Slieve na Brock by Colin Middleton

Slieve na Brock by Colin Middleton
9p Stamp issued 1971 - United Kingdom

Middleton (1910-1983) trained at the Belfast Academy of Art and was heavily influenced by the work of Vincent van Gogh.  His artwork was quite surreal in many respects.  In addition to being an artist, he was also a musician, theatre designer and poet.  In 1969 he was awarded an MBE and appointed an associate at the Royal Hibernian Academy, with full membership in 1970.

His work was one of three paintings in the Ulster '71 Festival stamp series:

A Mountain Road by TP Flanagan

A Mountain Road, by TP Flanagan (1929-2011)
UK 3p Stamp issued 1971

TP Flanagan made a large contribution to the arts during his long career in Northern Ireland in the mid 20th century.  As well and being a teacher at the St Mary's Training College in Belfast until retirement in 1983, he had a parallel career as a professional artist in oils and watercolours was quietly flourishing throughout the 1960s and 1970s, with awards, exhibitions, honours, a television film (TP Flanagan: Painter).

He and his family were close friends with the famous Irish poet, Seamus Heaney, who was quoted as saying: "As an artist, Flanagan has gone his own way, explored the Irish landscape and enhanced Irish landscape painting through the discovery andelaboration of an individual style."


This stamp is one of a series of three "Ulster Paintings" from the Ulster '71 festival on 16 June 1971:
Colin Middleton
Tom Carr

Bamboo Shoots, by Heihachiro Fukuda

Bamboo Shoots (1947), by Heihachiro Fukuda (1892-1974)Stamp issued 16 August 1981, Japan
Yamatane Museum of Art in Nihonbashi, Tokyo

Fukuda was trained at the Kyoto City School of Arts and Crafts and he was a prolific Japanese artist of the early 20th century during the Taisho Era (1912-1926).  This work is from the middle stages of this long career  - many of his works reflected simple things in nature over his career.  The works were distinct as they managed to be abstract and realist at the same time.

The Secret Assembly of Vostitsa by Kostas Klouvatos

The Secret Assembly of Vostitsa by Kostas Klouvatos (1923-2007)
Greece Stamp Issued 1975
Folk Art

This is an engraving by an artist who is more known for his sculptures.  Klouvatos' work during the 1960s was focused on critical points in the history of Greece.  This one focuses on 26th September of 1820, where all dignitaries of Peloponnese (Moreas) gathered, and Pappaflessas (a Greek Revolutionary hero) is trying to convince them that a revolution should be launched.  Klouvatos attempted to combine elements of Greek tradition with various styles through the ages, thus accounting for this depiction of Pappa Flessas.  The stamp was part of a series that commemorated the 150th Anniversary of the death of Papa Flessas.

Pablo Picasso - La Vie

Pablo Picasso (1881-1973) - La Vie (1903)
Equatorial Guinea Stamp Issued 1973
Painting at the Cleveland Museum of Art USA

Pablo Picasso went through a period where most of his work consisted of monochrome greens or blues.  This is one of his most famous works during that period - there is an overwhelming sense of desolation in this work.  This period of blue desolation was common in Picasso's work following suicide by one of his friends, Carlos Casagemas, in Paris in 1901.

Picasso was only 20 when he completed this painting.  His paintings would depart radically from European convention from 1907 starting with the Les Demoiselles d'Avignon.  This would lead him into being one of the most famous figures of the modern art world.

Mother and Sick Child is another one of his desolate depressing works through this period, which was fittingly used as a stamp by the Maldives when Picasso died in 1973.

Other Picasso works on Stamps:
Seated Nude

Pablo Picasso - Mother and Sick Child

Pablo Picasso (1881-1973) - Mother and Sick Child (1903)
Maldives Stamp Issued 1974
Painting held at the Barcelona Museum, Spain

This is one of Picasso's earlier works, well before he started to mix up peoples faces.  The Maldives is a beautiful group of tropical islands that are stretched intermittently across the Indian Ocean to the south of India.  As the highest point of the Maldives is only 2 metres above sea level, it is one of the most threatened countries if sea levels do rise.  They also issue stamps on many topics that have no relation to the Maldives as a way of raising revenue for the country. 

Other works by Picasso have been used on stamps, including:

Seated Nude, 1905
La Vie, 1903

Two Against White - Charles Sheeler

Charles Sheeler (1883-1965) - Two Against White (1957)
USA 32c Stamp issued 1998

Sheeler's works are stark - they are defined by clean lines, urban expanses, but there are very few people.   - he is known as one of the founders of modernism in art in America.  The work that was depicted in this 1998 stamp was reasonably abstract, but many of his works are very realistic depictions of buildings and interiors that are absent of any people, and idealised in an almost dream like manner - it is like you are looking at a perfectly sparse place in a dream, rather than a real place that has imperfections.  An Australian artist, Jeffrey Smart, appears to paint in a similar manner, but his paintings include many solitary figures.


He was also a pioneer in completing artworks across different emerging media in the early 20th century, as he worked with film and photography in addition to painting.

