Sonia Landy Sheridan (American, 1925–2021) Portable Postcard Exhibition 2, 2011
30 artist postcards and introductory card in a folding enclosure
Produced by Whitman Communications, Lebanon, New Hampshire; organized on Generative Systems Facebook
Collection of Bre Pettis
PION.2026.8147
Description
Forty-two years after the original Portable Postcard Exhibition, Sonia Landy Sheridan revisited the idea in a radically different communications environment.
Portable Postcard Exhibition 2: A Cyberwork Organized on Generative Systems Facebook 2011 was assembled through the online community surrounding Sheridan's Generative Systems project. Instead of participants sharing the physical environment of the School of the Art Institute of Chicago, the new exhibition could be generated by a geographically dispersed network of artists communicating online.
The finished work nevertheless returned this digital community to a deliberately physical format. It consists of 30 artist postcards plus an introductory postcard, contained in a folding black enclosure. The cards were produced by Whitman Communications in Lebanon, New Hampshire.
The introductory card describes the project as "A cyberwork generated on Generative Systems Facebook." That phrase captures what makes the second exhibition so interesting. Facebook and digital imaging weren't simply subjects represented in the work; they were part of the system that allowed the exhibition to exist.
The individual postcards encompass photography, drawing, painting, collage, computer-generated imagery and other digital practices. Despite the enormous technological distance between 1969 and 2011, Sheridan once again gave every contribution the same simple physical form.
Forty-two years later, Sheridan reconvened the idea through a Generative Systems community on Facebook. The new exhibition combined members of the original 1969 SAIC project—including Guy Herman, Leif Brush, Mario Castillo, Olaf Borge and Sheridan herself—with a broader network of artists working across photography, experimental film, electronic art, computer art, sound and other media.
Participating Artists
Portable Postcard Exhibition 2 brought together artists associated with Sonia Landy Sheridan and the Generative Systems community. The introductory card identifies the participants as:
Sonia Sheridan
Ruth C. Wickum
Mitch Petchenik
Philip Malkin
Leif Brush
Marilyn Schultze
John Mabey
Bill McCabe
Willard VanDeBogart
Greg Gundlach
Marita O'Grady
Aldo Tambellini
Laurie Spiegel
Marisa Gonzalez
Brian Oglesbee
Joan Lyons
Gloria Brush
Pete Lekousis
Nathan Lyons
Holly Pedlosky
Bruce Posner
Craig Goldwyn
Stan Vanderbeek
Guy Herman
John Kukleski
Glenn Sogge
Mario Castillo
Douglas Dybvig
Olaf Borge
The thirtieth position on Sheridan's introductory image is labeled "In Memory" rather than with an individual artist's name.
A complete copy was included in the Visual Studies Workshop's 2011 benefit auction, and contemporary documentation records copies beginning to enter museum collections soon after the project was produced.
My copy is complete, containing all 30 artist postcards, the introductory card and the original enclosure.
What I especially like about Portable Postcard Exhibition 2 is that Sheridan didn't respond to forty-two years of technological progress by abandoning the postcard. She used the new technology to construct the network—and then turned the network back into a physical object.
The Internet made the exhibition possible.
The postcard made it portable.
Note: Stan Vanderbeek died in 1984, so his presence among the 2011 participants must be posthumous — likely an estate contribution or the memorial position; worth checking the physical card.
