AMAZINGStory ofThe

TheshoppingTrolley

gallery

As It boldly goeswhere no art galleryhas gone before

EMANATIONS

FLUXUS

This is the true story of my ShoppingTrolley Gallery and of my mailart activities from 1996 to2011,although somewhat simplified.For instance only general photos ofthe exhibitions are shown and notindividual art pieces as I wouldhave preferred because it is notpossible to include all of them andto choose some over the rest iscontrary to the principles of MailArt. Those of you who practise MailArt know this, of course, but forthose who are new to it here is ashort explanation.

The beginning of Mail Art is usuallyattributed to Ray Johnson, an USAartist of the sixties who used to sendhand made postcards to his friendsunder the umbrella of

Before himthere is the precedent of Vincent vanGogh’s illustrated letters to hisbrother Theo, as has been done byunaccountable anonymous and forgottenletter writers who never consideredthemselves artists, let alone Mail

Artists.

Anyhow, since the sixties, Mail Art has developedrapidly as an art movement with underground characteris-tics. It consists of the exchange between artists ofany artwork that can be posted and it is not bound bythe current convention or fashion of the establishedart world or even the avant garde of the moment. Theart is not for sale and it is usually shown inunconventional places, rarely in galleries. Mail Artexhibitions are never competitive and the art work isnot selected, every submitted piece is always shown.Mail Art can take many forms; postcards, books,videos,etc .The artwork can be hand or computer made.

Anybody can participate; a degree in art is notnecessary. In my web site, www.mailartmartha.org.uk,there are links to other sites that list invitations toparticipate in many projects.I hope to see you in the post.

F.I.S.T.A.S.THE FIRST INTERNATIONAL

SHOPPING TROLLEY

ART SHOW

In an era in which theavant-garde is well andtruly part of the galleryestablishment, when theoutrageous fails to shockbecause it has becomecommon place and whenhermeticism reigns su-preme, the first show ofthe Shopping Trolley ArtGallery was unusual andrefreshing.

The artwork that coveredthe sides of the trolleywas of consistent highstandard and on the wholefrankly accessible. Theartists who produced thiswork do not wish to beisolated, preferring toenter into open debatewith their public. Theseare the true rebels oftoday.

Review of the opening night

show by Geoff Stoker.

...and the FISTAS artists too.In Cork Street, London

WINTER1996-97

Sixty-one artists repre-senting twelve countriesresponded to the invitation. Of these a thirdchose to comment on theactivity of shopping al-though the theme had beenleft free. A wide varietyof media was employed, fromstamp art to computergraphics, passing throughwatercolours, photography,printmaking,constructionsand collages with imagesand experimental poems.

1996-97The Not At All PrivateView took place on the21st of December, 1996 inThe Glades, Bromley TownCentre, South London. Theshopping mall was atits busiest with lastminute Christmas shoppersand the exhibition wasseen by an estimated20.000 people in the twohours it was on show.

During January and February1997 the trolley-gallerywent around Beckenham HighStreet, in its normal roleof carrying the weeklyshopping. In London the 1stISTAS was parked in theforecourt of the RoyalAcademy of Arts where itwas seen by plenty ofpeople.

It visited, without previousappointment, the Institute ofContemporary Arts where itwas temporarily confiscat-ed. It was also wheeled upand down Cork Street, nearPicadilly, in front of someof the most exclusive galler-ies in town.

1996-97

Group Show

During 1999 the Shopping Trol-ley Gallery showed the work ofmail artists as it carried outits shopping trips in the localHigh Street. An extension wascreated this year to enable itswork to be carried furtherafield: the Shopping Bag Gal-lery (SBG).In this way mailart was shown during a day tripto Calais during the summer,and across France down to theMediterranean in September.There it visited Matisse'satelier in Collioure, France

1999

During 1998 the ArtFull Snail Mail Art Project wasdeveloped under the aegis of the Shopping TrolleyGallery. Having lost many a colourful flowering plantto my resident snails, I started some time ago to painttheir shells which resulted in a convenient arrange-ment for everybody: the snails lived happily and I gotsome colour in my garden. It also amused my neighbours,who kept returning to me the painted snails they foundin their gardens... Networking artists were encouragedto do the same, and all over the world unsuspectingsnails were sought, trapped, painted and releasedagain. Those artists who could not bring themselves totouch the snails or did not have any around were askedto express their views on the artfullness of snails ingeneral. I made a book with all the work I received,which was then sent to every participant and a copy

deposited in the British Library.

