this is actually uncanny, or a near miss. i told r. about these tree mail art boxes and she said hey! i know that guy. and gave me his address and i wrote him and he said sorry, that's not me. and i felt a fool and a jerk because i called him ape troff in the subject line and i don't know why i'm just silly and annoying, but he wrote again saying i have no idea, and i said i'll look it up and i found the picture (now the box has vanished) and lo, it says alexis petroff in bold letters on front. maybe some dude stole his mailbox and decorated it with buttons and hung it on this lichened tree in hyde park just for a lark or in anonymous homage. maybe alexis petroff is somebody else's art name, or maybe alexis petroff, now in his retirement, has become a mailbox awaiting letters, a piece of folk art on a tree in hyde park, or the ghost thereof, now stuck on some other anonymous cat's wall.