U.S. artist and photographer Kevin Colton, of Seneca Falls, N.Y., has created seven custom-made first-day covers (FDCs) for this year’s Group of Seven issue.
Collector Steve Klinck, of Cowansville, Qué., notified CSN about the FDCs, which are offered on eBay. Each cover features three framed images, including a portrait photo of the respective artist to the left, one of the artist’s paintings in the centre and the stamp issued earlier this year to the right. Two phrases – “100 years since the Group of Seven first exhibit” and “Establishing a distinctively Canadian artistic style with the way landscapes were pained and viewed” – are also included at the bottom.
“They are outstanding,” says Klinck, who bought the set “and congratulated him on his work.”
“They beat Canada Post’s hands down.”
The seven-stamp set issued by Canada Post this May came 100 years after Canadian art enthusiasts first witnessed the work of the Group of Seven, which later became Canada’s best-known school of art.
On May 7, 1920, artists Franklin Carmichael, Lawren Harris, A.Y. Jackson, Frank Johnston, Arthur Lismer, J.E.H. MacDonald and F.H. Varley hosted their first exhibition under the banner of the Group of Seven.
The 2020 stamps feature paintings from each of the group’s founding members, including:
- Carmichael’s In the Nickel Belt (1928);
- Harris’ Miner’s Houses, Glace Bay (circa 1925);
- Jackson’s Labrador Coast (1930);
- Johnston’s Fire-swept Algoma (1920);
- Lismer’s Quebec Village (1926);
- MacDonald’s Church by the Sea (1924); and
- Varley’s Stormy Weather, Georgian Bay (1921).
The issue is available in seven-stamp self-adhesive booklets and traditional-gum mini-panes plus a set of seven OFDCs, each of which are serviced with cancellations from locations “significant to each artist,” according to Canada Post.
Among Colton’s more than 1,500 creations is a cover for Canada Post’s 2017 issue marking 150 years of Canadian photography.
KSC CACHETS
One of only a few contemporary cachetmakers for Canadian stamps, Colton works under the banner of KSC Cachets and has issued more than 1,500 FDCs.
His first FDC for a Canadian stamp, released in 2016, was for that year’s Star Trek issue (Scott #2911b), according to CSN columnist Gary Dickinson, who wrote about Colton last December.
Colton’s print runs are small – he typically only makes 20 copies, but sometimes it’s as few as a dozen – and he numbers each one.
To view Colton’s eBay profile, visit ebay.com/usr/kcolton315.
He also has a profile on HipStamp, another online collector marketplace, at hipstamp.com/store/ksc-cachets.