COVER N. 694 - FRANCE

Postmark: 1926 Paul Bocuse 2018 Premier Jour 69 06.02.2026

Posted on ?;  Received on the 10th March 2026

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Art Déco... quoi dire? .. J'adore!

Un grand merci, Eric!

Indeed I love it.

Modernism, in its many forms of expression and supports, has got to be one of the most interesting periods in the history of all the arts. Within the confines of the early expressionism of Van Gogh masterpieces and the clean cut lines of Oscar Niemeyer's architecture, a world of immensely diverse esthetical experimentation continuously swirls, ejecting as if by centrifugal force, a truly prolific shower of beauty that encompasses all the earth continents.

Art Deco is one of modernism’s multi expressions, mostly associated with the inter-wars period, the fabled roaring 20's, which would impact the visual arts, design and architecture alike.

On a very personal basis, I (whose appreciation for the arts is mostly based on personal fruition and self derived conjectures, rather than on education and study)  think one could look at Art Déco almost as a consequential transition from Art Noveau, although in the end, both manifestations of art would strongly diverge in character and aspect. 

In fact, for some reason I cannot express, the evolution of one seems, to me, to lead on to the other, as if pushing the natural flowing and yet sometimes extremely complex surfaces of the former to their inherent limits would make them morph into the angular and geometric shapes of the latter.

Of course the beautiful feminine images of Mucha are quite different from the equally outstanding images of Tamara de Lempika, or even those of our own Almada Negreiros wherefrom cubism and futurism perspire, but art is just that: evolution, revolution, transgression.... and yet, always, a window into the past and a door into the future.

In the light of this simple fact it is of course hard to establish a founding moment for a given artistic movement, but art historians have established the Exposition internationale des arts décoratifs et industriels moderns, held in Paris in 1925, as the birth of Art Déco.

Celebrating the centenary of this important occurrence in the history of art, and its evocation through a celebratory exhibition held at the Musée des Artes Decoratives in Paris, La Poste issued on 20OCT2025 the very beautiful 1,39 € stamp on the cover.

The stamp is the result of a partnership between la Poste, the Musée and the École Nationale des Arts Decoratifs, who entrusted  Lisa Derocle Ho-Leong,  one of its graduates, with the task of conceiving the stamp, which presumably reflects the artist's interpretation of items  from the museum collection in the stamps illustration.

Postage for the cover was completed with another quite interesting stamp: a 2028-2024 surcharged “Lettre Verte” Marianne, of the “Marianne L'engagée”series, issued in 2024.

The stamps are cancelled with a First Day Postmark issued for the recent stamp honouring Paul Bocuse, one of the seminal names behind what come to be known as Nouvelle Cuisine. Bocuse, (1926-2018). Being a distinguished Lyonnais it is only natural that La Poste chose to also honour him with a postmark issued on his city, which was a also the  place from where the cover was sent.

This and the fact that the conceptual and esthetical complexities of  Art Déco go perfectly hand in hand with Haute Cuisine,  brings the cover full circle and I am very happy to have in my collection.

 COVER N. 693  / POSTCARDS 212-213 - SPAIN

Postmark: Illegible

Posted on the 2nd March;  Received on the 5th March 2026

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A letter  can be a window... better yet, all letters are windows.

More often then not, they reach you closed. And it is easy to understand why, for as such the draught of  unrelated gazes or minds is kept outside, protecting the words within from intent disturbance and privacy violation.

It is then up to you, the name called for on the face of the envelope, to open it, to let the free flowing breeze of words out of its temporary confinement, to finally allow content and intent to self-regenerate themselves through the sheer magic of reading, that most fundamental of all fundamental skills. 

But not all letters are created equal, so not all letters receive the same attention or treatment.

A letter might sit for days on the desk, unopened. In some extreme cases, it might even end up in the bin in the same condition, a sad waste of paper and intent...

These, though, are letters that lack the warmth of pure and simple conversation; these are the letters that are opened by brutally tearing apart the side of the envelope with an unceremonial finger inserted through the flap on their back; these are letters that in lieu of an attractive stamp on the corner of the paper rectangle that imprisons them, exhibit a cold printed legend: "Postage Paid"; these are impersonal letters; these are letters that herald "utilities", "financial statements" or other just as unpleasant but nonetheless essential consequences of the interactions between the individual and the state.