1999The ArtFull Snail

Sinhalese New Year Show

The Singhalese Community of South London celebratesthe Spring as the beginning of the year. We had a NewYear Mail Art Show with the theme'Peace in unity'.The work of the mail artists was much admired by thepublic, not less because it came by post from somany far-away places. It was recorded and shown lateron Sri Lanka's National TV.

Vouchers for stretches to be taken in a happy place weresent out .They were returned with descriptions of verymany interesting locations:

The Stretch Project

1999

2000Throughout the year 2000 the STG has carried the workof twenty-five mail artists as a group show to andfrom the Beckenham supermarkets and High Street shops.The Shopping Bag Gallery, for those places that theSTG cannot reach, went with the Curator to France inSeptember on a walking and beach holiday and to Brugesin December. The SBG also met Angela and Peter Netmailat a Stamp Fair in Newbury, England, and was taken onmany shopping trips.

But that was not all.The STG and the SBG both appeared in February at CandidGallery, Islington, London, side by side with fine artpaintings and sculptures, where it loudly preached themerits of Mail Art. It may have given the visitors abit of a shock at first, but it did make new converts.In complete contrast in September the STG joined an

I am quoting the organizer Vic Scott,at the Riverhouse Barn Gallery, Walton-on-Thames,Surrey, England.

Group Show

Julia Tant, mail artist and good friend, had beenorganizing regular art shows for years at what was thenthe Café Prov, Camberwell,London. It occurred to me thatit would be a great venue for a Mail Art show, if shecould persuade the owners. Besides, since DavidDellafiora moved to Australia, it seemed that FieldStudy was in danger of disappearing from the Englishscene. So I contacted the only two other London basedField Workers that I knew: Alan Turner and PatriciaCollins and we organized a show. Artworks on the themeby Pat, Julia, Alan, a few local artists and myselfaccompanied the Mail Art show when launched in October2000. 'Eat Your Art Out' was a great success, so muchso that the owners of the cafe decided to keep it onand even helped to pay for some of the cost of thedocumentation. So the Mail Art postcards from aroundthe world did weave their way around the walls untilthe Cafe was sold.

EatYour

Artout

2000

This year the international community of Mail Artistshave again joined the young artists of the ThamesBuddhist Vihara in the celebration of the Sri Lankan NewYear. I chose butterflies as a theme because of theBuddhist symbolism of this insect with its manytransformations. Participants of a Mail Art workshopconducted by Julia Tant at the Carnegie Library,Camberwell, London, have also joined in with theirbutterflies, a very successful first time effort. Thehall in Croydon hired for the day seated 1000 peopleand many more were standing around. About 100 beautifulbutterflies were displayed on the glass screen wall thatseparated the hall from the foyer. The photographs weretaken with the curtains closed, but with them open thefront and back of the butterflies were seen which wasgood as many were painted on both sides. Everybodypraised the art show and they were happy that so manyartists from so many countries had participated in theirtraditional celebrations.

Sinhalese New Year Show

2001

2001

The response to this project was great. It was collectedduring 2000 and shown, in a changing display, on theSTG during 2001, the first year of the New Millennium.

2002Sinhalese New Year Show

In 2002 the New Year was celebrated with elephants.Forty-five mail artists participated and they were

joined by the local children. The show took place atthe Bishop Lanfranc School, Croydon, South London, whereit was seen by the many visitors who came to theFestival. It was filmed to be shown on Sri Lankantelevision as usual and later it was also shownworldwide on Sky Television.

