Collaborator Experiences – Berkeley Commonplace

_{The Round Table Collaboration}
Postal Collage Project

Collaborator experiences are no less significant than the resulting artworks. The collages are compelling artifacts; the experience of participation is the real substance of the project.

Share your experience HERE.

Updated July 2026

Margarita Maldonado [2026]

Honestly, I was a little disappointed in the experience. As time went on, it took longer and longer to get each different collage, and I grew increasingly disappointed with the quality of what I was receiving. I’m grateful for the experience, but I’m not sure I would do it again.

Joan Margaret Davis [2026]

Hello! As this was my first experience with a collaborative project with people I did not know, my expectations were stretched (timelines and finding a way to incorporate other ideas into each piece). Some were confusing and others were amazing. My original design was returned as an eye opener for me. Looking forward to the next year where I can continue to practice the life skill of flexibility. Thank you.

Teri Bevelacqua [2026]

What a good experience I had this year. The collages that came my way presented welcome and irritable challenges for me. Some pushed my material boundaries, some my compositional sensibilities were challenged and some I loved from the moment we met. It was good to have some real challenges that I could tackle and feel well about how I addressed those challenges and the additions I made to each piece of art. I will be back!

Three from the archives: Hannele Rubin 2024, Mike McGarry 2019, and Heidi Kitlas 2018.

Ben Hoz [2026]

I have shared my experience of the collage roundtable collaboration with artist that did not participate in this project. Quite a few were horrefied by the thought to hand over theyr personal work to somebody else to be worked on.

This I understand, but it also made me realize that by letting go of your work and including another soul to be part of it, it adds a whole new dimension to making art and being in this world. The struggle of the artist being alone in his studio with his inner demons and angels now suddently is joined by new beings. And are we not just a self that is part of the self of a bigger living system ?

The need to understand and be in todays world is ever more pressing. There is a need to be ever more present as an individual and at the same time a participant to something much more grand.

Christine Hippeli [2026]

Hi! This is my 2nd year participating and looking forward to making it a tradition, so hope to be back for a 3rd year next year. I teamed up with my partner Frank this year and it was his first. Don’t think he’s as into as I am. Ha! Different strokes for different folks. Shrug.

Some things I find curious/a little annoying …

(but won’t stop me from keep participating because the good out weighs the “bad,”). This is a group collaborative project and yet sometimes it seems folks that sign up aren’t really interested in communicating (at all) with the group. I get that we all have lives of subjective varying degrees of “busyness,” and communication/sharing isn’t required, but–if you’re generally not interested in working within group dynamics or you truly don’t have the time to contribute with generosity–maybe this project isn’t for you?

Also–folks that seem to take this extremely seriously and get very upset when a specific theme/aesthetic they had in mind isn’t adhered to (as if it’s not explicitly explained that everyone is autonomous at every stage, while still working within the group dynamic.). Sensing lack of ability to give up control generally gives me the icks.

Lastly, I know art is subjective, and someone’s goregeous is another person’s totally ugly–and same goes with the subjectiveness of effort made vs. no effort made–but it’s a bit of a disappointment when folks clearly put in no effort other than slapping a scrap of paper and sending the piece on it’s way.

My friend Ellen (from Portland that I convinced to join for the 1st time this year) have this on-going jokey commentary that surmises that Marty is really more interested in the psychology/sociology of the inner workings of group dynamics than the collaborative arts. Again–a joke–but in the off chance it’s true…GENIUS and mad props to Marty. Heh. Anyway! Thank you Marty and Berkeley Commonplace for orchestrating/organizing/curating this long running project. I hope it continues on for many years. So interesting and fun (despite a sprinkling of annoyances). Art on! Christine (group 72)

Melanie Hayes [2026]

I joined my collage group again this year to have a creative outlet and hoped to process the relentless stress of being a full-time caregiver for my terminally ill husband. It did give me that, but it also helped me move through grief after he died. Thank you to my collaborators in my group, and to Marty for creating this life affirming, community building program. ❤

Monica Church [2026]

This is my first year participating. Our five person collaboration created a space for me to look carefully at an image before acting upon it. Using snail mail rather than a digital exchange added to the slow-looking experience and this reflective, slower pace is something that we don’t often enjoy in art making or viewing anymore.

I was touched by my team’s sensitivities to materials and colors. When working on an exchange college, I felt like I was adjusting a focus knob rather than having to be a creative director. I enjoyed having this visual collage conversation and appreciate the decisions and careful observations of my collaborators.

Leanne Poellinger [2026]

I love the idea of a collaborative collage, and this is my second year participating in the Berkeley Commonplace postal collage project.

In both years, my group experienced delays and some pieces that I don’t think were ever completed. This is a bit discouraging, although I understand the life can get in the way of intentions. This year, the piece I started was completely started over before being returned back to me–not a single part of what I originally used was in the final piece. I will admit that this made feel bad enough that I probably won’t participate again in the future. I did enjoy seeing and adding to the other collages that made it to me this year.

Janet Valls [2026]

This was my first year with the Commonplace Postal Collage project. I read some of the comments from collaborators in past years and I felt that the only way to begin successfully was to give up any sense of ownership. So I initiated a piece and sent it into the “universe” of our group and wondered what it would grow up to be.

Version one was lost in the mail. So I began again. In the meanwhile I received the work of other members of the group. I didn’t know anyone else in the group. So taking on the responsibility and the challenge for working with authenticity and integrity was really daunting. I added and I subtracted. I retained but re-arranged. Such heavy lifting. I would certainly do this again, primarily to keep learning about problem solving and collaboration. I love the way the piece I originated was finished. I added to it at the end, but what I really treasure are all the unexpected images and colors added by others. The piece concluded with a solid theme and strong harmony. I’m very grateful to those who contributed to this little treasure. Deepest gratitude to Berkeley Commonplace for the opportunity and the experience.

Jessica [2026]

This was my 3rd year participating. I like the idea of having a project that I actually have no control over the outcome. One year I sent out a rectangle and got back a square, each person both adding and changing to create a unique piece. One of my favorite things was identifying different artist’s styles each time a new collage came in the mail. The final project is always completely unexpected, but reminds me of being connected to a group of strangers through art.

Nadja Lazansky [2026]

This was my 3rd year. I matched up with some of the same folks I did the first one with, one new person. I started my collage with a theme of grief, as I had lost two close people in my life and so had others in my group.

One person said she had been expressing her grief through collage, so it seemed fitting. We all got right into that (unfortunately). It was, as always, a messy process from collages being lost and redone (or not) to being late and or/early. But, whatever it is, i love knowing something special will be coming in the mail to work on in some of the colder, darker days of the winter and i can cozy up in my studio and work on my part. I am looking forward to next year already!

Marissa Decepida-Wong [2026]

This is my 3rd participation in the Roundtable Collaboration. Each time, I’ve enjoyed the process. One day I hope to attend the exhibit, displaying the various and talented Collage Artists.

Ellen Wardell [2026]

2025-26 has been my first year participating in the Berkeley Collage Collaborative. This has been a exciting adventure of not knowing exactly what to expect along the way.

I enjoyed the challenge of not knowing how to add to someone’s collage, working on getting it to the next person in a timely fashion, and to wait to see what would be revealed in the end of the experience. Marty has been very patient and great to work with. My community started a Collaging group that met once a month so that we could have some shared materials, a location to collage and support from others along the way. That part has been a wonderful take away. We have continued to meet once a month to work on another collaging project. I look forward to being a part of this cool collaborative next round.

