Perception and Reading: "self seen" (qbdp # 70)

Chautauqua Institution, Chautauqua, New York

This cards had a slightly strange genesis. I wrew the four-color calligraph on the front of nine found cards while at Caroga Lake yesterday. Then, as I rode in a car a colleague of mine drove to Chautauqua Institution (in the southwest corner of New York) on our way to a meeting, I addressed as many of the cards as I could. Once at the Institution, I noticed it had its own post office, so I decided to write quick notes on the cards and finish addressing some of them and mail them from there so that they'd receive Chautauqua postmarks. I actually spent the night in Williamsville, New York, as this post makes clear.


Geof Huth, "self seen" (27 Jun 2005)
The recipients:

1. Ruth and Marvin Sackner

2. Bob Grumman

3. Roy Arenella

4. Ruud Janssen

5. Reed Altemus

6. Christopher Fritton

7. Scott Helmes

8. Dan Waber

9. qbdp

un violon d'ingres

Levels of Collaboration: "VRR," etc. (qbdp # 69)

Still Point, Caroga Lake, New York

A simple calligraph today, one I decided not to include in yesterday's "Digraphs & Trigraphs." I created these upon extras I had of Reed Altemus' Visual Poetry Collaboration cards. The front of each card included a collaboration between two verbo-visual artists, and I then added elements to each collaboration. This card I've kept includes what I think is my best (and only non-verbal) collaborative effort.


Reed Altemus & Jim Leftwich, "flake upper phase react" (2002) as modified by Geof Huth (Jun 2005)
The recipients:

1. Ruth and Marvin Sackner

2. Bob Grumman

3. Roy Arenella

4. Ruud Janssen

5. Reed Altemus

6. Paper Kite Press

Geof Huth, "VRR" (26 Jun 2005)
un violon d'ingres

Folded Words: "Digraphs and Trigraphs" (qbdp # 68)

Still Point, Caroga Lake, New York

Happy apoChristmas! which is that day in the exactly equidistant from two Christmases, June 25th, my younger brother's birthday.

This small booklet of calliglyphs took me a few hours to make, but I like it quite a bit. I wrew each glyph in a different color on a single sheet of paper I had folded into a six-page leaflet. I placed the leaflet into a small envelope of cream-colored laid paper, added a small Chinese chop mark and the title of the collection to the front of the envelope and added the colophon and a unique two-line message to the back of each envelope.


Geof Huth, "Digraphs & Trigraphs" (25 Jun 2005)
The recipients:

1. Ruth and Marvin Sackner

2. Bob Grumman

3. Roy Arenella

4. Ruud Janssen

5. kiyotei

6. Reed Altemus

7. Jukka-Pekka Kervinen

8. Paper Kite Press

9. RF Côté

10. Luc Fierens

11. Mick Boyle

12. Erin Huth

13. qbdp

un violon d'ingres

He Wrote the Written Writing Writ: "writ/WRAT/wrot" (qbdp # 67)

Holiday Inn Select, Room 360, Niagara Falls, New York

The "Select" is important in the name above because this Holiday Inn is one of two separate Holiday Inns on Third Street in Niagara Falls. I've been here in Niagara Falls (the US side) since yesterday, but I was too tired and too busy at the New York State Association of County Clerks conference to create a card yesterday, and tonight's card is pretty skimpy as well. I was trying to make a fidgetglyph (of sorts) that could accompany the nine numbered stickers I found in my new Moleskine notebook. Note that I matched the color of the postage stamp with the color of its respective sticker.


Geof Huth, "writ WRAT wrot" (21 Jun 2005)
The recipients:

1. Ruth and Marvin Sackner

2. Bob Grumman

3. Roy Arenella

4. Ruud Janssen

5. Reed Altemus

6. Jassy Lupa

7. Jukka-Pekka Kervinen

8. W. S. Wilson

9. qbdp

un violon d'ingres

The Way in Which Text Swirls in the Currents of the Air: "zephyr/ari3" (qbdp # 66)

Ramada Inn, Room 276, North Syracuse, New York

Another simple fidgetglyph created in a small edition, since my colleagues and I are meeting in Syracuse with a members of the advisory council I work with. I created the glyph while in Lake Placid, and I wrew the glyph onto the back of a handful of free Amazon.com postcards.


