Trees and Houses…I just like ’em. (Great Britain, Liechtenstein, Slovenia, USA)

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Why do I collect stamps? The images! Many collectors want to delve into the meaning behind those images—to explore. I do that too, but oftentimes it’s simply the imagery that excites and satisfies me.

I always look closely at stamps featuring houses and trees. Why? I’m just interested in the amazing variety of structures people build for themselves.

And trees—they don’t entice like flowers, but the simplicity of their appearance—trunk, branches, leaves—has more affinity for me. And maybe it’s their size too. Maybe it’s because I climbed so many as a boy and could hide in the cover of their leaves—watching all from above. And maybe too it’s because we children could play with our little cars and soldiers and cowboys in the raised roots of the fat old oaks behind our house.

Perhaps I’m a topical collector. I haven’t organized a collection of either houses or trees, but when I’m ready, my first stop will be the American Topical Association. There I’ll find others who share my interests, as well as the ATA’s comprehensive topical stamp checklists.

Let me know what your favorite stamps are that picture houses and trees.

 

Bulk Mail Tulips? (Netherlands)

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Encountering this series of “Tulip” stamps, I assumed because of the subject, the clean contemporary design, and the PTT POST imprint, that these were from the Netherlands. There was, however, no monetary value on the stamps.

The other bit of information on the stamps was PORT BETAALD (“POST PAID” in Dutch). Further investigation led to the fact that these were used for Bulk Mailing.

I was drawn to these stamps for their beauty—a refreshing approach to bulk mail stamps, which in the U.S. are generally quite bland in design. Perhaps even junk mail can bring a smile to your face, provided the stamp is appealing.

Three Views of Four Seasons (China, Germany, Liechtenstein)

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Spring is coming to the Mid-Atlantic (too slowly for me). Has it always been thus?

Some 800 years ago, Liu Shong Nian (1155-1224) approached the seasons in a more contemplative frame of mind.

His exacting watercolor renderings of the seasons are featured on a 2018 Chinese souvenir sheet (from right to left: Spring, Summer, Autumn, Winter). His seasons express the harmony between nature and human activity.

These are exquisitely detailed miniature paintings, each about 4″x5″. Note the white tree blossoms at water’s edge and the abundant greenery of Summer in the enlarged stamp (top left). And below it, notice snow covering roofs and distant mountains. All is in harmony.


In 2006, Deutsche Post photographically rendered each season as the year unfolded, beginning with a Winter stamp in January. The intent of the stamps was to convey the beauty of personal communication via the ordinary letter. Then and now, electronic mail hungrily devours personal postal communication; however, the beauty of a snow-covered oak, white tree blossoms in Spring, yellow-flowering rapeseed, and a beech forest, combined with the personal touch of a simple letter, impart a truly unique dimension to human messaging.

What a difference 800 years makes—even 10 years! In 2016, Liechtenstein gave us the four seasons on one stamp. Designer Hans Peter Gassner presents the seasons in the four quadrants of the stamp beginning with Winter at top left and proceeding clockwise through Spring, Summer and Autumn. Gassner’s approach to the seasons is totally abstract. Pallets of color dots, circles and squares within a seasonal grid convey the feeling of distinct times of year. And though images of nature and mankind are absent, perhaps that same sense of harmony that Liu Shong Nian conveyed in watercolor, and Germany via photography, is conveyed by this stamp. When I ponder the color fields with a contemplative mind, I can see and feel the beauty of the snow on the distant mountain, a soft Spring rain, exuberant summer flowers, and Autumn’s mature coloring.

 

My Favorite Gutenberg. (Bulgaria, Germany, Hungary)

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As a boy, decades ago, if asked, “Who invented printing?” my answer would have been, “Gutenberg.” Today, if asked, “What did Gutenberg invent?” my answer would be, “The first effective method for printing in volume with movable type.”

So, if Gutenberg didn’t invent printing, why is he so admired? His genius was much like many other “inventors.” He took pre-existing technologies (printing, the press, movable type, ink) and modified each so that they functioned together as a viable system for producing cost-effective multiple copies of printed matter.

It’s likely that the bulk of his inventiveness and labor was devoted to perfecting a system for making and using movable metal type, hence my Favorite Gutenberg stamp is not one that features a portrait of him, but rather features movable type. Besides, no portrait of Gutenberg is known to have been made until 1567, 99 years after his death, so what we see on stamps is an artist’s imagination at work.

My Favorite Gutenberg stamp was issued by Germany in 1983, one of a pair of Europa stamps. That stamp features a piece of cast metal type against a background of Gutenberg’s gothic type letters that can be found in his printing. The stamp focuses on the most significant aspect of the printing method he developed—movable type. And personally, I see in the imagery of one piece of movable type against a background of numerous printed letters as a graphic metaphor for the explosion of knowledge that Gutenberg’s “invention” made possible.

For information about all things philatelic/printing/graphics, check out the Graphics Philately Association.

A Break from Winter Cold. (Niuafo’ao, Macao)

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In mid-December I posted “Need a Lift?”, because I sometimes do. At times I need a break from winter cold too. So here are two more sheetlets that do the trick for me.

The Jandaya Parakeet on this recent sheetlet from Niuafo’ou just can’t be contained by the stamp and has to extend its tail onto the selvage. I can’t think of another sheetlet so starkly white–selvage there only because this parakeet needs more space and demands exuberant framing.

This 2018 souvenir sheet from Macao features the painting “Bright and Fragrant Flowers” by the contemporary Chinese artist Ieong Tai Meng. The subtle and sensitive brushstrokes and coloring reflect centuries of Chinese artistic tradition.