Sonja Hinrichsen [2026]

I absolutely loved being part of this amazing community project that stretches all across the US and other countries. In my case it also accompanied me during a time of change

where I dissolved my 20+ year existence in one place (Oakland, CA) to make room for an entirely new chapter, first briefly in a different state (NM) and in preparation for a move to a new country (France), where I am im the process of creating my own ceramics art studio, clay vacation project and multi disciplinary artist residency.
This community project somehow bridged across all of these decisions and moving from place to place, despite address changes. It felt grounding to be part of this group of creators without being tied to a specific location. And inspiring to feed off of each others ideas. Not knowing the group participants in person, felt liberating and gave me a lot of freedom without worrying about the outcome or what others might think about it. It was fun, inspiring and liberating.

Carol David [2026]

I had mixed feelings. The collage I initiated I would have done completely differently next time – it didn’t really invite collaboration. The first collage I received was full of possibility and I enjoyed doing it.

As we went along, each one became less inspiring and it all felt chaotic. With each one I was able to add to it in a way that I felt improved it, which was a worthwhile exercise. And I started to try to look into the minds of my previous collaborators, which made me appreciate more what they had done and see the works with different eyes. I need to see the finished collages in person to find out what I feel about them. I might or might not do the project again.

Marcie Simon [2026]

This was my third year participating in the PCR; Second go-around with the same group. Prior to beginning our creative journey, we met via Zoom to discuss and agreed on a common theme:
WHAT IS LEFT BEHIND?

It was eye-opening to see how each of us interpreted this theme; However it did serve for “direction” on most of the collages. Mostly, this pushed me to really think about my contributions to further the “theme” for the individual collages. This process also reminded me of the joy of creating artwork and to devote more of my own artwork outside of this structure.
I’m always astounded viewing other group collages online, and of course, visiting the gallery gives me ideas about how or what I want to create next year.

Christie Desrosiers [2026]

This was my first ever participating. I found it a fascinating experience and just love that the End result is a collaborative of artists’ souls. Hoping I am invited to participate again next year.

Emma Brown [2026]

This is my second year participating in this project. I love being part of the collaborative experience and watching the artworks evolve as they pass through different hands.

Michelle Fav [2026]

The 2020 experience was my last go round, and that ended with the shut down thud of the bad times. This go round offered a chance to notice and remember – AND I was in a group with known (and new!) folks which added a beautiful bit of extra fun when we were able to have an in person photo and catch up before the final swap! Appreciating the discipline and looking forward to celebrating at the opening party!

Michael H [2026]

It was a wonderful project. I love the international aspect, and our group was very diverse. That did require a lot of patience on our part. Fortunately, thanks to Deepika’s efforts, the collages we thought were lost have resurfaced. It was my first participation in this project. I can’t wait for it to continue.
How wonderful it would be if the whole world could work together in such a creative way. It would bring peace.

K Hanrahan [2026]

This is my second year participating in the postal project. Both years have revealed a variety of personalities, skill sets and communication styles.

Some folks unfortunately just quit. Some are very poor communicators which can be very frustrating. Others participate fully, honor deadlines, share creative joy, playfulness, awe – inspiring talent and loyalty. Whenever I participate in collaborative type projects I always learn or witness something new to me in the process. I think for me that’s one of the many reasons to continue. I have great admiration for our curator/moderator/organizer and his even-tempered delightful way of taking good care of us and this project. Congrats on 15 years of celebrating collage and all the artists from around the world who create in this manner.

Amy Tingle [2026]

I think this year is my 5th or 6th year participating, but who can keep count in these strange and horrifying times? I’m grateful for the momentary distraction when the new collages arrive! As usual I was surprised, frustrated, exasperated, and delighted by the collaboration.

I have been playing with substrate for the last few years and this year I started my piece on a brown paper shopping bag. I wanted to see what folks would do with three dimensions. When I received my starter back, I was surprised to see so much blank space still showing. I have yet to experience being part of a group where folks really go wild and push the limits of collage. I’m still hoping to have that experience someday. But I always enjoy the process, no matter what, and love participating in mail art project! It brings me so much joy.

Rebecca Wendler-Burke [2026]

I’ve been participating in these collaborations consistently since 2021. The starter for this round had a lot of sentiment behind it, more so than in the past.

I shared the inspiration as text with my starter as it was sent to the various participants in our group- 88. The inspiration was a very vivid dream involving bears. At the time, the dream felt like a totem shift, like I was earning the Bear as a feature in my totem line-up. It also had elements of rewriting a narrative, correcting the past of some unfortunate and traumatic family events. The bears in the dream were running toward me on a grassy undulating field. Feeling in danger, I summoned my guttural bear growl, and grabbed a baby bear by its scruff. I carried it unharmed to the podium. My reward was a saucer of bear’s milk, with the spoken blessing, “May all your travels be fruitful.” Upon my starter’s return, I incorporated more thematic additions, namely, that of a Thangka, to the dreamscape. It felt appropriate to give these bears an elevation in stature to depict deities. The arrows given to the project by s. howard gave it a sense of direction, of travel. I used the bear on the paddle board to signify movement, and like that of a dreamscape, one that was fluid, transient, opaque as well as transparent. The pool the bear navigates is the saucer of bear’s milk.

Tanya Davanzo [2026]

This was my first experience with the collage project and I just loved it! It was a pleasure to be able to focus on creative process. Working in a group allowed me to transcend the ego and just play.

Jodi S. Klebick [2026]

I was glad to be included, and it forced me to think a little differently work a little quicker and get into the minds of other artists. I will definitely do this again! This helped me to better understand my artistic perspective, philosophy, and voice! Thank you

Diana Jameson [2026]

I think this was my 4th year and I have definitely added the experience to my annual calendar. My piece started with a question “Where do we go from here?”

I was torn between travel and new experiences; and addressing the conditions in our nation. The piece evolved to the pressing concerns of the nation which became very cathartic for me. The completion of the piece brought a feeling of peace and hope as I was able to express my belief that together we can be better!

Gitty Duncan [2026]

THIS WAS SO MUCH FUN!! It scratched an itch I didn’t know was still there- to play and draw and build and arrange and free-associate and call upo the muse of my late Aunt May, who always sent me interesting things in the mail when I was little. Definitely up for another round!

Caren Andrews [2026]

I have deeply enjoyed this project. This is my 4th year and the group I am in by design has been fantastic.

We choose a theme, format and color palette to work with. These parameters were helpful and inspiring. The layers added and subtracted worked beautifully together. I hope to work with this group of women again. This time around I also participated in a random group that Marty assigned me to. The contrast of being strangers to one another and having no guidelines felt very different. My practice is to “destroy to build” so I hope my manipulation of the art works did not offend anyone. I look forward to seeing all of the collaborative efforts once displayed.

Austina Alexis & RoyaleXI [2026]

Our 8th year doing the PCC and still enjoying the surprise of opening every collage and adding our little twist to it!

Elizabeth Dallas [2026]

I enjoyed this ongoing collage conversation. I found that it continually responded to the events of the world around us and that was comforting. I enjoyed seeing the evolution of our pieces. Great way to build community through collaboration. Thank you!

Cindi Gray [2026]

What a wonderful activity! The collaboration helps to see my place with collage in new ways. I appreciated getting to know my fellow collaborators through their art.

