Signed, Sealed, Delivered: X O
On March 4, 2011, I presented “I Am A Man,” a series of twenty text panels by Hank Willis Thomas, as a “book of stamps.” I imagine them situated among the United States Postal Service Black Heritage Stamp Series featuring “notable Black American” stories. Current forty-four cent stamps in the Black Heritage series include a painting of Barbara Jordan and a stylized portrait Oscar Micheaux; both based on photographs. In 1999, a 33¢ stamp with a photograph of controversial political figure Malcolm X was released. The Willis Thomas text stamps convey collective narratives alongside the USPS portraits.
According to the Smithsonian National Postal Museum, a Cinderella Stamp “looks like a postage stamp, but this imaginary issue is without postal value.” During the 2008 Presidential campaign season, the Shepard Fairey stenciled image of then-Senator Barack Obama, bearing the logo of his Presidential campaign, held great cultural value. The United States Postal Service memorializes figures of the past. A portrait based on a photograph, this iconic blue, red, and white rendition of the Presidential candidate imagined Barack Obama as the history of the future.
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Signed, Sealed, Delivered, X O by M. Liz Andrews, Shepard Fairey, Associated Press, United States Postal Service is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 3.0 Unported License.
Based on a work at www.LetterToObama.com.
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