Creating junk mail art is a great visual art practice if you don’t already have one. It’s the perfect art material. We were going to throw it out anyway.
We tend not to attach to, and invest in it like we do brand new markers, paints, canvases or smooth blank pages.
We are more inclined to roll with the adventure because hey, it’s junk! Our expectations are low.
A lot of junk mail is aesthetically interesting.
I’m rarely interested in the solicitation but often, I’m crazy about the intricate, innovative packaging. I stash them as templates for envelopes and flier folds when I send “good mail” (postal art) to friends.
When I began playing with junk mail I recognized it as yet another metaphor for seeing the possibilities for play in everyday life.
“[The residual purpose of art is] purposeless play. This play, however, is an affirmation of life – not an attempt to bring order out of chaos nor to suggest improvements in creation, but simply a way of waking up to the very life we’re living, which is so excellent once one gets one’s mind and one’s desire out of its way and lets it act of its own accord.” Artist and writer Keri Smith channeling composer, music theorist, artist, and philosopher John Cage