Rachel Bühler [2026]

Such a unique experience and incredible initiative. Berkeley’s organisation, coordination, and support has been most excellent!

Nellie Seigel [2026]

The round table collaboration is a great reminder to ourselves in our art practice to loosen up, let go of control, have some fun and go with the flow. It also reminds us that “it’s a small world after all” and we’re all in this together.

Christie Desrosiers [2026]

This was my first experience with such a project. I have mixed feelings about the process and the actual collages. At first, the idea simple enough. Then, as each piece began to move around they were all so different. I never felt I was creating art though. Would love to try again next year and see if it feels different.

eric peltier [2026]

I’ve honestly lost count, was this my 5th or 6th year? At this point it’s basically a tradition, which probably says everything. I obviously keep coming back because this project has truly become one of the highlights of my year: low stress, high fun, and consistently inspiring collaboration all around.

Every year is different, of course. Some years you feel more inspired, some less, that’s just the creative weather, but overall what you’ve built here, Marty, is genuinely a gem for everyone involved. There’s something pretty special about watching all these wildly different pieces come together into one collective moment. I’m really sad I won’t be at the show this year, because seeing the collages in one place is always a treat (and a reminder that I should probably up my game). But yes, I’ll absolutely be present for next year’s collaboration. Thanks again, Marty.

Darlene Sardinsky [2026]

This is my third year participating in the Collage exchange and I can’t express in words how beautiful an experience it is. Watching my original Collage transform at the hands of others has been so lovely. I can’t wait for next year!

Leah Sosewitz [2026]

It was nice to work collaboratively with the same group of artists for the second year. This time we had a Zoom meeting before beginning our collages to come up with a theme which I think was helpful for me personally.

The theme was wide open to interpretation, so while it helped us focus in a bit, we also all took different approaches at the onset which gave us each the opportunity to consider each other’s original collage and build on that person’s approach. Having worked most of my life alone in my studio, this collaboration was especially meaningful. Also, it eliminated any pressure (for me at least) for the piece to present any particular way at the end, as each artist’s addition to my original piece made it something new and different from my initial approach. I also got to know a couple new people I might not have otherwise met through the process. Thanks to my dear friend Marcie, who I’ve known since middle school, for bringing us together!

Pat Lacy [2025]

When this collaborative project began, I did not fully understand what I was doing. Although I work in collage daily, I typically avoid fixed themes and photographic magazine imagery. Instead of imposing meaning on my original collage, I kept it simple with no theme or artistic imagery.

Instead I wanted to observe how each teammate interpreted the piece when they received it. In doing so, the collaborators brought their own theme forward. What I learned from this was that it was no different than if I had given it a theme.

As I worked with each collaborators themes and artistic collage — using materials I initially resisted — I began to think more deeply about meaning, intention, and response. This process changed my relationship to collage and will do so in my art outside of collage. I didn’t just complete a project. I crossed into a new way of working. What began as uncertainty became growth, and I left the project eager to work this way again.

Thanks again to my teammates for a wonderful experience, and to Marty for the support and direction you gave us.

Julie Fischer [2025]

This year was the best – I loved how my group was proactive in meeting deadlines- actually they were a head of the curve and i got the art work so far in advance it was relaxing not to have the pressure of rushing to get the art sent on. I also enjoyed that I was feeling very creative and alive with the process – looking forward to being involved in the future.

Bonnie [2025]

A lot happens over six months. I was nearly three months pregnant when this project started in September, by January my baby was born and had died. I don’t know how to talk about it, especially in relation to a shared collage experiment. The two things had nothing to do with each other, but they were happening at the same time. And that was comforting.

I worked in between two real artists – Laura Turbo and Michelle Ballou – who both pushed and pulled ideas and imagery to new places and brought inspiration. I got to know them through their collaging, found a sense of their personalities, values, and mixed-media stashes. I also followed Marty’s commitment to the project, and love of data. These strangers were important; being with people who didn’t know my sadness gave me a chance to come up for air. The escape was especially needed this year. Thank you for the opportunity.

Mimi Kusch [2025]

This is my first time participating, and I had a blast. I liked being inspired by others’ ideas, and I also liked being stumped. My starter got chewed on by a dog at one point, and I was sad about it at first, and then realized the dog was part of our team and had made its own contribution. The end result of all the repairs was very interesting! I liked the feeling of collaboration and could feel everyone’s spirit in the work without having ever met them. Thank you, Marty!

Penny Peak [2025]

Becoming an Artist Through the Postal Collage Project

The rules are few: our “starter” collages, the ones we initiate and send to our four collaborators, need to be mailable at relatively low cost and stay on schedule as they travel around the circle of collaborators. When our collage returns to us, we can finish it however we wish. In the first year, I wanted to respect the artistic choices of my collaborators; however; that’s not a rule, we don’t have to.

Participating in this process is eye-opening, frustrating, encouraging, and inspiring. I spend many days each year finding the colors, textures, and look that satisfies my own internal aesthetic sense. I’m not trained as an artist – yet I’ve found that my aesthetic sensibility is very strong.

In my 2024 starter collage, I was captivated by the contrasts of a tiny mountain climber scaling the monumental nose of Lincoln at Mount Rushmore. I asked in my accompanying statement, “Who or what do we celebrate?” I mailed it to Brooklyn, knowing that each of my collaborators in turn would add to the imagery, changing it. Often, when my collage returns, some elements speak to me and others don’t. Or worse – it doesn’t make sense to me artistically, it’s a mess. I get to choose what to change and add until it is complete. Marty McCutcheon, the project founder, has said something like, “artists make choices.” I love this way of understanding art-making.

As I finish my college, I am looking, reflecting, experimenting, and deciding. We can grow, shrink, and completely change our starter collages. This time around, I took mine apart, removing and moving elements. And because it’s collage, we can add anything that interests us—over the years, I’ve used twigs, real and artificial leaves, old circuit boards, fake fur, paint, and many images from National Geographic magazines, eventually affixing my choices with rubber cement, tacky glue, thread, wire, or other fasteners.

Over the six-month length of each collage cycle, collaborators in different cities, states, and around the globe may be affected by significant personal, social, and political events and sometimes these events find their way into our collages. In the months since we started our collages last fall, the political situation changed significantly—I find it frightening. Art and nature can help us deal with the stress. I find inspiration in nature—a flower blooming, fruit forming, an interesting shape, the glow of color, these bring me joy every day. As I finished my collage, I wanted it to reflect hope. I needed blooming life to overshadow chaos, evil, and fear. I found a huge flower in just the right colors and allowed it to fill the sky.

Rosa Ziebell [2025]

This was my first time participating. Last year I came across the collage exhibit by accident. It intrigued me and I decided to participate. I had come across a few photos of my grandmother and decided to honor her memory. It was a tough time during the process. I lost two family members, and there were medical issues, which got in the way of productivity. However, the project itself became a welcome distraction. I am especially grateful to the team who were understanding and supportive. I like my collage and the embellishment from all the collaborators. I look forward to the show.

Theresa Palmer [2025]

New to collage and collaboration, this project was at first intimidating. I was working with a trusted group and felt free to create without judgement. I saw emotional themes emerge along the way and was happy to join in, expressing my own. I was disappointed in not finding a clear message in my own piece at the end and would start mine differently next time by steering a beginning thought. It was interesting to see the morphing of messages and I was excited to see the changes to each one along the way rather than just seeing the finished piece.

