As a longtime — if intermittent — stamp collector, and one who has a lot of Soviet and Russian stamps, it’s been fascinating to witness the global interest in a certain commemorative postage stamp issued by Ukraine’s postal administration on April 12. And, at the same time, to consider how I feel about my Russian stamps during this deeply painful time.
While there are no metrics to measure and compare such things, it’s possible this Ukrainian stamp release has received more news coverage, and more attention from both stamp collectors and those for whom “philately” might as well be a strange Greek word — which it is! — than any other.
(FYI: Philately is the English spelling of the French word “philatélie,” which was assembled from Greek roots, and is the fancy way to describe stamp collecting and associated endeavors. Use it to impress!)
Why so much attention? First, the stamp was issued by Ukraine as it confronts an invading Russian army that commits cruel, obscene, inhumane and inarguably evil acts every minute, of every hour, of every day.
Second, it commemorates an iconic moment at the start of the war, on February 24, when Ukrainian border guards on an island 30 miles south of the Ukrainian coast used what FCC-regulated broadcasters might describe as “salty” language to reject a Russian Navy ship’s demand that they surrender: “Russian warship … go fuck yourself!” (DISCLOSURE: The Berkshire Edge is not regulated by the FCC.)
Third, the ship in question, the Moskva, considered the most powerful of Russia’s Black Sea warships, was struck by Ukrainian missiles and sank just a couple of days after Ukraine’s wartime president, Volodymyr Zelensky, posed triumphantly with the new stamp.
And finally — let’s be honest here — the stamp features compelling artwork of a Ukrainian soldier flipping the bird at the Moskva, which is a wee bit different than common postage-stamp fare of flags, animals and historical figures.
All these elements have given the stamp, and stamp collecting, a moment. “What makes any good postage stamp is a good story, and this has a heck of a story behind it,” Jay Bigalke, editor in chief of Linn’s Stamp News, the weekly information bible of stamp collecting, told me in a conversation this week. “Interest from stamp collectors is very high. There are not many obscene gestures on stamps,” he noted, wryly.
Ukrposhta, the Ukrainian postal service, printed a million of these commemorative stamps and will likely not print more. In Kyiv, Ukrainians stood in line for hours to purchase a maximum of six stamps each, a limit put into effect on Monday. Online sales are no longer open due to massive website traffic and to ensure Ukrainians can acquire the stamp, not just dealers and resellers, according to Ukrposhta — which, remarkably, continues to deliver mail in Ukraine amidst the violence.
Indeed, demand is extraordinarily high. The stamp, with a version for international mail that has a face value of about U.S. $1.50, has been selling briskly on eBay for at least $50 and well over $1,000 for first-day covers — that is, envelopes featuring the stamp that are postally canceled on the date of issue. Many if not all the sellers are from Ukraine, and Bigalke told me these sales “are almost like charity auctions,” as buyers are willing to pay inflated prices to support Ukrainians during wartime. He said it will be a while before the Scott Catalog, which sets the value of stamps and which he also oversees, will be able to value it accurately.
This global interest in a postage stamp comes as I’ve been thinking quite a bit about my own stamp collection, which includes more than 500 Russian stamps from the Soviet era and at least a few dozen issued after the dissolution of the U.S.S.R. in 1991. Should I feel differently about them now? History is history, and art is art, but as I’ve flipped through the many album and stock-book pages that display my Russian stamps, I’ve found it difficult to separate them from the ongoing tragedy of this war — and the horror and suffering still to come at the hands of Putin’s regime.
It’s not clear that my confused feelings are widely shared. In the wake of Russia’s invasion, there has not been any significant reaction from the collecting community, other than broad support for Ukraine. I did find one dealer in Russian stamps that announced, on its website, that it would no longer purchase new stamps from the Russian postal service for resale and would instead focus on Russian stamps acquired elsewhere. Bigalke, of Linn’s, said he recently saw a dealer at a stamp show who posted a sign that he was no longer selling Russian stamps, though it was unlikely to have a significant impact on his sales. And my unscientific survey of online collecting forums found virtually no discussion of the war and Russian stamps.
Graham Beck, whose innovative “Exploring Stamps” YouTube channel has found a large audience by focusing on the history represented in postage stamps with creatively produced videos, had a similar take. “Buying stamps directly from the [Russian] post office can be seen as supporting the country financially. I know it’s minor, but that’s the concern: Can be this be perceived as support of Russia during this time? I anticipate Russia will have far fewer sales of stamps,” he said.
In general, though, Beck told me that he hasn’t seen the war have an impact on collectors’ feelings about Russian stamps. “I have not seen any changes within the community with regard to showcasing Russian stamps or sharing imagery of Russian stamps,” he said. “I hope there is no direct swing in opinion within the community. Russian stamps deserve to be spoken about, they’re beautiful stamps.”
In early January, Beck released a compelling, deeply researched and long-planned exploration of Russian stamps that includes a fascinating segment on the territorial dispute between Russia and Japan that led to war in 1904. He said a video exploring this subject would certainly be received differently if released today, during the Ukraine war. But he doesn’t believe it’s a long-term issue.
