the Personal Photo Album of Jaap-Aap!



With a nice portrait / whole body picture.



And Jaap-Aap standing in an amazing watery landscape! Fortunately the Bear didn't notice nor ate Jaap-Aap.



Jaap-Aap watched an interesting Bird...



...And did his own laundry!



He also appeared to be an experienced operator of the mixing panel (I was not sure whether Jaap-Aap was mixing sounds or mixing lights, or both, or if he was operating the railway logistics, but after some investigation I found out that Jaap-Aap was making Radio!)



Meanwhile I could enjoy a picture of a pictogram, a person pushing the pedestrian's traffic light button.



And Jaap-Aap started to create Art.

Thank you very much, Jaap-Aap and Nico, hartelijk dank!