This artist’s book, part of a limited edition of 500 numbered copies, documents Genesis P-Orridge’s mail art action and the subsequent legal battle. It is richly illustrated with facsimiles of legal documents alongside correspondence and articles exploring the case and P-Orridge’s collaborative mail art practice with Cosi Fanni Tutti as COUM Transmissions. While a later reprint appeared in a different format through Primary Information in the 2010s, this is an original artifact from the seminal 1976 first edition.

“The trial thus marked the end of COUM’s whole-hearted commitment to mail art. P-Orridge’s conclusion to the acknowledgements in ‘G.P.O v. G.P-O read: “What E am interested in now is that point where Art meets Life and fuses, dispersing art and enhancing life.” The vehicle for achieving this aim in the immediate future would be TG rather than COUM.” – Source: ‘Wreckers of Civilisation: The Story of COUM Transmissions & Throbbing Gristle’, edited by Simon Ford, p.6.13, Black Dog Publishing Limited, 1999.