Eat Your Art Out, our 2000 show, was joined duringNovember and December 2001 by Apples. In the photoJulia Tant and I are in the Café and the two rows ofpostcards at the bottom of the wall are part of EatYour Art Out and the postcards and artwork above ispart of Apples.The cafe looked stunning;the ownerswere very pleased with our shows and were sure thatthere were more customers since the walls had beencovered with Mail Art.

Apples was very well liked, it seems, as we had manycontributors and many of them sent several pieces ofwork each. In January 2002 it was transferred to theCarnegie Library, Herne Hill, London.

2002

The

The Second International ShoppingTrolley Art Show was launched atthe Carnegie Library on January 6,and did the usual rounds of thelocal supermarkets until December2003.

It was on display on the STG .Work by 71 artists from 15 coun-tries has been displayed in rota-tion. It was shown at the CarnegyLibrary Gallery in January 2002and then while shopping aroundBeckenham.

2002S.I.S.

T.A.S.

In January 2002 this project was shown for the last timeat the Carnegie Library as well.

2002

EX-LIBRIS was a very interesting project. On the onehand it was misunderstood by a few artists who sent verybeautiful books or bookmarks; on the other hand we madecontact with a whole lot of artists new to MailArt who specialize in bookplates and who sent absolutelyfantastic work. It was shown at the Carnegie Libraryfor six weeks at the beginning of 2002, where it wasgreatly admired..

After the show closed here David Dellafiora mounted itin the Hub Gallery, Geelong, Australia as part of thelocal celebrations to welcome the Dalai Lama.

The Shopping Bag Gallery went to the Tate Britain inLondon with visitors Guido Vermeulen and Bernd Reichert,black and white photo taken with a spy camara. Also tothe Tate Modern with David Dellafiora, Julia Tant, andother mail artists during the Field Study Internationalreunion in January

2003During 2003 it has travelled to Colombia, Austria,Germany and France.

THE SHOPPINGBag GALLERYwelcomesCLEMENTE PADIN

to the Tate ModernOn February 26 the Tate Modern Gallery, London, washonored by a visit from Clemente Padin, the South

American poet, performer and mail artist.

In the cafeteria under the guidance of Peter Net Mailand with surgical masks, rubber gloves and a vacuumcleaner, we performed the disinfection of Clemente.

Clemente at theCafe Esperanzaand doing thesights in London

2004

2004 was also the year that Patti Bristow, a veryenthusiastic artist from San Francisco Bay, USA, joinedthe Mail Art community with a Shopping Trolley Gallery.Patti came to London and, after performing an ObscureAction for Vittorio Baroni in Camberwell Green,stickingMail Art on an official poster, we went to the EsperanzaCafe for a chat over our coffees and Shopping BagGalleries, surrounded by Hope postcards.

ESPERANZA - HOPEThis year the walls of the Café Esperanza (ex Prov) werecovered with postcards about Hope. We provided blankcards and crayons so the patrons, both adults andchildren, joined in the show with pleasure.

2004

On a very windy day, in frontof the Tate Modern and wit-nessed by everybody that wasat the moment having lunch atthe restaurant and severalwindblown passersby,we wrappedDavid Dellafiora in toiletpaper which had stamped onevery sheet the words: UNDERCOVER FIELD STUDY, a perform-ance by Peter Netmail.

2005We all signed the sheets of paper, which later wereincluded in one David's editions of 'Wipe' books madewith toilet paper.

Field Study

International

meeting

This book project was a gift of Mail Art for my firstgrandchild. Most of the artwork is in images, very fewwrote stories but the most interesting fact is thatalmost all entries refer to grandmothers or grandchil-dren, only very few to grandfathers.Some of the artists were young children who sendpictures just as great as those of the seasoned mailartists.

The black and white book was sent to all participants.

2005

Responding to the invitation lots of superb postcardsarrived through the Summer on this theme. All the cardswere on line for a long time and now I intend to makea book with them.

The path of peace

This year we lost the CafeEsperanza as a Mail Artvenue, unfortunately itwas sold and I did notmanage to persuade the newowners of the advantages ofdisplaying Mail Art orindeed any art at all. TheShopping Trolley Gallerykept doing the rounds asusual,with its changingcollection of Mail Art.

