Wednesday, September 24, 2008

Post Cards from the Selv-edge

As with the last postcard, there was something that bothered me about this one. Can you guess what it is?

Here is the back. It was pretty bland.
Now the new front. There is one slight change. It bothered me (heaven knows why!) that the fish was in a can while in his watery environment. So I cut him a little window so that he could see. Now he is wearing a "costume". A little strange perhaps, but with Halloween coming and his tale and bottom fin sticking out from behind the can, I thought that it would work.
On the back is where I did most of the work. I laid some gold paper that I had over the whole back and then glued down the "message".

When I was working as a gallery assistant one summer back in my student days, one of the things that I had to do was some typing. There was a computer of a very basic sort and I was much more familiar with the typewriter and so most of the time used that. It was one of those typewriters that had a corrector ribbon that would pick up the letters that you had hit by mistake. At one point during the summer, the ribbon that was in the machine became full and instead of throwing it out, I put it into my pocket and brought it home. Where I put it in a bin or drawer or container of some sort that was labeled " neat stuff". I thought that maybe I could weave with it.

Fast forward about 20 years and this little spool surfaces a couple of months ago when I was looking for something completely unrelated. I set it down on my dresser (handy horizontal surface that acts as a catch all) and when this postcard came in in all of its matt board stiffness, I knew that the letters (and some words) would be perfect for the back.

I unrolled the whole thing to look for what may act as a message and found some words and a lot of gibberish. But there are enough words that are recognizable that I am happy. I was very happy to find Fredericton amongst the gibberish and was able to put an address. Sort of. And I have to admit, that is one long postal code. ( As usual you can click on any photos to see a little larger version)

5 comments:

Anonymous said...

I know that you have been very busy with processing the garden's bounty so I have been patiently waiting for your blog once again. I must tell you that I really missed reading your blog.

You are very creative Jackie. Who would have thought that the fish needed a little window to see through.
Very cute indeed.

You know what they say, one person's junk is another person's treasure. You seem to have an awful lot of treasures. I like what you did with the correction ribbon.

Mamoo

Jackie said...

Are you saying that I am a junk collector?

Oh wait a minute! Looking around , I think that you may be right!

Anonymous said...

Okay, now I have it in writing, and in public. I'm not the only junk collector in the house. Okay, my junk may be bigger and more plentiful, but still...

And like Mamoo, I've very much missed reading the regular blog posts. Even though I know why you're busy, having chopped all of those peppers myself. You are going to show them, aren't you?

tanita✿davis said...

I love what you did with the letters, but how'd you get them OFF of the ribbon? Did you iron them... or something? I like the randomness of the message; it's like gibberish out of dreams.

I'm actually jealous you've stayed in one place long enough to know where a roll of typewriter ribbon was that you had twenty years ago. Oh, sure, you didn't know exactly where it was, but it was IN YOUR HOUSE. Twenty years ago... well, I have stuffed animals from then, but nothing actually useful, and as many times as I've moved, the ribbon would have been flung to the winds years ago.

PS - I'm VERY PEEVED the package we sent hasn't arrived. Whose postal service should we abuse, yours or ours?

David T. Macknet said...

You know, you really do some amazing work. Do you exhibit anywhere? I mean, really!