Pink Prairie Post: planting seeds of radical hope

Pink Prairie Post is an experimental mail-art project that seeks to plant seeds of radical hope using paper, print, propaganda, and the United States Postal Service. Volume 1 is comprised of eight newsletters, eight corresponding manifestos, and a handful of other prints and ephemera that were produced at the University of Iowa Center for the Book during a period from August 2025— April 2026. Sent to a subscriber list that varied from 45-55 subscribers at any given time, these were produced at the lowest cost possible and were sent to a majority of subscribers free of charge. Recipients had the option to pay $20 per month to receive each month’s corresponding manifesto, which subsidized the cost for other subscribers.

This postal project is unabashedly anti-capitalist, blatantly radical, and unflinchingly antagonistic at times. The newsletters are RISOGRAPH printed primarily on handmade paper made from recycled propaganda, linking the reclaimed power of the substrate and content together in the process. The wood and metal types used to print each month’s manifesto imbues them with a historical connection to labor and protest movements. Pink Prairie Post embraces the assertion that all art is political and uses propaganda, unabashedly, to spread the message as far as possible and in a manner that is as accessible as possible.