In its travels the Gallery went to Bosham, a villageand port in the South coast of England. Its Saxon churchis in a scene in the Bayeux tapestry dated from 1064. Init King Harold is entering the church to pray beforesetting sail for France. Behind him a courtier ispushing what appears to be an early version of aShopping Trolley Gallery. For his duty free wine?

2006

It was grey and windy and wet, onthe Millennium Bridge thatSaturday midday. Even so, anintrepid band of Mail Artists ofnative and foreign origingathered hopefully to see theArtistamps rise above London onthe tails of two silverballoons.

Not so, the balloons promptlyflew away from David's hands,took a dive and finished on theriver. Although the balloons hadbeen carefully calibrated athome with just the rightquantity of stamps to be able torise easily, the stamps got wetin the rain and the added weightof the water was enough to groundthem, or more accurately, riverthem.Even so the work of so manyartists was duly appreciatedand admired thanks to the Artis-tamps Album, which was on dis-play at the Pub where we all

gathered for lunch afterwards.

Field StudyMeeting andArtistampsShow

2007

Above what it did happen:the balloons in the the Thamesseen from the Millennium Bridge and below what shouldhave happened. Oh, well...

All afternoon the balloons kept going backwards andforwards in the Thames, between the Millennium andBlackfriars Bridges, with the in and out tides, whichhad a certain poetry of its own.

2007

The show opened at theWhitgift Center, Croydon,Surrey, one of the mallsI use from time to time.Then it got on with theweekly shopping as usualin Beckenham local shops.I gave away some of theDude's stickers I hadcollected over the years,which were very wellreceived.

After the Artistamps show closed restof the year was taken with a oneperson show on the STG as mycontribution to the Sticker Dude'sUniverse project. I printed an A4enlargement of one of Joel's stick-ers and mounted it on the trolley..

The sticker

dude universe

2007

According to Dr Ana Conder, Professor Emeritus at theDepartment of Anthropology, University Of CentralRetailia, this personage pushing a receptacle is a shamanwith an early version of a shopping trolleygallery,possibly used to collect narcotic mushrooms.The lack of wheels would have made the trolley difficultto move, pointing unequivocally to its exclusiveritualistic function.This theory is supported by the bird decoration,possibly a parakeet, on the trolley, which suggests thepsychotic flight of the shaman. Other indications inits support are the disks with spirals surroundingsemi-spheres representing hallucinogenic mushrooms, thefeline mask of transformation and the wings each sideof the elaborate headdress.

FromG. Russ, 1996.

During 2008 the STG received and displayed in rotationthe L.I.S.T.A.S its last Mail Art show. This was alsothe year in which the Queendom of Retailia wasdiscovered and many an archaeological find was madewhich helped to elucidate its past.

2008

At last the mystery of the Goddessof Creditcrunchester is lifted.

Last summer a Creditcrunchesterianfarmer saw bits of sculpture stick-ing out of the ground. Professor P.H. Otto-Shopp, Chair of Archaeology,University of Central Retalia, whowas picnicking nearby realized thatthese were the fragments of ashopping trolley gallery. This wasbased on the similitude of thisartefact with trolleys depicted onthe frieze of classical templesrepresenting the Salesthon, theannual race of shoppers that cele-brates the religious Festival ofSales. The arms and the trolleyseemed likely to belong to theGoddess of Creditcrunchester andlater the professor successfullyrestored the image of Purchasia, theancient Goddess of Shopping, Oncethe trolley was cleaned thewords ‘Adquiro Ergo Sunt’,

, were revealedchiseled on the cover. On the sidepanels appeared a procession offigures carrying containers, anintegral part of the weekly Ceremonyof Restocking the Shelves, as itis still carried out in our times,although with less pomp. All ofthese further confirm the identityof the Goddess.

2008

Field Study Meeting and

The Last International

shopping trolley

art Show L.I.s.t.a.s.Showing art postcards on my shopping trolley worked verywell at the beginning of my Mail Art activities Thenthe amount of artwork received grew and grew. For thislast project the artwork sent during 2008 was above whatthe Shopping Trolley Gallery can carry in one go so itwas displayed in several group shows. Over 140 artistshave sent postcards, quite a few of them severalpostcards at a time. I have displayed all of them onthe trolley but only one from each artist were on thefourteen posters shown at the meeting at the front ofthe Tate Britain on the third of January.