And then, there are the other:

The letters that generate a surge of dopamine and curiosity; that exhibit on the envelope the grace of a functional tiny piece of art applied on it as a laissez-passer; the letters that are slowly, pleasurably and carefully opened up with a small knife running along the top fold of the envelope so as to minimize as much as possible damage to the envelope; in short, the letters that say "Hi, good to see you"!

Well, Today I got one of these from Spain. Muchíssimas Gracias, Eva!

Eva used a 2€ stamp issued on 04NOV2014 as part of a 2 x 2€ stamp set themed on numismatics.  The stamp is illustrated with the image of the back of a 1 Peseta (the pre-Euro Spanish currency) banknote of 1953 issue. The companion stamp in the set bears the image of a 1 Peseta coin, of 1944 issue.

The stamp has some augmented reality capability embedded in it but unfortunately it seems that the app used to access it is no longer available to download (at least I could not find trace of it over the internet),  so I can not report on what's on hiding in it.

If letters are windows to a secret world only accessible to the addressee, then Postcards are obvious windows into the regular world, and by nature much more unconductive to privacy unless upgraded in treatment to letter support status.

That's what happened to the two curious postcards Eva included in her letter.

Postcards. There once was a time when every little town, or even village, no matter how small or hidden, would have a little shop or kiosk with a postcard stand. 

The chosen images were sometimes not the most interesting, compositions amateurish, printing deficient, BUT there was always at least a few to chose from those on offer, neatly ranked on the stand whith some exhibiting a curvature and some washing out of the colours due to the continuous exposure to the inclemency of the sun.

Sending out postcards to family, loved ones and friends was an axiom of life back then, especially on holidays....sadly, though, as George Harrison so aptly put it once, all things must pass, and today, baring the larger, more touristy places, finding the little 10x15 rectangles with a local image to slap a few words and a stamp on it is getting ever more difficult (while, in inverse ratio, finding hidden Pokémons has become a more productive routine for some, it seems).

Eva is one of those Postcard hunters that will not yield to Pokémon. And she managed to trace two interesting examples of 80s vintage postcards from the city of Alcañiz, province of Teruel, in the Autonomous Community of Aragon in the Northeast of Spain which she kindly included in her letter.

The Plaza de España (just as Eva wondered in the letter, who would care to include so much empty featureless street in the foreground on a picture ..😃)

The Monument to the Drum and the drummer, authored by José Gonzalvo and inaugurated in 1968.

As I understand it, drummers are very much a part of the processions of Semana Santa in this region of Spain and the statue represents one such drummer wearing the traditional vests of the Holly Week.

  

COVER N. 692 - SWITZERLAND

Postmark: 3000 Bern 6 Kirchenfeld 20.02.2026

Posted on the 20th February;  Received on the 26th February 2026

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Vielen Dank Vural, for another nice clean cover , this time with a humourous touch.... I'd say it's a GOAL!

Stamps:

1981 was proclaimed by the  General Assembly of the United Nations as the International Year of Disabled Persons.

Calling on the attention of the general public to this fact, many postal administrations across the globe issued commemorative stamps for this occasion. Swiss Post was one of them, having issued on  09MAR1981 the 0.40 Swiss Frank stamp on the cover.

Swiss Sport Aid, or better yet Schweizer Sporthilfe is a foundation established in 1970 with a view to financially support talented  athletes with or without disabilities throughout their sporting career.

The 0.30 Swiss Frank  stamp illustrated with what I presume to be the logo of the foundation was issued on  issued on 19SEP1974.

The 14th UEFA Women’s European Football Championship took place in Switzerland  from 2 to 27 July 2025.

The tournament was won by the British team who defeated the Spanish squad in the final game. 

To celebrate the event, Swiss Post issued on 08MAY2025 a rather funny self-adhesive 1.20 SWF stamp, illustrated with  a match scene on which a goalkeeper fails to stop the ball from hitting the inside of the goal's net... the funny part ifs that the ball is printed as a cutout, and so it can be placed outside of the stamp itself, just as Vural did on this cover.

The postmark was applied at Kirchenfeld, an historic district in the South of the city of Bern, the Swiss capital.

COVER N. 691 - CANADA

Postmark: Canada Post / Postes Canada Canoe B.C. 12.02.2026

Posted on the 12th February;  Received on the 23rd February 2026

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Hip-hop. I have to confess: not my cup of tea, the same as a long list of other genres before (and I'm sure after). 