Sally Senior [2025]

This was my first year participating in the Postal Collage Project. I don’t remember where I heard about it, but it may have been through the Special Agent Collage Collective in Seattle. Although I currently live in Portland, Ive had a special connection to Berkeley all my life.

My grandmother first moved there in the 60’s. She was an activist and a piano teacher. Then both my aunts moved there into Northbrae, and bought houses right next door to each other. My sister also lived there for a time. This created a sort of family compound where we all could gather together. The aunts both worked at the University. One working in the architecture dept and the other, my namesake, was the Asst Director of Summer Sessions until she retired. I spent Sept of 2020 clearing out my aunt Sally’s house after she passed, in the middle of a pandemic and smoke filled skies. Not my fondest memory and that was the last time I was there. I miss it. So, participating in this collaboration was cathartic in a way. Giving me some much needed connection to a place for which I have a special affinity and which holds some of my best memories. I enjoyed creating with my team, each one bringing something new and a chance to ponder how I could add my contribution. When mine came back around to me, I struggled to find a connection between all the images. With perseverance, I managed to knock back the chaotic feeling of the piece and bring about some cohesiveness, with focus on some of the key themes. I’m still not sure it makes much sense but it felt a lot better when I was finished with it. I really enjoyed the process of collaborating with my team and the challenge of finding meaning in the imagination of others. Much appreciation to Marty for bringing it all together.

Hannele Rubin [2024]

My experience of the Postal Collage was philosophical and emotional rather than aesthetic; it was more about my personal struggle to feel “seen and heard” than artistic collaboration or conversation. I found it very disappointing in some ways–and revelatory in others. I’ll probably do it again. Because hope springs eternal…

Postal Collage Notes

When I visited my daughter, now in her sophomore year, at UC Berkeley, I somehow stumbled on the Postal Collage and immediately signed up. What a wonderful opportunity, I thought at the time, to have fun/communicate and share artistic insights with a wider community.

My family has been living in College Station, Texas, for almost 10 years now. We moved here from New Jersey, where we lived for 10 years. Before that, I lived for more than a decade in Manhattan.

I’ve traveled a lot. As a child, I lived in Los Angeles and Nigeria. I’ve never felt as culturally, artistically, socially and politically isolated as I do in Texas. The Collage Circle seemed to present an opportunity to reach beyond its borders. And I looked forward to the prospect of finding pleasant surprises in my mailbox.

But despite my efforts to connect with other Group 36 members, I experienced a profound lack of communication and understanding. When my collage came back, the documentation referred to “subtraction” and “reconstruction,” terms the next person in my circle used in substituting their vision for mine.

This is what I sent off initially. an imagined map of my life (apologies for the odd cropping—I photographed each quarter, but not the entire collage). The open space, I thought, would provide opportunities for others in my group to add to the map in their own ways. To augment it.

In general, I’m reluctant to impose my vision on others, or to radically change others’ work. In my work as an editor, my aim is to bring out the best in a writer’s work. Likewise, in working on others’ collages, my goal was to enhance them, to exchange ideas, to have a kind of aesthetic conversation.

This is what eventually came back to me of my collage:

The next person in line in my group had written in the documentation that my collage originally “was very sprawling, and Texas inspired. I used subtraction and reconstruction,” they wrote, “to modify the footprint and general feel. Hannele’s note,” meaning the documentation I had sent with my collage, “went missing in my pile of collage materials.”

How casually, I thought, did this person erase my work. Who were they to “subtract” from my carefully composed collage and carelessly misplace the ideas I had wanted to pass along to my fellow collagists? Did they even read it before it “went missing”? Wasn’t this supposed to be a collaboration?

I emailed Marty to complain:

“I understand that, according to the rules, each creator has artistic autonomy,” I wrote. “But I had thought it would be more of a collaboration than an exercise in ‘subtraction.’ And the way [they] noted losing my documentation seemed a tad dismissive of my effort.”

Marty wrote back:

“Sometimes, though not often, a collaborator will make major, transformative alterations with mysterious motivation. It can be perplexing, disappointing, even jarring. Combined with a casual disregard for associated documentation, it becomes irritating and discouraging. Sorry! I hope you will make the most of Stage-6, the completion stage.”

I took another look at the rules:

“Each and every collaborator is autonomous at each and every stage. …When the contribution is made, and the work is passed along, that authority is relinquished to the next contributor.”

I put the collage away. I took it with me on several trips, intending to work on it. I didn’t. Weeks went by. I considered withdrawing from the project. I took another look. I noticed that a few elements remained from the original—including a handwritten part of a postcard that had been mailed from Oregon (encouraging me to vote), and a pirate ship:

In Marty’s email to my group looking for status updates (he monitors the experience surprisingly closely), he included some links. (I had thought this project would be a fun distraction. Instead, it became an epiphany.) Among the links was “collaborator experiences” (so it WAS supposed to be a collaboration?). The top of the page read:

“While the collages are compelling artifacts, the experience of participation is the real substance of the project.”

Below that, previous participants wrote that the Postal Collage had been a “joy” or “great fun.” Others extolled the experience of “letting go.” Still others expressed the same disappointment I felt.

Marty’s email included a list of our group’s collages. He had (with customary subtlety) embedded a link in the punctuation that followed mine:

CURRENT STATUS
Hannele’s original (?) collage is with Hannele.

The link led to a Wikipedia page on the Ship of Theseus, a thought experiment “about whether an object is the same object after having all of its original components replaced.”

Several more weeks of “collage block” passed while I considered “letting go” of preconceptions, of ideas of authorship and control, of notions of permanence.

Letting go seems to be a big part of my life now that I’m 63. My body is aging, so I’m letting go of the idea that my life will go on as it always has. My son is in his junior year at NYU and my daughter, as mentioned, is in California, so I am “letting go” of them. After teaching journalism at Texas A&M University, for a variety of reasons, I let go of that. My husband and I are planning eventually—probably soon—to let go of our Texas home and move someplace more culturally, socially and politically hospitable.

I let go of my hurt, anger and disappointment, and went back to the collage, taking it apart, “subtracting” elements that didn’t speak to or for me. I added elements that reflect my experience and views. If my collage was “sprawling and Texas inspired” before, it’s even more so now.

I have no control over what others do. If I wanted communication and collaboration and didn’t get it, I still have “sole authority” over my piece.

The current collage reflects my view of Texas, with its guns and money, Christian-centricity, cowboy machismo, uncompassionate conservatism, political repression, sexism, and big oil dominance. It is a visual representation of the many ways I find “Texas Living is Not for the Faint of Heart.” And, in honor of Marty, who really made me think, it includes a pirate ship. My Ship of Theseus.

Like the ship, my collage “only exists when observed.”

It exists until I let it go.

~Hannele Rubin, Group 36, Postal Collage 2023-2024

BACK TO THE TOP

mac [2024]

To whom it may concern, sincere gratitude and a mea culpa.

Looking back, I can’t tell you how I came across the PCP, but I can tell you that it came at the perfect time, a time I needed it most. Having just come through a timeframe that surpassed all levels of difficulty heretofore, I craved an outlet that, baldly put, would provide two things that I feel only Art can “safely” provide: the act of wanton destruction in an arena of intimate connection.

