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After Dadaism, Fluxism, Mailism comes Tourism

The documentary with mail artists from the USA and Canada is part of Ute Christiane Hoefert's dissertation: „Rollenflexibilität und Demokratisierung in der Kunst: Der Konzeptkünstler, Mail Artist und Networker H. R. Fricker“.
The Swiss artist Hans Ruedi Fricker, born in 1947, has been practicing mail art since 1981. This art form takes place in an open network in which the participants exchange art, objects, and self-designed stamps, postcards, and envelopes via the mail. Some of them organize exhibitions, make books, have collections and archives.
Even before his mail art activity, Fricker intended to dehierarchize, decentralize and finally democratize the art market, which he perceived as elitist. He is one of a new type of artist who reacts to the present in an original way and is committed to personal and social processes with his art. The director's journey begins in New York, where Fricker has met in 1984 mail artists. She travels further to Los Angeles, Seattle and visits Canada to interview some of his old colleagues. The interviews give a deeper insight into this underground art scene, which still exists and has partly shifted into social media platforms.

  • Ute Christiane Hoefert
    Director
  • Ute Christiane Hoefert
    Writer
  • Ute Christiane Hoefert
    Producer
  • Olivier Hamaker
    Editor
  • Project Type:
    Documentary, Student
  • Runtime:
    47 minutes 5 seconds
  • Completion Date:
    March 15, 2021
  • Production Budget:
    7,500 USD
  • Country of Origin:
    Switzerland
  • Country of Filming:
    Canada, United States
  • Language:
    English
  • Shooting Format:
    DSLR, MP4
  • Aspect Ratio:
    16:9
  • Film Color:
    Color
  • First-time Filmmaker:
    Yes
  • Student Project:
    Yes - University of Zurich
Director Biography - Ute Christiane Hoefert

Dr. phil. Ute Christiane Hoefert is an art historian. After completing a carpentry apprenticeship, she studied art history and modern history at the Technical University of Berlin. During her work at the Kunstmuseum Thurgau, she was entrusted with the exhibition and publication project "H. R. Fricker: Conquer the Living Rooms of the World!". This formed the basis for her dissertation at the University of Zurich. Besides her research, she worked as an art educator at the Kunstmuseum Olten from 2012 to 2015 and was deputy director of Galerie & Edition Stephan Witschi in Zurich from 2017 to 2020. As project manager and author, she was responsible for the book "Marcel Reuschmann – Crossing Borders between Science and Art", published in 2019 in the Edition Stephan Witschi. As a member of the Art Commission of the City of Kreuzlingen from 2016 to 2020, Hoefert curated various exhibitions, such as the Boulev'art 2017. During her research, she traveled to the United States and Canada to interview mail artists and visit archives. She filmed her conversations. The film "After Dadaism, Fluxism, Mailism comes Tourism" is part of her dissertation „Rollenflexibilität und Demokratisierung in der Kunst: Der Konzeptkünstler, Mail Artist und Networker H. R. Fricker“ awarded with the Nachwuchsforschungspreis der Thurgauischen Stiftung für Wissenschaft und Forschung 2020.

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