Still it is undeniable that this musical movement, which goes beyond the constraints of a genre for one cannot untie it from other art expressions such as break dancing or street art, for instance, has found a solid space in the arts panorama, having already made the transition from the margins to the mainstream, with all the highs and lows that are always associated with this inevitable fact of the life of the arts.

The recognition comes in many forms and Canada Post chose to do it i the way we here are mostly concerned with: Philately.

So,  a great thanks goes out to Eduard, for having sent me this quite nice cover.

Canada Post issued the three "P" tariff stamp set on 28JAN2026, withing the backdrop of it customary philatelic celebration of Canada's  Black History Month, which has been celebrated for the past 30 years and which, in 2026, upholds "Honouring Black Brilliance Across Generations – From Nation Builders to Tomorrow’s Visionaries" as motto.

The three stamps feature distinguished MC's from the Canadian Hip-hop scene, which Wikipedia informs me was established in the 80s. 

Quoting directly from Canada Post's  website  and following the stamps clockwise from the top left, "Maestro Fresh Wes propelled Canadian hip-hop into the mainstream with groundbreaking hits that set new industry milestones. Michie Mee combined rap with dancehall and reggae to create an iconic sound that captivated fans. Montréal-based group Muzion layered French, English and Haitian Creole into their music, injecting the ever-evolving genre with a fresh new vibe".

The Postmark is the nicely illustrated one from the city of Canoe, in British Columbia, which bears the image of two people holding a... canoe, over their heads. Nice!

I said above that Hip Hop has made its transition to mainstream and when I was writing that I remembered a production of Rameau's “Les Indes Galantes” of some years ago that totally blew my fuses off when I was lucky to watch it on TV.

Not that Zima and Adario thake to sing Hip-hop style, but the ambience of the full production is totally Hip-hop in conception. A feast for the eyes and the ears... and the soul.

Here's a clip from it (there is at least another one with a solo by a dancer accompanying Sabine also soloing, which is so movingly beautiful that it is hard to put it in words... check it, you won't regret it)

COVER N. 690 - FRANCE

Postmark: Cinéma Eden Théâtre 13-La Ciotat Les Lumières de L'Eden, Premier Jour  La Poste 13.02.2026

Posted on the 13th January;  Received on the 20th February 2026

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Le Cinéma..... The moving image, the moving photographs that moved people into theatres so that they could get moved at watching simple factual "snapshots" (or, should I say, "snapmovies")  of day to day life such as  the workers coming out of the factory or the arrival of a train at the train station...

Although not being the first ever made films,  these two cinematographic landmarks,  carefully captured  on their "Cinématographe" contraption by the Lyonese Lumière Brothers would go down in history as probably the most famous of  the  early examples of "movies", since they would also be among the first to be screened in front of an audience.

The immediate success of films meant that suitable auditoriums had to be found for their screening and one such case was the Eden Théâtre of La Ciotat, France.

Inaugurated on 15 June 1889, it would, 10 years later, on 21 March 1899, host  the first paying public  screening of films from the Lumière catalogue, with the above mentioned “Arrivé d’un Train à La Ciotat“ on the session programme.

Today, Eden Thèâtre, which become the property of the Municipality of La Ciotat in 1992,  is still opened to film loving audiences, what makes it the oldest cinema in operation in the world.

On 13FEB2026, La Poste issued the 1,52 € stamp on the cover, celebrating this historic landmark of cinematographic relevance.

And Eric and his sister Annabelle, à qui je dirige mon plus grand et sincère Merci, were overkind and generous in sending me not only the lovely FDC but also the beautiful Carte Postale with the image of the Eden's Façade. 

The stamp bears a head-on view of the Theatre and Cinema buildings, the latter as far as I can make it from the images I consulted on Google earth occupying the South wing of the building.

Unfortunately, the Post Office chose again to add a totally unnecessary and absolutely defacing mechanical cancellation on the stamps. I really have trouble understanding why philatelic mail cannot be treated with the respect it deserves by the postal service. Same happens is Spain, very often...

The Postcard that Annabelle so kindly included bears the illustration of the monumental façade with its pediment showcasing what I believe is the city's coat of arms, a detail which was also used in the design of the celebratory postmark.