Needing to give myself over to abandonment, as you might well know, to engage in my practice of mixed-media is already a bit of a risk(depending), but can be so planned out that the Act of Destruction is now removed(this may be a portent of Things To Come….I’m not sure…..who authorized this??). Can I tell you, the act of giving something one has created, entrusting a stranger to interact with your creation at their leisure and discretion, is equally terrifying and empowering. In other words, to indulge in being a Mad Genius(and get AWAY with it!) while allowing oneself to be subjected to the same ruthless action is mind-bendingly free-ing and, at the same time, so frightening it helped provide the outlet necessary to successfully navigate the devastating landscape I had been traversing.
Interestingly, the first of the two years found me hesitant to destroy, alter, or even remove the previous artists’ work in my group, resolving to be as un-invasive as possible. However, the following year, I found myself unapologetically making and/or leaving more of a personal impact on my group’s work/contributions. This was also the year I couldn’t discern two separate artists’ work from another’s and had to send the work on regardless, letting The Process, and The Project, prove out as Fate would dictate.
   All in all, extremely cathartic.
Well, I think that’s it for now! I found the project to be a refuge, and, as an unexpected side effect, a real challenge artistically: it tested my abilities, not just forcing me outside my comfort zone, but also giving me the opportunity and the permission to Play, having no fear of judgment, recrimination, or disappointment(other than my own), thus surrendering to, and, ultimately, being buoyed upon, the truly healing effects of Beauty, manifested from Destruction.
   love,
   mac
   PCPs 12 & 13
   2022/23

Nadja Lazansky [2024]

This was my first time participating in the collage roundtable. I was invited by a friend, I knew most of the people in our group (one I didn’t). I had no idea what to expect, how it would work, how we would work together, or what I would get from the others. I really looked forward to receiving a collage in the mail every month, and my friend, who works at the post office, would always ask me “what’s in the package?” when she saw my delighted face. I would tell her about the project and she was excited too!

After unwrapping the package at home, I usually had to sit with the new collage for a few days, taking time out from a busy day to peek at it so I could start to figure it out. Each one was a little like a puzzle, but not all the pieces fit (to me, aesthetically). I really struggled with a few. I wanted to figure out what the previous person or people had intended or were thinking or feeling, like cracking a code. But often, it didn’t seem like there was a code at all, just secret personal decisions made as to where and what images were placed, some spoke to me and others did not. That’s when I would feel a little discouraged.

Deciding on what materials to use was also part of it. We were not sticking strictly to magazine or other printed materials, though probably that was the most popular. For me, the materials also guided what I was doing. Finally, when I was ready to go up to the studio and tackle the newest collage to try imagery that had been gestating over the past few days, I would try different materials, based on my own secret personal decisions of where I thought they should go. I would leave pieces for a day or two before gluing them down and often move, eliminate or add some. The feeling to “stop” was pretty clear, and I would. Then, wait for it to dry. Pack it back up, drive to the post office where my friend would say, “collage?” And I would with a smile, “yes,” and off it would go to my collaborator in Connecticut to unwrap and puzzle over too.

When I received the one I started back, I was pleasantly surprised! I only did a few little things to it, but was very happy with it (though I heard others had struggled with it). I would do this collaboration again! So much to learn about my own process of deciding where things go, and how to work with other people’s choices. Looking forward to next year!

To Marty: I was not able to attend the exhibit, but I think you have compiled some of the BEST exhibition documentation, ever! Thank you!

Darlene Sardinsky [2024]

I have always believed that experiences are what you make them and this was a truly beautiful one thanks to all of the people that I collaborated with.

I love collage, the freedom and intuitive form of art that allows our souls to spill on paper. I eagerly awaited everyone’s collage delivery month after month, sometimes waiting to open the package because the anticipation is as glorious as the initial viewing of the piece. It just felt right to collaborate and explore outcomes with fellow artists. Then, the grand finale that I unfortunately cannot view in person being that I live in New Jersey is so impressive. All of the work that went into it and the professional gallery set up. I am honored and humbled to be a part of this beautiful experience. Thanks everyone!

Janice Kuchinka [2024]

I have not looked forward to mail so much since I was growing up and wanted to be a mail carrier! I enjoyed the collage experience and seeing everyone’s ideas. The finished collage that I initiated looks great! I am amazed at the variety of finished works. Thanks for this great opportunity!

Arlene Tribbia [2024]

collage collaboration after note

The collage I made began with a simple idea – the moon.

And it grew into a story about billionaires racing to the moon in a land grab over celestial and lunar rights.

The collages I received from fellow collaborators arrived with their own stories. Whenever I opened a package it was always with reverence and astonishment that another person who I didn’t know and had never met was sending me their artwork, trusting me with their precious creation.

And it was precious because what we do and how we spend our time is our life.

When I looked at the collages I received I tried to imagine the story it was offering and I wondered, sometimes for quite a while about what I might add.

In one piece, all I added was a tiny pink star. In another, I added a painted gold cloud.

I don’t know if these pieces were removed or not. One gorgeous blue color I added to a collage was removed.

When I received my collage back it was irrevocably changed and I fell in love with it.

The collage collaboration eventually seemed to me to offer an uncanny mirror up to how we approach anything.

Camille Pietrow [2024]

This is my second time participating in this collage experience. The first time, I had no idea what to expect. I thought it was all about the art that we created.

The second time around, I was more relaxed and I could truly appreciate how talented my team members are. Everyone has different talents, views, experiences and skills. I loved taking it all in and it was exciting to create something unique together. This collage experience was about building relationships with fellow artists, knowing we all have a love for art and allowing ourselves to be open and creative. Thank you for this opportunity to explore and make new friends.

Cristina Sayers [2024]

My expectations to collaborate with other collage artists, I had to be open and artistically vulnerable to their contributions.

From the starting point of the canvas I created and sent off to creatively mature by our Collage TEAM.
The finally ending was a completely different interpretation from my aesthetic collage work- and that in its self fulfilled my desires from a Collaboration aspect- as a artistic growing experience.
From my collage signature, allowing each Artist contributor to have their voices heard was a at times difficult. But ultimately we were contributing as group, in a joint effort to coordinate and carry out the requirements of our project. I hope to be invited back again.

Judy Weaver [2025]

I often wonder if the positive impact of the Postal Collage Project could ever be assessed.

I think about all the steps that people go through to be a part of it and how many ways it can affect our lives positively, even in the smallest ways. The connections with ourselves and with others for instance. From learning more about ourselves to getting to know other participants and the act of collaboration! It’s so incredibly simple in a way and at the same time has a myriad of benefits.

I really appreciate having the creative opportunity, anticipating, preparing, imagining, gathering possibilities, trying things out. Hardest part is making up my mind! Next is receiving my group’s work, often so very different and challenging but inspiring me to think ‘outside the box’ and to contribute to their pieces in the spirit of collaboration! The range of possibilities is endless so it can tax my Gemini mind to choose what I will add. And there’s the notes from some artists which can illuminate, define, or sometimes request certain treatment for their collage (which I am free to use or not). All in the process of learning and working with others!

Finishing my starters has taken me to places I’d have never imagined, opened me up to what the other collaborators have seen, and making my choices for the final piece. And then there is the always astounding experience of seeing these hundreds of finished collages hung in a gallery and getting to talk about the process and how much it means to me. It touches me in a very special way and I believe that is shared by many other collaborators.

[To Marty] So however long the Postal Collage Project continues, I will support, love and appreciate this opportunity, the process and most of all, you and Ingrid for making it possible. The project’s growth is a sign we need more positive ways in this world for people to work together, get to know each other, share different points of view, even disagree. The Postal Collage Project encourages that in subtle ways.

