Existing comment:
John Calvert Palmer, aka Rudi Rubberoid (1927–2012, American)
Sheet of Artistamps, ca. 1990
John C. "Jack" Palmer, aka Rudi Rubberoid, was an artist who got involved with the international mail art community in the early 1980s. Palmer owned and operated a stationery store in Bellingham, Washington. His first contacts with mail art came from his friend Bob Urso, who encouraged Palmer to use his rubberstamp designs for mail art. Though Palmer went by many aliases, he was most well known as Rudi Rubberoid and as the editor of the Rubber Fanzine. While Palmer is most remembered for his sense of humor, his work also had a political bent. These artistamps, bearing a rubber-stamp image with the phrase "What About Politics?" and the words "anarchy," "pornography," "homosexuality," and "gonzopost," demonstrate how mail artists were using the postal system to circulate materials and increase communication about topics that were banned from distribution through the post, an indicator to the recipient that mail art is a form of communication in which no topic is censored.
-- Jessica Perry |