Geof Huth, "zephyr/ari3" (15 Jun 2005)The recipients:

1. Ruth and Marvin Sackner

2. Bob Grumman

3. Roy Arenella

4. Ruud Janssen

5. qbdp

un violon d'ingres

The Certain Symptom of the Sea: "Sssssssea" (qbdp # 65)

Crowne Plaza Lake Placid Resort, Room 236, Lake Placid, New York

I created this small fidgetglyph today while sitting in a session at the New York Association of Local Government Records Officers (NYALGRO) conference. It is quite simple and I made few copies because I have to spend lots of time with people at conferences! For some reason, I have decided to show only the fidgetglyph itself, rather than the entire card, but the address and colophon and postage stamp on this are primarily (or entirely) blue--as is the photograph of the Adirondack's Heart Lake, which graces the front of this card.


Geof Huth, "Sssssssea" (13 Jun 2005)
The recipients of this card were as follows:

1. Ruth and Marvin Sackner

2. Bob Grumman

3. Roy Arenella

4. Ruud Janssen

5. Mick Boyle

6. qbdp

un violon d'ingres

The Letter We Keep Curled Up in Our Pockets: "The Face of Type" (qbdp # 64)

Crowne Plaza Lake Placid Resort, Room 236, Lake Placid, New York

I created this small calliglyph while in Caroga Lake, so I wouldn't have to make one here tonight. I fashioned it to the back of a free "GoCARD" and quickly added the colophon and address. I went so quickly that I added the old name of this hotel to the card: the Holiday Inn Lake Placid. Oh, well.


Geof Huth, "The Face of Type" (12 June 2005)
The recipients of this card:

1. Ruth and Marvin Sackner

2. Bob Grumman

3. Roy Arenella

4. Ruud Janssen

5. Luc Fierens

6. Reed Altemus

7. qbdp

un violon d'ingres

How Green was My Night: "23 HEÜST" (qbdp # 63)

Still Point, Caroga Lake, New York

Once again at the lake, I put together a small mailing on a big and beautiful Krazy Kard postkard. I wrew the fidgetglyph in green with a fountain pen and added the address and colophon in green as well. Then I colored in the rectangular space for a stamp and a part of the Krazy Kat komic strip with green colored pencil. And added a green stamp. On the other side of the card, I replicated the final green flourish (from the point of the ellipses).

The lucky recipients of this card were as follows:


Geof Huth, "23 HEÜST" (11 Jun 2005)

1. Ruth and Marvin Sackner

2. Bob Grumman

3. Roy Arenella

4. Ruud Janssen

5. frips

6. qbdp

un violon d'ingres

The Varying Shapes of Meaning: "(k/p/[f/r])/ee(z/p)ing" (qbdp # 62)

Penn Station, Waiting Area for Passengers, New York, New York

While waiting for my turn to speak at a day-long workshop today, I doodled this single fidgetglyph, which examines the ambiguity of letterforms and written meaning. (Honest, it does.) Later, while waiting for my late-night train in Penn Station, I created seven of these cards and ran across the street to the all-night post office to mail them just before my train arrived.


Geof Huth, "(k/p/[f/r])/ee(z/p)ing" (10 Jun 2005The recipients of this card were as follows:

1. Ruth and Marvin Sackner

2. Bob Grumman

3. Roy Arenella

4. Ruud Janssen

5. Erin Huth

6. Paper Kite Press

7. qbdp

un violon d'ingres

Flags of Various Kinds: "oh my flagging" (qbdp # 61)

Park South Hotel, Room 506, New York, New York

My daughter Erin and I went to the penultimate day of a small exhibition of the work of Tom Phillips. I enjoyed the show and took with me a good collection of the small bifold catalog for the show. Back in my hotel room I cut the cover away from the rest of the catalog and ballpoint-penned this large fidgetglyph.