Edward Hopper - Nighthawks

Edward Hopper (1882-1967) -  Nighthawks (1942)
USA 32c Stamp Issued 1998
Art Institute of Chicago

This is one of many artworks that appeared in a 1998 series of stamps issued in the USA.  Nighthawks is an instantly recognisable artwork that was popular since it was created in 1942, shortly after the attack on Pearl Harbor.  The work is quite sinister in it's tone - conveying a certain emptiness about life in the 20th century - bright loud colours, garish accessories and dress, people huddled under florescent light, while darkness envelopes the deserted streets.  This piece was also used as a base for The Boulevarde of Broken Dreams poster that was popularised in the 1980s - the figures from this painting were replaced by Elvis Presley, James Dean and Marilyn Munroe.

Grant Wood - American Gothic

Grant Wood (1891-1942) - American Gothic (1930)
USA 32c Stamp Issued 1998
Art Institute of Chicago

This is probably one of the most famous images of America in the 20th Century - a hard working farmer and his spinster daughter pose in front of their gothic style house somewhere in the mid west of America.  This art carries a number of symbols of 20th century America that are both honoured and subject to criticism.  This work has been parodied ever since it was created in the 1930s.

Apparently the house does really exist in a town called Eldon in Iowa.  The painting was part of a art movement known as regionalism - it rejected the abstract art that was rocking the art world at the same time in Europe.   Paintings such as American Gothic certainly capture the viewer, with its strong characters, who communicate with the viewer.

Naata Nungurrayi - Untitled

Naata Nungurrayi (1932 - )

Australia $1.65 stamp issued 2003

This artist lives in an incredibly remote area of Australia, being the Pollock Hills in Western Australia.  She did not begin painting until 1996, but Nungurrayi's works are highly sought after.  This is one of many stamps that have been issued depicting indigenous art in Australia.  


This stamp is an "International Post" stamp that can be used for postage of items to overseas only - as GST is not charged on overseas despatches, but GST is charged on local postage within Australia, different stamps now need to be used for local vs overseas items.

Rita Angus - Central Otago Landscape

Rita Angus (1908-1970) - Central Otago Landscape 1953-56

New Zealand 30c Stamp issued 1983

Museum of New Zealand Te Papa Tongarewa

Rita Angus was a well established New Zealand artist during the art deco period, with her work being heavily influenced by the cubism movement and Byzantine art. She lived in the South Island of New Zealand and was mainly known for landscape works.

This work is the result of a trip to Central Otago by the artist in 1953. The stamp is one of a series of 4 works by Rita Angus that were depicted on NZ stamps in 1983.

Guy Grey-Smith - Skull Springs Country

Guy Grey-Smith (1916-1981) - Skull Springs Country

Australian 45c Stamp issued 1995

Painting Completed in 1965 - Held at the Art Gallery of Western Australia

Gery-Smith had a coloured and challenging life, as he was born in WA before heading off to WWII with the Royal Australian Air Force in France.  After being shot down from his plane, he was held as a POW in France, where he learned to paint with watercolours.  Art became his life subsequent to this and he eventually returned to Western Australia after establishing his career overseas.

Full biography is available: Guy Grey-Smith .


This is the last of the series of four stamps of Australian Modern Art that were issued in 1995 by Australia Post. 

Robert Juniper - Outcamp

Robert Juniper (b. 1929) - Outcamp

Australian $1.05 stamp issued 1995

Held by the Art Gallery of WA, Painted in 1977

Robert Juniper is one of Western Australia's most accomplished artists.  This work was depicted with three other modern art works in the 1995 Australia Day stamp issue. 

Juniper recently participated in installation works where model cows were painted in the Margaret River region, and he was also commissioned to design the stained glass windows of a church in Bunbury Western Australia.

Ian Fairweather - Kite Flying

Ian Fairweather (1891-1974) - Kite Flying (1958)

Australian $1.20 Stamp Issued 1995

Held at the Queensland Art Gallery

This is the second of four modern art paintings that were issued by Australia Post in 1995.  Others in the series included work by Russell Drysdale, Guy Grey-Smith and Robert Juniper.  

Extract from Queensland Art Gallery Website:

Kite flying 1958, one of Fairweather's most significant works, exemplifies the artist's approach to painting. Lines inspired by Chinese calligraphy cross the work, exposing layers of underpainting. Figures, kites and balloons dance in and out of focus in a fusion of shapes and colours.

The work is based on a 2000-year-old Chinese kite flying festival, which celebrates the protection of loved ones against misfortune. The festival commemorates the story of Huan Ching, a man from the Han period in China, who was warned by a sage to take his wife and children to the mountains.

Taking this advice, he took his family kite flying, and so escaped the massacre that befell their livestock. The felicity of this occasion is reflected in the painting's joyous vibrancy.

Arthur Boyd - Nebuchdnezzar on fire falling over a waterfall

Arthur Boyd - Nebuchdnezzar on fire falling over a waterfall (1968)

Australia 45c Stamp Issued 1999

Art Gallery of NSW Sydney

This stamp was issued in 1999 in conjunction with another stamp that portrayed artist Arthur Boyd who died in the same year.

The disturbing character depicted in the stamp is credited with building the Hanging Gardens of Babylon, in addition to succeeding in conquests of Judah and Jerusalem in bible stories in the “Book of Daniel”. Arthur Boyd created this painting as part of a series of 70 paintings that commented on the suffering and madness of the Vietnam War. He often depicted the biblical characters in Australian landscapes.