So if you need a break from the cold…or a lift…contemplate these stamps.

Light and Color in French Morocco

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Color gradations artfully employed by stamp designers always attract my attention. Think of Great Britain’s long-running Machin series or Israel’s Twelve Tribes definitives from the 1950s. But the five stamps of French Morocco shown here, from the Townscapes series of the late 1940s, are perhaps my absolute favorite. The stamps were designed by Camille Paul Jooso (1902-1986) and engraved by Pierre Gandon (1899-1996, see an earlier post about Gandon’s Sarah Bernhardt stamp).

When I see these stamps, the acclaimed French artist Henri Matisse (1869-1964) comes to mind as does his lifelong quest for, as he told the art critic Pierre Courthion (1902-1988), “the clarity of light.”1 Matisse travelled often, including two stays in French Morocco in 1912-1913, not to see different places but “to see light, to restore, through a change of its quality, the freshness it lost as a result of being seen day after day.”2 To me, these stamps powerfully convey that clarity of light through their sensitive  design, exquisite engraving, brilliant color selection, and masterful printing. They are a marvel!

The other quality within these stamps that brings Matisse to mind, is the complex patterning of the terraced townscape. Matisse’s paintings, beginning in the early 1900s, abound with the patterns of textiles, with the objects they cover being visually flattened and converted to an overall decorative image. The Terraces stamps convey that same flattened decorative quality. Kudos again to the stamp designer and engraver for achieving such complex and enticing imagery.

Forgive my dream, but I can easily imagine Matisse looking out his hotel window in French Morocco at the scene we experience viewing these stamps…and being delighted just as I am.

1 & 2. Schneider, Pierre, et al. Matisse in Morocco, Exhibition Catalog, National Gallery of Art, Washington DC, 1990, page 31.

WWI Beckons (Great Britain, Slovenia, Ireland)

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For five years many nations have been marking the 100th anniversary of the years of WWI with postage stamps. We’ve forgotten most of those issues, just as that war is a thing of history to us—with no personal meaning. Today’s mass murders trouble us greatly, as they should, and yet WWI accounted for some 15 to 19 million military and civilian deaths—averaging more than 10,000 a day. And like all war, it didn’t have to be.

Those WWI commemorative stamps generally feature photographs of military personnel and monuments, but a few affected me.

In 2017 Great Britain issued a set of six WWI commemoratives. The four above spoke to me. The shattered red poppy told of peace shattered by war. Private Lemuel Thomas’ life-saving Bible was for me an ironic image. How many millions on both sides of this tragic conflict professed true faith in the Bible? The tombstones in Belgium, at stamp size anonymous, whisper wasted lives. And Isaac Rosenberg’s poetic words from Dead Man’s Dump of 1918, “Earth has waited for them, All the time of their growth,” testify to the human tragedy. (Rosenberg, an Orthodox Jew from Gloucestershire, was killed in 1918 after returning from a night patrol near Fampoux, France, most likely be a sniper.)

This year Slovenia issued a visually haunting interpretation of that endless field of tombstones. The ethereal shape created by the varying light and dark crosses are a mist of millions of lives lost…most now forgotten.

Also this year Poland, whose designers are known for graphic directness, presents us with the choice that faced nations 100 years ago: flowers or explosives. That choice continues to face us. Too often the decision is disastrous.

Ireland’s literary approach to Armistice Day is twice strong. Canadian physician Lieutenant-Colonel John McCrae’s 1915 poem is familiar to many of us, and is always worth a reflective read:
  In Flanders fields the poppies blow
  Between the crosses, row on row,
  That mark our place: and in the sky
  The larks, still bravely singing, fly
  Scarce heard amid the guns below.

Finally, from Thomas Kettle’s 1916 poem To My Daughter Betty, the Gift of God:
  Died not for flag, nor King,
  Nor Emperor, But for a dream,
  Born in a herdsman’s shed, And
  for the secret Scripture of the poor.
Kettle, a Member of Parliament, joined the Irish Volunteers in 1913 and died in 1916 on the Western Front.

Consider these stamps. Click the links above and read these poems in their entirety. Tell me what you think…and feel.

German Smiley Face?

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Looking through some German commercial covers, I felt this Hausding & Bermann cover smile back at me. The designer, who arranged the images of some H & B products on the cover, surely had a sense of humor and created a predecessor to our own ubiquitous round yellow smiley face.

Illustrated German commercial covers of the late 1920s were far outnumbered by covers simply listing a company’s name and address. There was a reticence toward progressive advertising practices in early 20th century Germany. This company, however, opted for a bit of whimsy, though I wonder if the Smiley Face actually registered with the owners.

Hausding & Bergmann, Pirna Perfin

Hausding & Bergmann, founded in 1919, was a supplier of furs and other products for the hat industry, both manufacturing and retailing. Though I haven’t been able to discover much about the company, evidence on the cover suggests that it was not small and probably was an active mailer. Of course, the illustrated cover itself and the company’s description on the cover point to this conclusion, but the stamps on the cover also provide evidence. Note that each stamp has the company and city initials punched into the stamp. This kind of punched stamp is called a Perfin (perforated initials) and was employed by organizations that used large numbers of stamps to control possible stamp pilfering.

The cover is franked with one 15 and two 5 pfennig stamps paying the 25 pfennig rate for a letter under 20 grams mailed to a foreign country (in this case to Switzerland) on February 28, 1929. And it probably brought a smile to the face of the recipient!