And I really like supporting the Post Offices too!

Santa Cruz, California, March 2024

Andrea Lewicki, Special Agent Collage Collective [2024]

It felt like a wild idea for Special Agent Collage Collective to do the Postal Collage Project as one of our missions but I reached out to Marty anyway.

He welcomed our participation and I put it on SACC’s activity schedule for 2023. This group had pulled off a few complicated interactive projects already, and by the time Postal Collage Project would begin, our first external collaboration would be behind us (Circulaire 132, a mail art zine that has been published monthly by R.F. Cote since 2008). Plus, everyone involved had followed through on at least one challenge, a requirement for earning their membership in the collective.

When I first contacted Marty, I estimated we’d have enough interested folks for 5 groups, 6 at most for a multi-month project that depended heavily on everyone doing their part, including the postal network. That tracked with participation in previous missions but I’d overlooked how quickly our membership was growing. We ended up with 89 participants organized into 18 groups. This was indeed a wild idea!

Since we were such a large group, we self-organized. This allowed us to start earlier and add an extra component — documenting the finished collages in an issue of the SACC zine. To bring some uniformity to our approach and put some of the SACC flavor into it, tighter guidelines were issued in the Mission Briefing. Starter collages would be 4×6 inches or smaller, and we would work only in black and white (grayscale acceptable) until the final round with everyone finishing their pieces with elements of color.

I kept track of the first round pretty closely and was relieved when we cleared the hurdle on getting 90 starter collages circulating. After that, I sent monthly reminders but let progress play out. It was exciting to watch! There is an emotional component to this project that is hard to convey upfront. There is a great deal of trust involved, and so much of what happens is out of your hands. I was glad I participated in Project #12 so I could anticipate when to offer assurance or extra guidance.

Somewhere between rounds 3 and 4, the inevitable chaos began to bloom. Collages were lost. The postal service of a certain European country remained as notoriously unreliable as ever. Members of our group were faced illness, grief, and unpredictable life circumstances that understandably put this concern on a far back burner. A few went on wonderfully long holidays or forgot about this project altogether.

By the dawn of 2024, it appeared that a third of the collages would not make it full circle. I knew when we kicked off last summer that it was unrealistic we’d get 100% completion, but that didn’t make it any easier when folks were disappointed after progress stalled. I also didn’t want to move forward with the zine if so many of the participants would not be represented in it. But maybe adjustments were possible.

I proposed a new plan to Marty: instead of sending all of our collages to Berkeley for the exhibition in May 2024, we could display them in Seattle near SACC HQ, adding a few precious weeks to our timeline and turning the Postal Collage Project exhibition into a two-city event. I had already reserved gallery space for SACC for another one of our missions, and there was room to accommodate our Postal Collage Project pieces. Marty agreed with the updated course of action, and there were several Special Agents who rallied with renewed enthusiasm at the news.

We took it just a little farther after that. I reached out to the Special Agents whose starter collages seemed least likely to make it full circle and offered to place them in SOS groups, following the same rules but with only 3 people. Those groups are now off and running. Best case scenario, each of those participants gets two finished collages to the finish line. At least more Special Agents will experience the full-circle collaborative process. It remains to be seen how this will play out, but we’re giving it a shot.

Since SACC began in 2021, members have suggested an add-and-pass challenge and Postal Collage Project was a perfect fit. It’s allowed us to interact and collaborate with each other more than before, and I hope that it has established collage friendships that continue once the project is completed. I am so grateful to Marty for welcoming us and to every Special Agent who chose this adventure!

Andrea Lewicki, Founder and Agent 001, Special Agent Collage Collective

Helen Sizemore [2024]

Having had positive experience in the past, I was so disappointed that participation ended with one disappeared artist and my original was not returned , either with or without additions from others. Not knowing what caused the breakdown, I will expect integrity from participants in the future.

Priscilla Otani [2024]

When I got my Project 12 collage back from my group, I was hard pressed to pull all the disparate elements together. The collage was dense with images and each person was telling their own story.

The cacophony of images led me to muse on the chatter generated by NextDoor. Once I made the connection, it was a lot of fun to tie everything together through the peculiar vocabulary of NextDoor. I tend to make social statement art in my own art practice but was not planning on making one on this project so was surprised and pleased that the piece ended up as a commentary on neighborhood surveillance.

Lisa McElroy [2024]

Although my group comes from the same online Artist Alliance Community I belong to, and we live in the same area, I had never met them before this project. I also didn’t know what kind of art they do, or their personal aesthetics.

This project was an interesting way to get to know other artists and to find out how they put things together, how they communicate visually and what kinds of collage/mixed-media materials they each gravitate toward. And then to tie all that in together in one final project–that is truly the nature of collaboration. There’s also an element of trust involved, trust that each member of the group will participate thoughtfully and send the results on for the next person. That is also a part of getting to know people, the trust element. I enjoyed participating not only for the art experience, but for the social aspect–that was a nice surprise.

Mike McGarry [2019]

For a variety of reasons, I found this entire process incredibly discouraging.

Most of the others in this project were in my men’s group here, so they could simply hand their projects to each other, but I had to mail mine each time to Toby in Santa Cruz, a process that added extra time and inconvenience.

Then, apparently I didn’t use the best adhesive, because I found out later that some of the major contributions I made to other collages were no longer present on those collages—it was if my contributions to those, work of which I had been proud, were erased.

Finally, I got my own back: it was hideous and unrecognizable, with absolutely no trace of anything I had originally done. I felt zero connection to it—in fact, I felt completely repulsed by it. I considered setting it on fire and presenting the charred remains at the final viewing, but I felt that would be too passive-aggressive. I simply threw it in the garbage.

This entire experience has completely turned me away from ever participating in any kind of shared art project again, and in fact, it probably will be quite some time before I have any appetite to explore creating visual arts at all.

BACK TO THE TOP

Irene Nelson

I enjoyed the process- another variable on the theme of art making and letting go.

Lindsay Fox

This project makes me a bit giddy. I’m nervous the original creators won’t like what I do/that I’ll ruin their work.

I love using this part of my brain. I feel like I’m at summer camp being resourceful and working with these strangers that I know in a limited capacity but feel closer to them working on a project together.

Patricia Prieto Blanco

Participating in Round Table has been both a challenge and a very rewarding experience. The beauty of this project, to me, is that it is open to anyone regardless of craft, education and to some extent income.

