9 x 9 Update / 36 Participants

One of my weekly routines is to hit up the thrift stores. Sometimes I spice in a little off-brand dollar store shopping to this routine. My favorite off-brand dollar store chain is called Mighty Dollar. There’s a couple around the area but the one in Thomasville is the one I end up going to  most often. I mainly look for weird things to use in mail art. They have a lot of remainder and “fell of the truck” type of stuff. I buy stickers, tape, strange pens, and whatever strikes my fancy. Out of the blue I saw these cheap wood boards. Inside of the frame were nine blocks that fit neatly together. I bought a couple of the boards without thinking what I might use them for.

The instructions for the project.

I stacked the boards off in the corner of my “making things” room. They sat there for a few months before I had the whim to make a collaborative project out of it. My idea was to send a block to each person, have them fill it up, and then they could send it back to me. Initially I was just sending the blocks out to people, which wasn’t particularly affordable, especially not when people in Europe got involved. Like an idiot I sent the block as is to them which cost about 13.00 dollars. I posted about the price online and someone solved the puzzle, “Just send out a piece of paper the size of the blocks.” Genius.

Once I started to get some artwork back, I set up an online group to share the images and to create a little community around the project. A lot of the initial people involved were non-mail art folks so I wanted them to be more involved in the process. Once a board was completed I maneuvered the blocks into a couple patterns I thought were interesting and had the groups voted on which they liked. I hate when I get involved in a project like this and don’t see how it came together or even if it was finished. I wanted the artists to see and get to play a part in the completion of the project.

At this point I’ve finished four boards in the project. It feels like it's a nice place for an update. I’m not stopping at four (I have ten more people to mail a square to) I’m simply filling everyone in on how things are going.

The first four pushed together.

The top left board is board number one. The one directly to the right of that one is board two. Bottom left is board three and the one to the right is board four. Below is a list of everyone that has contributed so far.

Heidi Abrassart – Sirault Belgium – Board 3
Artista Daily – Taylor MI – Board 1
Richard Baudet – Marseille France – Board 4
Allan Bealy – Brooklyn NY – Board 3
Catherine M. Bennett – Columbus OH – Board 4
Breanna Boulton – Uniontown OH – Board 2
Jennifer + Josh Boyle – Lexington NC – Board 1
Kevin G. Brandtner – Vienna Austria – Board 4
Joao Casetela Cravo – Portugal – Board 3
Brooke Cooks – Seattle WA – Board 1
Angie Cope – Port Washington WI – Board 1
Creative Thing – Cypress CA – Board 3
Toni Hanner – Eugene OR – Board 2
Jan Hodgman – Anacortes WA – Board 1
Laura Hortal – Winston Salem NC – Board 1
Amy Irwen – Rosemount MN – Board 2
Tiina Kainulainen – Helsinki Finland – Board 3
Audrey Knox-Averett – Omaha NE – Board 2
Susanna Lakner – Stuttgart Germany – Board 2
Patricia Landon – Del Ray Beach FL – Board 1
Phillip Lerche – Columbus OH – Board 4
Mars Tokyo – Baltimore MD – Board 3
Kathy McIntire – Little River SC – Board 1
William Mellott – Tainan Taiwan – Board 4
Tina Morris – Whitby UK – Board 4
Sabine Munchow – Bremen Germany – Board 2
Katerina Nikoultsou – Thessaloniki Greece – Board 2
Michael Orr – Clarkston GA – Board 3
Jeremy Paddock – Tallahassee FL – Board 2
Joey Patrickt – Oakland CA – Board 4
Duke Petree – Oklahoma City OK – Board 2
Camilla Post – The Netherlands – Board 1
Carmela Rizzuto – Sunnyvale CA – Board 3
David Stafford – Santa Fe NM – Board 4
Strangroom – Somerville MA – Board 3
Tamara Wyndham – NY NY – Board 4