Junk mail is a veritable plague on our planet. Those seemingly innocuous catalogues, unwanted credit card applications and pathetic flyers advertising sales at big box stores, all have a lethal effect on the planet. The majority of junk mail is printed on virgin forest and an estimated 100 million trees are cut down to feed the world’s annual junk mail habit.
American artist Barbara Hashimoto works with junk mail in her provocative and extremely popular installations. To date she has created the Junk Mail Experiment, Junk Mail with Grand Piano, Junk Mail Landscape and Junk Mail Xmas art installations. We caught up with Barbara to ask her a few questions about her multi-faceted junk mail art installations.
I spent one year hand-shredding the collected junk mail, resulting in 3,000 cubic feet of shredded material.
Tell us about the Junk Mail Experiment.
As Artist-in-Residence (AIR) at the Chicago-based architecture firm BauerLatoza Studio, one of my responsibilities is to engage the staff in creative projects. The Junk Mail Experiment, my initial project as AIR, draws upon the firm's commitment to sustainable design and green practices. I began with a simple task that could easily involve all sixteen staff members; I asked them to set aside the junk mail they received at the office address. The experiment -- to measure how much junk mail the U.S. Postal Service delivered to this one small business during a one-year period. I spent one year hand-shredding the collected junk mail, resulting in 3,000 cubic feet of shredded material. This labor- and time-intensive, yet intimate process, has inspired a series of sculptures, installations, performances, and collaborations presented in exhibitions in Los Angeles and Chicago beginning in 2007.
How did the idea start?
The genesis of this project was inspired by a number of mind-boggling statistics: AMERICANS RECEIVE 77 BILLION PIECES OF JUNK MAIL ANNUALLY and THE AVERAGE AMERICAN WILL SPEND EIGHT MONTHS OF HIS/HER LIFE HANDLING JUNK MAIL. Statistics like these have taken hold of me both visually and physically. I have witnessed the stacks of collected junk mail and the resulting piles of shredded material grow and take over my studio. Physically the act of shredding all the junk mail and moving it to and from exhibitions became a burden.
Is Junk Mail Xmas a part of the larger Junk Mail Project?
Yes. For the past ten months my Junk Mail exhibition has been under the sponsorship of The Chicago Arts District at one of their exhibition spaces. During that run we have presented an evolving schedule of shredded junk mail installations, associated works, visiting artists, and special events. The installations changed on a monthly basis with receptions open to the public during The Chicago Arts District’s Second Friday Gallery Walks. Since the main exhibition space had expansive 45-foot floor-to-ceiling storefront windows, the main installations were built there to be viewed from the street and were lit in the evenings for night-time viewing.
How much junk mail is included in the various art installations?
During the year of collection, the installations included whatever amount of junk mail had been collected to that point. In October 2007, the installation/performance "Junk Mail with Grand Piano" was presented at BauerLatoza Studio in conjunction with The City of Chicago's Department of Cultural Affairs' Chicago Artists' Month. We had been collecting junk mail for only four months but had enough to fully engulf the concert grand piano in my studio.
Buried in paper, Torrez continued to play, his final melodic lullabies muffled by the hundreds of pounds of paper entombing the piano, symbolic of the never-ending stream of junk mail that we all are subjected to.
The performance was a collaboration with Edward Torrez, a musician who is also a principal and architect at BauerLatoza Studio. As he played on the concert grand, I transferred my stockpile of shredded junk mail onto the piano until it fully engulfed both musician and instrument. My movements, initially calm and deliberate, grew into a frenzied crescendo and finally to resignation. Buried in paper, Torrez continued to play, his final melodic lullabies muffled by the hundreds of pounds of paper entombing the piano, symbolic of the never-ending stream of junk mail that we all are subjected to.
At the completion of the one-year collection period, in July 2008, the Junk Mail Landscape installation was built incorporating all 3,000 cubic-feet of junk mail. Exhibition visitors were invited to enter the landscape, walk in it, sit down in it, and play in it. I find that people are usually hesitant to interact directly with art. But in the case of these junk mail installations, it was hard to hold people back. The simple act of sitting in a pile of junk mail easily escalated into jumping, tossing, and laughing. I encouraged this release because the exhibition itself would evoke a lot of anger and I wanted to turn that into something more positive. From this audience participation and interaction, a series of Junk Mail Portraits evolved. This is an ongoing series in which exhibition visitors have their photo portraits taken while they interact with the junk mail. Another ongoing series, Junk Mail Confessions, is a video of visitors’ experiences -- mostly rants but sometimes raves. The showing of this video work will premiere in 2009.
A series of work entitled White Trash also developed from The Junk Mail Experiment. For a six-week period I saved the white paper that was used and discarded by BauerLatoza Studio during the regular course of business. The amount of waste would be incredible if there weren't the visual presentation of it. It measures about 20 x 5 x 4 feet. I've also created a series of work from the credit card solicitations entitled Red Sea of Credit, and a series of weaving made from the strips of junk mail shredding. I have discovered the beauty in this recycled medium.
Tell us about Junk Mail Xmas.
Junk Mail Xmas opened at The Chicago Arts District exhibition in December 2008 and will continue through January 2009. The initial inspiration came from my childhood memories of creating Christmas Lists for Santa Claus by leafing through Christmas catalogues from the department stores, referencing catalogs and page numbers on my list. So I created Junk Mail Xmas by decorating multiple Christmas trees with shredded Christmas catalogues and end-of-the year solicitations. I was also inspired by the department store window displays I saw as a child in Manhattan, so designed this installation especially to be viewed from street through the exhibition space's storefront windows.
Is your Junk Mail Project an environmental statement?
It is a privacy issue as well as an environmental statement. Here are a few more facts to support this: 100 million trees are cut down to produce junk mail annually; The majority of junk mail is produced from natural forests; In 2006, more than 15 million trees were cut down to produce the 1.8 billion pounds of undeliverable junk mail; 44% of the junk mail received goes unopened into the landfill. In other words -- we don't want it and we are wasting our natural resources. Those statistics don't even address the amount of fossil fuel used to deliver the junk mail.
As an artist, I set out to bring a visual statement (simply put: what does one year's worth of junk mail look like) which then evoked emotional reactions from the viewer. I also want to offer a way to harness the energy of those reactions into something productive. So I have teamed up with an organization that is doing something about the junk mail problem. ForestEthics is heading up a national DO NOT MAIL CAMPAIGN. Representatives from ForestEthics have been participating in my exhibitions, speaking with visitors about their campaign and getting signatures for their petition. I am now in discussion with ForestEthics to bring my exhibition to other locations in the U.S. in order to bring awareness to the junk mail problem and to work towards a solution.
Where can people see a Junk Mail installation?
Currently the exhibition is at the Chicago Arts District at 2003 South Halsted Street until the end of January 2009. The public can view the main installation from the street through the storefront windows. The exhibition is also open by appointment and that can be arranged through This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it . There will be a closing event open to the public on Sunday, January 25 from1 to 4PM. Junk Mail Portraits will be taken and Junk Mail Confessions will be videotaped during that time. The public will be invited to play in the junk mail and then help take down the installation by bagging the shredded material in trash bags.
Any other junk mail projects in the future?
I'm expecting the exhibition to continue under the sponsorship of ForestEthics. I would also like to create a permanent public artwork using the one-year collection. I envision it to be encased in plexiglas and put on permanent exhibition somewhere in Chicago.
Visit: barbarahashimoto.com
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