A friend of mine had an extremely thoughtful gift idea. He wrote a letter to Mark Tedin asking him to alternate the art on an Unlimited Sol Ring (included with the letter) to look like the Eye of Sauron. It's been several months, and after sending two follow up e-mails (two months ago and then last month) he hasn't heard back.

What should he do? Mark said on his website that he does this stuff, and I trouble believing that anyone in his position would deliberately be so rude. Does anyone have any thoughts?

Thanks!

Also, is he in some binding contractual agreement between the two of you where he was hired for this service with payment, or did he send the card without asking before hand and just popped in with the letter assuming that he is entitled to some standard of customer service and time frame? And you sent the package with insurance and tracking, or assumed that just because he's a famous MTG artist that he is obligated to send your card back?
I'm sure he will give your card back, but i really don't see what you want help with. I mean short of going to his house to retrieve it what do you really expect anyone to say? He can keep emailing every few weeks to remind Mark that the card is there and to send it back.

What he should do is just forget about his card and then some time down the road it will show back up and then it will be like a surprise gift. He is probably busy doing other Eye of Sauron alters

I sent some Drana to Bierek after i emailed and asked if he would sign a couple and he said yes and gave me his address. Months later i had long forgotten i even did that and emailed him about buying the print. I never did get an answer but a week later i got a letter back with a couple signed Drana.

__________________
Want Drana, Kalastria Bloodchief, and other vampire females oddities (foreign, foil, crimp, miscut, misprint, sign, test print, alters, artist proofs, etc)

Seems kinda wrong. I always include payment, even if they are just signing cards.

I am the friend that the OP is referring to in his messages. First off, I wanted to thank you all for your helpful responses and ideas. After reading your responses, I recognize that I should have done the following:

1. Send money with the card and envelope, even if the artist does not request this on his website
2. Wait for 6 months to a year, recognizing that some artists may be more busy than others

With regards to the first action, I had initially intended to send $20. I eventually convinced myself that this was not necessary since the artist does not indicate on his website that payment is necessary. In contrast, a different artist that has signed a card for me explicitly states on her website that sending $5 would be a nice gesture.

With regards to the second action, other cards that I have had signed have been returned within a few weeks. My buddy's birthday was in a month when I sent the card. I indicated this to the artist in my letter to him, but I also mentioned that it would be completely fine if he was too busy to send it back by then.

A few weeks ago, I e-mailed the artist asking him if he received the letter and card from me. I mentioned that if he is too busy with things, then I totally understand if he just sends the card back unsigned in the self-addressed and stamped envelope included with my original letter to him. He has not responded.

I draw two conclusions from this experience. First, Mark Tedin is a generous person. I am thankful for what he did and I plan on writing a thank you note back to him. Second, this board is full of nice and helpful people. Last week, I took the advice of sending him a little bit of money ($10) as a token of appreciation. I then forgot about it. I was surprised and elated to see the mail yesterday.

quote:

---

Originally posted by jellyfishfanatic:
Can we see your alter!? I've been following this thread since you posted it and I'd love to see how it turned out.

---

__________________
Want Drana, Kalastria Bloodchief, and other vampire females oddities (foreign, foil, crimp, miscut, misprint, sign, test print, alters, artist proofs, etc)

I love postimage dot org

__________________
Want Drana, Kalastria Bloodchief, and other vampire females oddities (foreign, foil, crimp, miscut, misprint, sign, test print, alters, artist proofs, etc)