Portrait of an e-card artist

Obsian Fallicut's interest in e-cards can be said to have begun when he casually purchased a job-lot of postcards during his first year at art college. By his third year, Obsian had elected to write a dissertation on Tom Phillip's 1971 thesis, 'The Postcard Vision'. To assist his research, Obsian took a part-time job as a postman. No aspect of the postcards he delivered, however trivial or minutely incidental, was overlooked.

Obsian received notification from the college authorities that he had been awarded a first class degree for his work on postcards. Propituously, the news was communicated by means of a postcard, printed on AZO paper. Ominously, the postcard was of a swollen river engulfing a railway track with just two telegraph poles above water showing where the track ran. Clearly, this was a postcard of a disaster. The card had been used, though not mailed, and was in VG condition. WOB said, 'This was the flood of Nov. 1927 / Conn. River and R.R. Bradford, Vt.' Obsian estimated it was worth 12 USA dollars.

Following his graduation, and in an attempt to widen his interest, Obsian's girlfriend introduced him to the cinema. Obsian's enthusiasm remained desultory until he was 'The Postman Always Rings Twice' by B. Rafelson. This persuaded Obsian that he ought to see more postal films and, within the space of seven days, he had seen, 'Letter to Brezhnev', 'Postal Inspector', 'Postcards from the Edge', 'Letter from an Unknown Woman', 'Postman's Knock', and 'Postmark for Danger'. After watching the third film Obsian was convinced it was dangerous to received postcards. After watching the sixth he judged postcards to be lethal.

Following his cinematic education, Obsian destroyed his postcard collection - much to his girlfriend's delight. To her dismay, however, Obsian left a message on B. Rafelson's answering machine asking if he would be willing to make a documentary in order to expose the hazards of postcards. After a long delay, Obsian was telephoned by a script writer who irritably said that B. Rafelson could not possible contemplate such a project as he was president of SOUP, the Society for the Organisation and Understanding of Postcards. This incontrovertible evidence of a postcard conspiracy spurred Obsian to found SEPIA, the Society for the Eradication of Postcards in Any Way.

In an attempt to eliminate postcards, members of SEPIA impersonated postmen and destroyed all postcards intended for the inhabitants of major cities in England. Unfortunately, Obsian was arrested by the police and spent 92 days in prison. It was here he read Adam C. Engst's 'The Internet Starter Kit'.

On his release, and with an unshakeable belief that the future of SEPIA lay with e-mail, Obsian developed the software to enable e-mail to be sent without e-envelopes. With Emmanuel Hermann, he went on to invent the e-card.

In an attempt to attach an adhesive stamp on their first e-card, Emmanuel received a 400 volt shock from his monitor. Obsian recalls that for five seconds or more Emmanuel's waterproof jacket appeared to shine brightly, as though illuminated from within. The postmortem revealed that the patterned fabric of Emmanual's underclothes had been stencilled in scorch marks onto is pelvis. The metal clasps of his watch had also melted and spattered, causing small burn marks along his left arm. In grief, Obsian produced his first e-card which, with religious ardour, he sends to himself each year on the anniversary of Emmanuel's death.



Since that fateful day, Obsian has taken to wearing rubber-soled shoes while manufacturing e-cards.

Obsian became a member of the e-card library (www.zen.co.uk/home/page/paul.m) on 1 August 1996. Within two days he had viewed all the material he could find, not missing a reference, however tenuous. He is currently engaged in the production of the definite catalogue of the e-card library.

With his catalogue, Obsian hopes to compile a list of the 92 most unfamiliar e-cards. It is not lost on Obsian that 92 is the atomic number of Uranium. With this list he hopes to achieve several ambitions, one of which is to persuade a documentary maker to produce a film on the e-card library. Obsian has become convinced that the library is an expensive, time consuming, and elaborate hoax perpetrated by either the library's director, SOUP, or a combination of both. It has occurred to Obsian that B. Rafelson may in fact be the e-library's director.

E-card Public Relations have so far declined to comment on either Obsian's or SEPIA's accusations.