“The community at large respects that stamp collecting goes beyond just the moment. People collect Nazi Germany stamps. There’s nothing wrong with it, you’re collecting history. It doesn’t necessarily point to what side you’re on, or agreement with the nation’s ideology or beliefs,” he said.
As for the new Ukraine stamp, Beck completely understands the response. “Ukraine has done a fantastic job with this stamp,” he said, pointing to the viral image of Zelensky holding the stamp and a launch event in Kyiv that included Roman Grybov, the soldier who reportedly told the Russian warship what to do to itself. “I don’t think we’ve seen before that level of directness, that ‘eff you’ approach, in stamps,” he said. “That’s exactly what stamp collectors love, the raw connection to history in the making. Stamps are now a part of it. And the connection, that the boat then sank. It has the making of an epic stamp that will be known in the hobby by all, I’m sure of it.”
My own years of on-and-off-again stamp collecting have never been about building a valuable collection (sorry, heirs!), so I’m not concerned about any impact the war might have on the already-modest value of my stamps (which appears to be … no impact). My collecting interests are worldwide and largely aesthetic, with a focus on colorful stamps about animals, space, the United Nations, peacemaking, birds and nature. Over many decades, it’s been a delightfully peaceful and refreshingly analog way to engage with geography, world history, culture and art for an hour or two on a rainy afternoon, meandering aimlessly through myriad topics and interests, Googling down many rabbit holes to learn more (sometimes about rabbits!), always without concern for productivity or profit.
One of my favorite stamps commemorates a joint U.S.S.R.-Cuba mission to the Soviets’ Salyut 6 space station. It’s part of a series of stamps that feature odd, cartoonish, and, in my view, unintentionally hilarious artwork of the astronauts and their spacecraft. In this particular stamp, an astronaut showers in his underwear (is he a Never Nude?) while another exercises nearby on a space treadmill in what appear to be his everyday street clothes. Was he pulled off the street to join the mission moments before launch? It’s an odd little exercise party in an orbiting space gym that, upon closer inspection, makes absolutely no sense.
Most Russian stamps in my collection are far less amusing and feature historical figures, beautiful artwork, architecture, and other typical postage-stamp subjects. So perhaps the best way to think about my Russian stamps in this moment is simply as history that informs my understanding of current events. So, when I look at a 1991 stamp, issued by the U.S.S.R. in its waning days, that commemorates Ukraine’s declaration of sovereignty a year earlier — that is, Ukraine’s independence from the Soviet Union — I think about 30 years of Ukraine’s incremental progress toward democracy and increased well-being for its people, and how much of that has been utterly destroyed in just eight weeks.
And turning another album page, I wonder how Russia could, just last May, issue a stamp honoring Andrei Sakharov, the Soviet nuclear-weapons scientist — and later, dissident and advocate for disarmament who won the Nobel Peace Prize in 1975 — at the same time it was planning its invasion of Ukraine. In that context, the artwork of the stamp is striking: It shows Sakharov looking down, appearing exhausted and distraught, with one hand covering his forehead. It’s as if he knows what’s coming. “A country which does not respect the rights of its own citizens will not respect the rights of its neighbors,” Sakharov wrote in 1968, words that ring loud and true about Putin’s Russia in 2022.
I’m less sure than Beck that this war won’t have an impact on collectors’ interests, given Russia’s unprovoked aggression and how it has targeted and terrorized civilians — both from a distance, via missiles and shelling, and up close, as revealed in shocking images of non-combatants executed and buried in mass graves. While some may collect stamps issued in Nazi Germany and from other despicable regimes, a great many would find that a distasteful pastime, regardless of historical value. At minimum, it’s hard to see why anyone would want to collect Russian stamps issued by Putin’s regime, and especially any released after February 24, 2022. What will they commemorate?
Perhaps Ukraine’s new “eff you” stamp will open the door to bolder, more direct and emotionally resonant messaging in stamps. Indeed, Beck told me that he thinks some stamps have always done this. “They play a role of communicating a frustration, an emotion towards an international policy or a neighboring country. They’re in a fantastic position to do that. They can be placed on envelopes that travel the world, that a lot of people see,” he told me, highlighting a 2020 stamp issued by Austria that subtly mocked Great Britain’s delayed and troubled exit from the European Union and which received wide attention.
It might be a leap to suggest that stamp collecting can influence geopolitics, but we’ve certainly seen that a clever, compelling stamp can quickly become part of an unfolding international narrative. More broadly, for collectors and others it’s worth considering how our engagement with the world is influenced by art — including art produced by compromised people or under the auspices of brutal regimes — regardless of whether it hangs in a museum, is performed on stage, or is printed on a small piece of paper that we stick on a piece of mail and send out into a beautiful, complicated world.
Bill Shein has been waiting for stamp collecting to have a moment so he could write a column titled, “Stamp collecting is having a moment.”