2009

This show was conceived to celebrate the Role of thePostal Services in Mail Art. The artistamps were shownat the Beckenham Post Sorting Office in July 2010

They were seen by some 1600 people collecting theirpost during that period and many did take down the website address so we soon may have new Mail Artistsjoining the Eternal Network. There is an article on theshow in the blog of The British Postal Museum and

Archive.

2010The ARTISTAMPS Show

The Post Sorting Office and Mr Brian Anderson receivingthe Golden Trolley for services rendered to Mail Art.

Every Mail Artist that attended received the GoldenTrolley for services to Mail Art and bravery in the

Field (Study)

The Artistamps Show 2010 was displayed at the meeting,this time we were not chased away as usual.They are

getting used to us it seems.

Field Study Meeting and

Artistamps Show 2011

We call on all cultural workers to reclaim the name ofFLUXUS from the hands of high street fashion!Supposedly inspired by the philosophy of the FLUXUSmovement an LA clothing manufacturer has branded itselffFuXus.

FLUXUS IS NO BRAND NAME!There is nothing avant garde about vests, tops, dressesand jackets worn by celebrity cloth horses such as JudeLaw.

This debases our cultural heritage and is an insult topractising FLUXUS artists. FLUXUS history is a decon-struction of fashion and artifice, e.g. Yoko Ono’s

, 1964. The Jeffrey Sebelia Collection of jumpershas no place in that history!Sew your label in your next deconstructed piece offLuXus clothing

David Dellafiora

At the meeting David Dellafio-ra staged a performance aboutthe usurpation of the wordFLUXUS by a clothes manufac-turer,

As I didn’t have any fLuXus clothing and did not intendto get any, I responded with the work shown in the nextpage.

2011

2011

to proceed to the deconstruction of fLuXus isnecessary to look at its (con)text and tothat emerges from the gaps and supplements in the text;I wish particularly to draw attention to thesignifier‘con’, both in its French and English usage

the deconstruction of fLuXus clearly shows theinappropriate and spurious link with the art movementFLUXUS which embraced an iconoclastic and revolutionarygroup of artists both sides of the Atlantic and is stilluniversally thriving.

in this my attempt at deconstructing it i have foundthat the mimicry of celebrity fashion and its semioticdissemination has no essence or meaning while thedialectic of garments off the peg available onlinesubtly and covertly subvert the conscious choices ofthe buyers/wearers.

in conclusion, while it is not easy to account forstylistic choices made by individuals or social groupsin situationally distinctive use of clothes this cannever be equated with the artistic activities of FLUXUSartists, in their untrammelled Zen-like iteration andflow in contrast to the slavish imitation and slaveryof fashion and the profit orientated retail tradeengagement of fLuXus.besides these clothes are rubbish i would not be seen

dead in them.

dr. ana conder, professor of (de)construction, differ-ent university, retailia.

2011

A note on the hardware: the Shopping TrolleyGallery started in 1996 on an old red trolleyalready much used, seen here on the top left.When it collapsed it was replaced by the moresturdy 4x4 model which is shown in the middleand is still going strong. Eventually a sportsmodel for light shopping and for ceremonial usejoined the fleet, the one on the right.After a couple of unfortunate home madeexperiments I was lucky to find a ready madeShopping Bag Gallery with two outer transparentpouches which take small cardboard panelssuitable for the display of very small items.

... for the present

Retailia, may 2012,year of the earthworm

that’sall,folks!

...that a few month later, on July 15, 2012, when Iwas coming back from the shops happily pulling mytrolley along ...

But that was not theend of the story as itcame to pass...

...we were the victimsof a fiendish terroristattack.

...and the Shopping Trolley Gallery is no more.

The end

Printed inthe United Queendom of Retailia

By Appointment

to Her Majesty the Queen

www.mailartmartha.org.uk