Stamping

Wild Plakken's stamps for the centenary of the Dutch trade union movement, produced in 1989. These use the iconic symbols of joining of hands to focus on the principles of solidarity, emancipation and democracy as the central tenets of the Nederlandse Vakbeweging. See a history of Dutch stamps here



Romanian stamp commemorating the Romanian Revolution from Ceaucescu's despotic rule.











A wide range of techniques, but all bold and direct, communicating often powerful statements of political, social, cultural and industrial ideals or achievements. All succinct for the limited surface area (and sometimes low grade papers) of the stamps. See more courtesy of here



My own collection of Czechoslovakian stamps. Though they span a period from 1918 to maybe the 1980's (before the dissolution into the independent Czech Republic and Slovakia), and a wide variety of subjects and illustrative approaches, they seem to share a certain sensibility and idiosyncratic aesthetic that indicates the fluctuating social, industrial and political effects on Czechoslovakian cultural identity during those times (the state being a somewhat forced mix of different ethnic groups, all with strong visual culture, but perhaps with the Czech identity at the fore). Perhaps the need to express the unity and identity of this emergent state resulted in this exuberant display.