COVER N. 689 - GERMANY

Postmark: Haustiere Berlin Erstausgabe 10117 08.01.2026

Posted on the 8th January;  Received on the 19th February 2026

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Pets. One of those subjects that I look upon with mixed feelings. I do like animals a lot and I can understand all the positive things that may arise from the relation between people and animals, but do we ensure that most pets live a dignified life? Should we keep birds in cages? Fishes in aquariums akin to water bottles? Dogs in tiny city apartments? etc, etc....

and then there's the ever-growing tendency to humanise animals.... No, a dog or a cat is not a human, so  there is no point in taking it to the hairdresser or to "embellish" them with  false fingernails, no matter how colourful and shiny they might be....

I love animals. That is why I never wanted to have a pet, when finally I could make this decision on my own. I find it strange to say MY dog, or MY cat or MY turtle. at least MINE, roam free wherever they are.

Danke sehr Peter, for another nice FDC to add to the collection.

The Agapornis genus, a type of parrot from continental Africa, comprises nine species which exhibit quite colourful plumage what has attracted the attention of humans who have long kept them in captivity as pets. Also known as love birds (their scientific name derives from the ancient Greek and means just that: Agape - Love + ornis - bird) they mate for life, this characteristic having been at the root of their designation by Prideaux John Selby who first described the species in 1836.

On 08JAN2026, Deutsche Post issued the 0,95€ stamp on the cover, illustrated with a photograph of an Agaporis and the legend “Haustiere” (Pets).

The stamp is obliterated with a First Day Postmark issued at Berlin.

Postage is completed with three stamps from the world of letters series:

0,05€ - Letters as Lotus Flower - issued on 02DEC2021 

0,10 € - Message in a bottle - issued on 02NOV2022

0.15 € - Letters Peacock - issued on 10AUG2024 

COVER N. 688 - CZECH REPUBLIC

Postmark: Svaty Valentyin Milostin 12.02.2026

Posted on the 12th February;  Received on the 18th February 2026

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A special Valentine's day cancellation coming from the Czech Republic. Děkuji mnohokrát, Ivan.

I have to confess: nothing against love nor against celebrating it in whatever way people might want to do it, be it through a letter, even if ridiculous, as Fernando Pessoa claimed that all love letters are, or through a Valentine's gift, or through whatever one might think fit for the occasion. After all, Love is the most important and encompassing emotion that a human may feel (since it syncretically absorbs all the catalogue of human emotions) so nothing bad can come out of the simple fact of celebrating it.

BUT

Traditions are part of one's culture and as such are bound by a reference framework that is specific to a given group, country, society. 

I also have nothing against welcoming traditions from other cultures into our own space. As I said they are manifestations of culture and there can't be anything wrong in that (provided such traditions do not conflict with the set of values that define humanity at large... do not expect me to accept genital mutilation just because it is a tradition somewhere....)

What really annoys me is pushing traditions into other cultures, by way of sheer mercantilism. I have seen it happen in my lifetime more than once and I really find it ... well...annoying.

Valentine's day is one such case, as is, for instance, my biggest pet hate: Halloween.

Back in my courting days time, we wrote ridiculous letters, we gave ridiculous gifts, we did all sorts of ridiculous things as befits lovers all year round... we needed no Saint or specific date for that...

Although I'm not a religious person, I think I can say that Saint Valentine was never one of the most revered  saints in Portugal, as I am absolutely positive that no one had ever heard of Valentine's day around here say 40 years ago.

Now go to a supermarket in my country around the first weeks of February and you'll find all sorts of things that make celebrating love an obligation, be it chocolates, flowers, parfumes, lingerie, you name it....

Commerce has put the celebration of love into the yearly obligations calendar in Portugal but celebrating Love as an obligation is a contradiction in terms....

Anyway,  the same has happened in quite a number of non-Anglo-Saxon ancestry countries like the cancellation on the cover so clearly proves..... a sign of times..... 

Maková panenka a Motýl Emanuel, or Poppy Doll and Emanuel the Butterfly are the central characters of an animation series of 13 episodes produced in 1972 that was very popular in what was then Czechoslovakia.

The two characters are the subject of the B tariff self-adhesive stamp, issued on 06SEP2023.

The theme for the EUROPA/CEPT common issue of 2008 was "Writing Letters". The Czech issue comprised one single stamp with a face value of 17 Krone, issued on 07MAY2008.

According to Google, the handwriting on the stamp is that of  Marina Richterová, the stamp's designer.

The Commemorative Postmark features no place of issue.