BRIAN HITSELBERGER
Artist / Writer / Publisher

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During the pandemic, I began working with the USPS as a collaborator.

It began when I saw reports of an increase in letter-writing during lockdown and social distancing. With the absence of physical contact, antiquated modes of communication gained new resonance. In this new context, a piece of mail became both a proxy and a vessel for physical touch.  





These pieces are made in my studio, then folded, taped, and sent through the mail to another party (a curator, artist, or exhibition space of some kind). As the work moves through the postal system, it accrues the marks of that trajectory on its various surfaces. Upon receipt, these works are opened and displayed in grids or other arrangements, making visible the distance traveled.


                           
This form opened a door for me. I began to explore the ways that images and language circulate, and how the forms of that movement might inform or dictate content.  

The physical distance these pieces travel also becomes embedded in their reading.

In the case of By Any Means (my largest mailer to date) I mailed the 40 individual units across a river: a distance of only several miles that I myself commute daily when going to and from my teaching job.

Other mailers travel a great distance.

During a residency on the Northern coast of Iceland,  I created a series of mailers as a form of description or note-taking, mailing them across the Atlantic to myself.  By the time I returned to my home studio, my notes were waiting for me. In this different context, they felt like reports from a foreign correspondent.  

BRIAN HITSELBERGER  © 2010 - 2025