Geof Huth, "oh my flagging" (9 June 2005)The recipients of this card were as follows:

1. Ruth and Marvin Sackner

2. Bob Grumman

3. Roy Arenella

4. Ruud Janssen

5. Luc Fierens

6. Erin Huth

7. Paper Kite Press

8. Ron Silliman

9. Crag Hill

10. qbdp

un violon d'ingres

The Transmogrification of Lettershapes: "His Holiness of Rags" (qbdp # 60)

Poughkeepsie Grand Hotel, Room 718, Poughkeepsie, New York

Using a large advertisement postcard put out by the New York State Museum (which shares a building with my organization, the New York State Archives), I wrew a little calliglyph with walnut ink. Actually, I prepared the glyph ahead of time to save time, and I love using walnut ink because of the randomness of its tone and its wonderful nutty scent. This inkglyph is one of a series of visual poems examining how to reorganize the parts of calligraphic letters into new letterforms.


Geof Huth, "His Holiness of Rags" (8 June 2005)

The nine recipients of this card were as follows:

1. Ruth and Marvin Sackner

2. Bob Grumman

3. Roy Arenella

4. Ruud Janssen

5. frips

6. RF Côté

7. kiyotei

8. Erin Huth

9. qbdp

Mailart Station, Poughkeepsie Grand Hotel, Poughkeepsie, NY (9 June 2005)
un violon d'ingres

The Answ to Your Ques

I have a hard time conforming to the imaginations of others, so whenever I'm asked to produce a piece of work that fits a theme or whenever I try to collaborate with someone, I tend to be slow. It takes me a while to inspire myself under those conditions. So it's taken me quite a few months to produce this simple visual poem


Geof Huth, "answ" (29 May 2005)
for and add-and-pass booklet Litsa Spathi sent out from the Fluxus Heidelberg Center. But I finally did. I should've used a different ink for the blue (as I did when I made my copy of the poem), but otherwise it turned out okay. Note that I'm using a small black f as my signature for this poem.

un violon d'ingres

Faces and Skulls

RF Côté does beautiful work. Taking a large stiff card from the "Imperial Stereoscopic Anatomy of the Head and Neck," he adds the faces of people in the form of stamps and he glues new eyes into the empty sockets of the bottom photos of the skulls. These skulls are stereoscopic, so maybe I should pull out my old stereoscope and see if they still trick my eyes into seeing three dimensional forms.


RF Côté, "Imperial Stereoscopic Anatomy of the Head and Neck," Section--IX--No.--29" (26 Mai 2005)
un violon d'ingres

Belgian in Pink and Blue

The wonderful frips, sewer of cards, sent me a great little photocard with different pieces sewn or glued onto both sides of a piece of corrugated cardboard. The front shows us a blender filled with a pink concoction and set against a blue background.


frips, Card, Front (29 Mei 2005)
The colorful back--I don't usually show both sides of a card--just has the address, stamps, etc., but what a beautiful scene it is!


frips, Card, Back (29 Mei 2005)
un violon d'ingres

A Coincidence in Cardboard

Just before Roy left Forest Hills, New York, for Greenwich, New York--which is so far from New York City that it is pronounced "Greenwitch" instead of "Grennitch"--he wrote me a note on a glossy piece of paper that came with one of the storage boxes he was packing his stuff into. Roy folded the sheet into a little booklet and wrote me a note from the back of the booklet to the middle--changing pens three times!

He also included in the envelope a bit of cardboard, with this message:

Roy Arenella, "A Natural Mark Becoming a Letter" (24 May 2005)
Roy was so rushed that he couldn't even be sure what the number was for this mailing; he had to say "117X (I think)," where the X means I don't know what since it usually means Xerox!

un violon d'ingres