Commonpress 16: Artists’ Postage Stamps.
Three Cinderella stamps affixed & black & white illus. throughout. [31] loose leaves as issued, several larger folded sheets. 8vo, printed wrappers & re-used envelope band, signed & numbered by the editor. Antwerp: 1979.
The 16th issue of Commonpress, edited by collector and independent publisher Guy Schraenen (1941-2018), and produced in an edition of 100 signed and numbered copies. WorldCat records only two copies, in Spain and Belgium. It presents the works of artists such as Anna Banana, Vittore Baroni, Paulo Bruscky, Henryk Bzdok, Ulises Carrión, Robin Crozier, Klaus Groh, Ko de Jonge, Tommy Mew, Pawel Petasz, Ruth Wolf-Rehfeldt, Lon Spiegelman, etc., etc. A total of 31 artists contributed to the issue.
In excellent condition, with the envelope band preserved. Signed and numbered by Schraenen on the upper wrapper.
❧ “Petasz launched this travelling magazine in 1977, and it may have been contributed to the idea that, in Petasz’s opinion, if each issue was edited by a different person and therefore the place of publication also changed, Polish authorities would not be able to control editorial work or ban the magazine. After the first issue [published in December 1977] Petasz only undertook the task of coordination. The practice was that the person who wanted to edit a Commonpress issue could announce any topic freely. If they wanted to know which issue it would be, it was necessary to exchange letters with Petasz. Then in each finished Commonpress publication the planned topic of the next issues, the deadlines to hand in contributions and the address of the editors were announced. This way the magazine was passed from hand to hand and the participants handing in their works followed the wandering addresses of editors to any part of the world. By this means Commonpress published nearly 60 magazines of very different characters in several years…
“The whole project could be compared to one big assembling whose centre does not receive contributions by the artists but the editors participating in it present different magazines under a common title. The issues themselves hardly resembled assemblings, since they were Mail Art compilations…”–Géza Perneczky, Assembling Magazines: 1969-2000 (2007), pp. 72-73.
Price: $500.00
Item ID: 11390
