Editing Mail art (section)

===Ray Johnson, New York Correspondance School, and Fluxus===
The American artist [[Ray Johnson]] is considered to be the first mail artist.<ref name=MOCA>{{cite web|title=Mail Art|url=http://www.moca.org/pc/viewArtTerm.php?id=22|work=Collection: MOCA's First Thirty Years|publisher=MOCA: The Museum of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles|access-date=11 April 2013}}</ref><ref name=Phillpot>{{cite book|last=Phillpot|first=Clive|title=Eternal Network: A Mail Art Anthology|year=1995|publisher=University of Calgary Press|location=Canada|url=http://www.artpool.hu/Ray/Publications/Phillpot.html|editor=Chuck Welch|access-date=11 April 2013}}</ref> Johnson's experiments with art in the mail began in 1943, while the posting of instructions and soliciting of activity from his recipients began in the mid-1950s with the mailing of his "moticos", and thus provided mail art with a blueprint for the free exchange of art via post.<ref name=MOCA /><ref>Francesco Vincitorio, "Informalista o videoartista? Le tendenze artistiche dagli anni '40 ad oggi", L'Espresso n.44, 7 November 1982{{full citation needed|date=January 2013}}</ref>

The term "mail art" was coined in the 1960s.<ref name=Plunkett /> In 1962, Plunkett coined the term "New York Correspondence School" to refer to Johnson's activities; Johnson adopted this moniker but sometimes intentionally misspelled it as "correspondance".<ref name=Plunkett /> The deliberate misspelling was characteristic of the playful spirit of the Correspondance School and its actions.<ref name=Danto>{{cite magazine|last=Danto|first=Arthur C.|author-link=Arthur Danto|magazine=[[The Nation]]|date=March 11, 1999|url=https://www.thenation.com/article/archive/correspondance-school-art/|title=Correspondance School Art|access-date=25 January 2023}}</ref>

Most of the Correspondance School members are fairly obscure, and the letters they sent, often featuring simple drawings or stickers, often instructed the recipient to perform some fairly simple action. Johnson's work consists primarily of letters, often with the addition of doodles and rubber stamped messages, which he mailed to friends and acquaintances. The Correspondance School was a network of individuals who were artists by virtue of their willingness to play along and appreciate Johnson's sense of humor. One example of the activities of the Correspondance School consisted in calling meetings of fan clubs, such as one devoted to the actress [[Anna May Wong]]. Many of Johnson's missives to his network featured a hand drawn version of what became a personal logo or alter-ego, a bunny head.<ref name=Danto />

In a 1968 interview, Johnson explained that he found mailed correspondence interesting because of the limits it puts on the usual back and forth interaction and negotiation that comprises communication between individuals. Correspondence is "a way to convey a message or a kind of idea to someone which is not verbal; it is not a confrontation of two people. It's an object which is opened in privacy, probably, and the message is looked at&nbsp;... You look at the object and, depending on your degree of interest, it very directly gets across to you what is there".<ref name=AAAOH>{{cite web|title=Oral history interview with Ray Johnson, 1968 Apr. 17|url=http://www.aaa.si.edu/collections/interviews/oral-history-interview-ray-johnson-13236|work=Archives of American Art|publisher=Smithsonian Institution|access-date=11 April 2013}}</ref>

In 1970, Johnson and Marcia Tucker organized The New York Correspondence School Exhibition at the [[Whitney Museum]] in New York, which was the first significant public exhibition of the mail art genre.<ref name=MOCA />

On April 5, 1973, Johnson declared the "death" of the New York Correspondance School in an unpublished letter to the Obituary Department of ''The New York Times'' and in copies that he circulated to his network. However, he continued to practice mail art even after this.<ref name=AAALippardLetter>{{cite web|title=Ray Johnson mail art to Lucy R. Lippard, 1965 June 29|url=http://www.aaa.si.edu/collections/images/detail/ray-johnson-mail-art-to-lucy-r-lippard-13544|work=Archives of American Art|publisher=Smithsonian Institution|access-date=11 April 2013}}</ref><ref name=RJEstate-bio>{{cite web|title=Ray Johnson Biography|url=http://www.rayjohnsonestate.com/biography/|publisher=Ray Johnson Estate|access-date=11 April 2013}}</ref>

Although much of Johnson's work was initially given away, this has not prevented it from attaining a market value. [[Andy Warhol]] is quoted as saying he "would pay ten dollars for anything by Johnson."<ref>Stewart Home, ''The Assault On Culture'', Aporia Press & Unpopular Books, London 1988 {{full citation needed|date=January 2013}}</ref>

In his 1973 diagram showing the development and scope of [[Fluxus]], [[George Maciunas]] included mail art among the activities pursued by the Fluxus artist [[Robert Filliou]].<ref>Hendricks, Jon (1988). ''Fluxus Codex'', New York: Harry N. Abrams, pp. 329–333. {{ISBN|978-0-8109-0920-5}}</ref> Filliou coined the term the "Eternal Network" that has become synonymous with mail art.<ref name=Bloch>{{cite book|last=Bloch|first=Mark|author-link=Mark Bloch (artist)|title=Amazing Letters: The Life and Art of David Zack|chapter-url=http://www.panmodern.com/zack-article.html|editor=Istvan Kantor|access-date=11 April 2013|chapter=An Authentik and Historikal Discourse On the Phenomenon of David Zack, Mail Artist}}</ref> Other Fluxus artists have been involved since the early 1960s in the creation of artist's postage stamps (Robert Watts, Stamp Dispenser, 1963), postcards (Ben Vautier, The Postman's Choice, 1965: a postcard with a different address on each side) and other works connected to the postal medium.{{citation needed|date=January 2013}} Indeed, the mail art network counts many Fluxus members among its earliest participants. While Johnson did not consider himself directly as a member of the Fluxus school, his interests and attitudes were consistent with those of a number of Fluxus artists.<ref name=Danto /><ref name=AAAOH />

[[File:CrackerJackKid Envelope1984.jpg|right|thumb|Mail art stamp and envelope with official Colt Anniversary postmark – Chuck Welch, a.k.a. Cracker Jack Kid, 1984]]