The first time around I was a bit nervous about my participation as I am not a trained artist but I was equally excited to collaborate across time and space with like minded people. At the start I thought of collage as something that is mostly paper based. Most of the pieces I worked on proved my assumption wrong. There are so many materials that can be part of a collage and there are so many different methods to incorporate them into the artwork! I remember working with eggshells, thread and old leather luggage tags in Project No. 4. Following the development of the collages through the photographs participants uploaded in the forum was very exciting. The second time around, however, I decided to go a little more blind and let the work surprise me live rather than virtually. Also, I had very little time the second time around as I was writing my PhD. The flexibility of collage and of Round Table allowed me to still be able to participate as no intense labour is expected. My strategy was to work with the four elements: air, water, fire and earth. I guess I did a bit of land-art and let the elements do their impact on the pieces without much input on my part. In Project No. 5 and No. 6 I have worked in a group with family and friends. I thought it would be a good way of getting to know my partner’s family a bit better as well as to keep in touch with them as the Atlantic separates us. Collaborating with friends is a bit tricky as deadlines get extended and excuses multiply somehow. However, the process of going back and forth does bring people closer together, at least that is what I felt. This is also the reason why I firmly believe this method has much potential to be applied in other networks or even to be used to create trust and rapport among people who haven’t met or among communities whose assumptions and prejudgements from one another prevent them from getting to know each other.

jori marie rillera

each month that i received a collage in the mail, i hoped to find a spark, something to ignite my creativity. but instead, i found what came my way dispiriting and uninspiring.

elements seemed slapped together without much thought or care. rather than artists responding to each collage individually and making specific choices, it looked like whatever material came to hand was the order of the day. i had expected more of a conversation through our collective collaging, a collaboration. each month, i struggled to make sense of all the disparate parts, to find some sort of relationship between the colors, images and objects. i sought to create a more cohesive whole, where the pieces spoke together, rather than babbled in nonsensical cacophony. and then, i received my collage after it had made the rounds. it was cut into pieces. to my knowledge, the other collages had largely remained intact. if i were younger, i think i would have been devastated. but, finally, i understood. nothing was in my control. what i held in my hands was the conversation: i just needed to listen. this was the collaboration: i just needed to fully participate. “letting go of all expectation and working with what is,” sums up the whole of what 2020 was like for me and so many others. i had hoped this project would bring a respite, something different, something unexpected, something marvelous. what this experience has taught me is to first look within.

C.K. Itamura

Managing initial expectations and attachments to outcomes; honoring the spirit of cooperation and respecting different points of view and ideas; the acceptance of reality while exercising the ability to reimagine: these things and more are at the core and are the brilliant essence of the Roundtable Postal Collage Project.

Julie Fischer

It gave me an opportunity to explore working in a medium I usually do not work in, plus the added bonus of collaborating with others I don’t know and getting to see the piece thru their eyes with what has been added to the collage.

Judy Weaver [2018]

I’m a 7 year veteran of the Postal Collage Project and a very grateful participant.
Each year has brought new experiences, connections, surprises, challenges and appreciation. I would not have missed a single one!

I love this Project. Every year I work with people that I have never met, people who I might know, friends, family. Every year I get 5 opportunities to have my mind challenged, expanded, and even blown. The first challenge is creating my own starter collage, knowing that 4 other people are going to add to it. Next challenges? I will be adding/changing each of their starter collages. What will they think of my changes? How will I feel about their changes to the one I started? I am sure you can imagine…. Some collages are easy to work on. There is a thread of communality, of color and shape and subject matter that I can relate to. Other collages may have the opposite effect – what were they thinking? Time to get out of my comfort zone, expand my concepts, open my mind. The greatest challenge is control. Collaborative art is a different ball game. Some like it, some don’t. Try it! It’s a helluva lot of fun!!!! And by the way, you get the final chance to do whatever you want to your starter collage after the rest of your group has finished with it. Even burn it! But deliver the ashes to Marty so he can include it in the Collage exhibits. Thank you, Marty, for bringing this opportunity to us and for all the work you do to make it happen, including each year’s shows of Postal Collage work!

Ben Hoz

[To Marty] For me the round table collaboration has been a fortunate and wonderful occasion to dive into an activity that I greatly enjoy but otherwise have not pursued since decades.

I am grateful for you organizing it and allowing me to participate. I have had many wonderful conversation over the years about this experience with you as well to help me go through baffling, frustrating, joyful, etcetera moments.

Joaquín O’Ryan

For the purpose of this collective collages, we dedicate a whole bedroom in our house since our former housemates left. Also, we have asked for old magazines and newspapers at a group we have created in social media in which people from Mytilene offer things for free instead of throwing them away.

This group has been working for more than a year and it is quite successful. We got many old Greek magazines from the 70’s that we leaf through to find out how every single one of the cartoons were either sexiest or racist. Anyways, we started the project celebrating and we are reflecting also on how the pieces of the collage are deprived from their context to jump into a whole new world of interpretation, with the new narratives that we carry in our minds and spirits. Different feeling while doing this first step: a collage is an invitation to defy the notion of the single author, and is an invitation to reuse -symbolically or physically- the scraps and make them a different meaning (ful-less) whole, a small flat manifest of the redundancy of which we are all part of, and the persistent need to be also more than that. From Lesvos, an island in which hundred of thousand have pass by from East to West the last 7 years, we start filling up some of the 5 canvas that mumbles some ideas, not connected to each other (or maybe they are, we will see) that will travel over seas to meet you.

Heidi Kitlas [2018]

Partnering with my son, Lucas (6 years old), on the collage started as a fun art project to do together. It was also a great way for me to feel a continued connection to the SF area, where I used to live.

Every project I embark on with Lucas teaches me about first and last impressions. As we began to discuss and create our original collage, he worried about mailing his work away and insisted on creating a duplicate collage, just in case he didn’t like how ours changed. Collaborating on other original works shifted his perspective and ideas about our involvement and ways we can carry a theme or put his ‘mark’ on a larger project.

He was excited to receive mail from Ireland knowing it had traveled around the world and we discussed each place the works had been.

When we were anticipating the arrival of our original piece, Lucas was anxious and concerned he would be upset about what it would look like. He asked if we could not use what the rest of our group did and start over. When we sent ours off initially, we included some language about how we conceived the idea to start the collage. When we received our original back, Lucas was overwhelmed with the result and especially loved that each group member continued to describe why they added what they did. Our group’s respect for the original intention of the work, for Lucas, made an irreplaceable impact. We were both touched by the creativity and thoughtfulness. The pride of effort and collaboration, seeing a project through and learning from others, working together on a creative, long term goal, were incredible lessons and an experience we will not forget.

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Jay Long [2014]

Wow, I don’t remember what I was thinking. I guess I admire Marty McCutcheon and I thought ‘is collaborative collage fun?’.

We’re old friends and Marty definitely lobbied me a little, with an unabashed emphasis on persuasion. I only participated for one season and it was definitely something new. Things came in the mail that were art instead of just my bills, so that part was definitely good. I received collages from all over the place, and I guess I sent mine all over the place. I suppose the only way to judge them, if you could, is by the results. I’ve only seen photographs of the resulting collaborations in some of the venues that they were displayed in, and it looked very cool. My hat is off to Mr. McCutcheon for inspiring, enlisting, and cultivating enthusiasm for what was clearly a labor of love, in endeavoring so many disparate parts into a cohesive display of creativity.

Mike Fusello

“Beginning is half” old Chinese proverb
I remember this proverb every time I’m stuck or procrastinating on a collage — and when I finally do something, it’s like “hey, that wasn’t so hard… why did it take so long?”

KJ, London 2018

When I was growing up in the sixties, ‘collaboration’ was a dirty word. Collaborators were dreadful people who dealt with fascists, and Collaborators were those who went to bed with nazis.

