Carly Toyzan: Can you describe when you believe mail art started and why artists started to do it?

The real start was when the communication with mail was used as a medium for art. Ray Johnson did start experimenting with this but the term Mail-Art was thought out by someone else. Why artists started this? The need to communicate. The need to send art to someone who doesn't want to buy it but who can react to it. The need to have an audience for art that isn't accepted by the galleries and standardd musea. Just a lot of reasons and the time for something new.

Carly Toyzan:There seems to be some disagreeance about when mail art started and why it started. From what I've read, some believe it started the 50's

When Mail-art started is a difficult question. It all depends on how you want to see things. Best way to explain it is to cite the Wikipedia definition. You can read it all here:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mail-Art

Where it reads: An amorphous international mail art network, involving thousands of participants in over fifty countries, evolved between the 1950s and the 1990s It was influenced by other movements, including Dada and Fluxus.

It also explains a lot of different versions about the History....

Funny is that I started this entry in the Wikipedia on Mail-Art. Somebody told me that there was nothing there on the subject and I started to write for them. The current version is altered many times by many people, but it is funny to realize I started something there.