Predominantly
created by amateurs and the self-taught, these postcards are almost all
unique, one of a kind pieces and span a time frame of over eighty years,
from about 1890 to the mid-1970’s. They comprise a vast range of
mediums and approaches, from watercolour to gouache to oils to collage
and altered photography. Subject matter ranges from the banal to births
and deaths to the advent of the car and the camera to women’s suffrage
and the confines of the trenches of WWI. There are hundreds of singular
works as well as several series of correspondence and/or collections
made by individual artists. Most have been posted and they originate
from locales all over the world.
My purpose in beginning this
blog is to share examples from my archive and hopefully facilitate a dialogue about the changing ways we
communicate. The postcard and the letter are slowly disappearing as a
means of keeping in touch. That is neither a good nor a bad thing; like
everything in this universe it is merely part of the constant state of
flux that makes existence interesting.