The word carried a stigma in all its tenses. A Collaborationist was someone whom you didn’t want to meet or deal with, and far less was someone you wanted to be. Now I struggle to remember how joint creativity in any form was described, but ‘collaboration’ wasn’t the term in use. Perhaps because of this I was suspicious of creative partnerships. Lennon and McCartney were obvious exceptions as were Watson and Crick, as are a host of others before and since in the fields of science, engineering, music, film, fashion, economics and politics. In visual art Warhol had his factory, it was a concept made manifest, but however assembled, no matter how many were involved in the conceptualization and making, the output was definitely Andy’s. Others too had their teams of studio assistants and saw no difficulty in signing the work. Bridget Riley comes to mind. I could waive my suspicions and forgive the collaborations of scientists, musicians, and film-makers, and could see that in a building no architect need lay a brick. In painting, poetry, and fiction I thought I saw a different dynamic where an editor’s steadying artistic or commercial hand may indeed contribute mightily, but where at beginning and end, the author was alone. Brian Eno spoke of collaborating with groups of musicians where the results turned out (to be) ‘not bad’. He concluded his remarks with the telling thought that while not bad can be good enough, good enough is not very interesting. Never-the-less, I was challenged by the potential of visual collaboration. I put the idea to my undergraduate colleagues that we as visual artists could perform Hamlet, by each for example, interpreting the role of a character in the play in painting or print. The idea was met with derision. It was too ambitious, and too much like hard work, and possibly some hadn’t read or didn’t like the play. Mostly though, it was rejected because the idea wasn’t theirs’, neither was the concept, and nor did they see how they could maintain control over the output. Loss of control, the last element of my student colleagues’ objections, is the most common negative reaction to the idea of collaborative work that I hear from visual artists. Control of the result however achieved is everything to the artist, so they ask, why allow another hand and another mind to intrude? It’s a good question and not one with an easy answer. Can the self-important artist ever collaborate in a poem or painting? It doesn’t seem possible. But, look at Round Table. If making visual art is a public performance, look at Round Table. If the result of the process of making visual art is important, look at Round Table. If speed of thought and an open mind with an element of obligation indeed pressure, spurs creativity, look at Round Table. Control be hanged. Control is in the lap of the gods. I value collaborative work, not because I cede control, but because it forces me out of my self-centered studio importance into confronting ideas and images that I could never have conceived. Much collaborative art results in an apparently incoherent mass of influences, and think Brian Eno’s ‘good enough’, but occasionally the results are transcendental and the artists who have collaborated making the art, have simultaneously taken the artist out of the art. Pure art. Look at Round Table.

Levi Mahoney

Just as prison is a microcosm of society, the Round Table Postal Collage Project is a microcosm of human communication.

It starts on the internet, traverses its way across the globe via snail mail, and ends IRL with a series of exhibitions in various locales. Human communication in Ancient & Modern forms. And in any form of human communication, whether it’s cocktail party chatter, a legal brief, or inmates talking trash, there will be ups and downs. The RTPCP is no different. One moment you’re in divine communion with your soul mate, the next you find yourself in an excruciatingly uncomfortable silence, two complete strangers avoiding eye contact and unwilling to say a word. But there is always a way out. Time & Edit Time spent waiting. Time spent contemplating. Time spent searching for themes in shape or color or emotion. Time spent talking to oneself. Time spent Edit In prison, in communication, in the Round Table Postal Collage Project, one should always have Edit Edit.

Scott Panton

RTPCP: Disgust, surprise, honesty, and lies. Never finished. Enjoyable when enjoyed. It’s a mirror.

Domingo Martinez

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Brian Sherman [2018]

The Postal Collaboration Collage [PCC] project exemplifies one of my favorite quotes. It’s by constructionist Mark di Suvero [there’s a great early piece of his in SF MOMA] It goes ” . . . . all art is equal because we know the joy of making it.”

I find the quote apt for all the PCC #7 collages I saw on display at their initial showing in Marty’s Berkeley studio at the end of March. PCC #7 was my first participation in the Postal Collaboration Collage project. I had happened upon the display of the collages from PCC #5 at Ramon’s Tailor gallery so I had some sense of the norms for participation. From those collages I saw from PCC #5 I inferred, for example, it’s okay to add 3-D material to a collage, as long, I supposed, you can send it through the mail. I made additions of string to two of our group’s collages I also inferred from PCC #5 one could put material on top of material already put there by someone earlier in the sequence. This I did. And I didn’t mind when, at the display in Marty’s studio, I saw someone had glued material on top of material I had put on collages earlier in the sequence. I accepted it in the spirit of our postal collaboration. I missed Postal Collaboration Collage #6, but here I am in PCC #7. I have been making collages for several years and I have some experience with collaborative artistic creation — but almost always where all the creators are present in the same space. PCC #7 was my first time with collaborative art by mail where the collaborators all worked on the same art work. I like the collages I create to reflect progressive social values. These include public transit and non-commercial community radio, so the raw materials I use most frequently are the dark-blue on light-blue schedules of MARTA, the metro Atlanta transit system where I live [and don’t drive — a socio-political commitment since 1986] and broadcast schedules from WRFG = “Radio Free Georgia — your independent 100,000-watt community radio station for progressive information” I have a high regard for postal workers and for the postal service so I was pleased we’d be using the US mails with the trust our collages would get to whom we were sending them. And they did! Bravo US postal workers for all the good work you do! [and shame on the politicos who don’t appreciate your work and dedication]. It was easy enough starting my own collage with the usual cut-up pieces from MARTA bus schedules, WRFG flyers, and a few other colorful sources. I mailed my starter collage to Bar who was next in our group’s sequence. The complete sequence was: Bar to Amy to David to Julie to Brian and back to Bar plus four other variants of the same sequence with each of the five of us a starter/finisher on one collage. As the other collages came to me I enjoyed the contrasts in our styles. Julie’s style was careful exquisite filigree She provided the most delicacy to our group’s collages. Both Amy and David were like photorealists using images of real objects including people. Between them they created some wonderful alignments of materials, especially of buildings along a body of water in one of the collages. Judging from the way they cut out the materials they pasted on the collages I would say Amy and David are both very skillful with scissors. They remind me of the great Kenyan collagist Wangechi Mutu who wears “a tiny pair of scissors in the shape of a stork” dangling from a necklace. Bar’s style was like the best of creatively humorous pop art. He started his collage not on a sheet of paper but on the circular cardboard from a pizza box. Either Bar and/or someone along the string after him [Amy, David, or Julie] attached some three-dimensional items to his collage, including a coiled spring and also what looked like two dark greenish blobs of plastic deformed from some utilitarian shape like a soda pop bottle. Kudos not only to Bar for his artistry but also to the postal service for getting Bar’s collage undamaged to each of us in sequence and then back to Bar in California. When it got to me there were still some bare sections in the collage on Bar’s pizza cardboard, so I glued various small colorful papers on the barest sections. Amy’s and David’s collages, on the other hand, were completely covered before they were mailed to me. I realized I would have to add my contributions on top of material already there. I had each of these two collages on my wall for two or three weeks contemplating where and how I could make additions which would add to the esthetic appeal of the collages yet not obstruct what was already there. I eventually made my additions and sent both collages to Bar who was next in the sequence. Presumably he faced [and solved] the same dilemma. There was a Robert Rauschenberg retrospective at SF MOMA the same week the Postal Collaboration #7 collages were on display in Marty’s studio. In the 1950s Rauschenberg was a pioneer in using found objects in art. Now it’s the 2010s and the found objects sensibility has permeated contemporary art-making culture. The collages in PCC #7 exemplify this flourishing sensibility with beauty, creativity, and delight. [The quote about Wangechi Mutu is from Sarah Thornton’s 33 ARTISTS IN 3 ACTS, p. 57.] [The Mark di Suvero quote is in OPEN HEARING, a compilation of artist statements distributed by the Art Workers Coalition in New York City in 1969, p. 99.]