BGuthrie Photos: DC -- Natl Postal Museum -- Exhibit (Case): Negro Leagues Baseball Stamp Art

DC -- Natl Postal Museum -- Exhibit (Case): Negro Leagues Baseball Stamp Art:

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Description of Pictures: Negro Leagues Baseball Stamp Art
October 20, 2010 – June 5, 2011
On view is original art produced by Kadir Nelson for the creation of the Negro Leagues Baseball stamps, which pay tribute to the all-black professional baseball leagues that operated from 1920 to approximatley 1960.

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Copyrights: All pictures were taken by amateur photographer Bruce Guthrie (me!) who retains copyright on them. Free for non-commercial use with attribution. See the [Creative Commons] definition of what this means. "Photos (c) Bruce Guthrie" is fine for attribution. (Commercial use folks including AI scrapers can of course contact me.) Feel free to use in publications and pages with attribution but you don't have permission to sell the photos themselves. A free copy of any printed publication using any photographs is requested. Descriptive text, if any, is from a mixture of sources, quite frequently from signs at the location or from official web sites; copyrights, if any, are retained by their original owners.

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[1] PMNEG_110618_01.JPG Medium (Email) (Bigger?)	[2] PMNEG_110618_04.JPG Medium (Email) (Bigger?)	[3] PMNEG_110618_09.JPG Medium (Email) (Bigger?)
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Specific picture descriptions: Photos above with "i" icons next to the bracketed sequence numbers (e.g. "[1] ") are described as follows:
1. PMNEG_110618_01.JPG: Commemorating Negro Leagues Baseball: Featuring a scene painted by award-winning artist Kadir Nelson, the Negro Leagues Baseball stamps were issued on July 15, 2010, to pay tribute to the all-black professional baseball leagues that operated from 1920 to about 1960. Often overlooked, the Negro leagues nevertheless drew some of the most remarkable athletes ever to play baseball. The leagues also led to lasting changes in our national pastime by advancing the exciting strategies of bunting and stealing bases, and they were among the first to play games at night. Ultimately, the Negro leagues challenged racist notions of athletic superiority and sparked the integration of American sports. From http://www.beyondtheperf.com/content/negro-leagues-baseball-home-run Negro Leagues Baseball: A Home Run Issue 016|Jun 13, 2010 One of the fundamental challenges for successful stamp design is selecting the right artist. Stamp art is inherently difficult; standards are very high, and the canvas is very small. Ideally, the artist will fit the project like a hand in a glove. In this case, a baseball glove. While an art student at the prestigious Pratt Institute in Brooklyn in 1995, Kadir Nelson was commissioned to do a painting on Negro Leagues baseball. He dove in to research the topic, not knowing that the journey would continue for years and grow into several paintings. Kadir Nelson Nelson's work on the subject was widely celebrated in such venues as Sports Illustrated magazine. This acclaim convinced him to expand the project into an illustrated book, which he also wrote, titled We Are the Ship -- based on the slogan for the Negro National League: "We are the ship, all else the sea." The long-term contributions the Negro Leagues made to baseball and to American society far exceeded tickets sales or league revenues. (View more information on the history and impact of Negro Leagues baseball.) Yet for years, those contributions received scant attention -- a mistake that officials at the U.S. Postal Service had no intention of committing. So they pursued a stamp release dedicated to the subject, originally planning a pane of stamps featuring four different players. But three of the best-known players -- Satchel Paige, Josh Gibson, and Jackie Robinson -- had already appeared as part of the 2000 Legends of Baseball issuance. "There were so many great people involved in Negro Leagues baseball," says Terry McCaffrey, manager of stamp development for the Postal Service, "that we decided it would not do justice to concentrate on just four players." Some other approach was needed. Enter Kadir Nelson. When the Citizens' Stamp Advisory Committee staged its quarterly meeting in Nelson's hometown of San Diego in 2006, he had two stamp illustrations in the works -- activist Anna Julia Cooper and author Richard Wright, both released in 2009. But Nelson seized the opportunity to meet with stamp art directors and show more of his work. He chose to include many illustrations from his book, which were received with an enthusiasm he could not have predicted. In a typical artist meeting, the goal is to find a style of work that will complement a given stamp subject. But this time, though Nelson did not know about the Negro Leagues project or the struggles to produce it, he presented works that matched not only style but also subject. "I was blown away by the beauty of the images," McCaffrey says. "When we decided to change the direction of the project, we knew he would be the perfect artist." Nelson's distinctive style allowed exploration of a new approach. His artwork on We Are the Ship shows vivid, almost exaggerated forms rendered at the peak of action. Dramatic light and angles contribute to images that feel like baseball of an earlier era. While many artists photograph models in particular poses to guide their production of artwork, Nelson posed for such photos himself. Using himself as a model gave maximum flexibility, avoiding the need to hire models or accommodate their schedules. Working with art director Howard Paine to develop a look for the project, Nelson settled on an unusual approach: a se tenant, with a continuous image stretching across both stamps. Early sketches were fairly generic baseball scenes, but Nelson and Paine refined the look. Now, in the left-hand stamp we feel the excitement of the game -- dust flying as a player slides into home. And in the right-hand stamp we see a packed stadium, with the foreground featuring Andrew "Rube" Foster, founder of the first successful Negro baseball league. Each stamp is powerful in itself, but together they tell the full story of a league that revolutionized the game of baseball. When the artist and the subject are a perfect fit, the stamp design may be a double, but the net effect is a home run.
2. PMNEG_110618_04.JPG: Andrew "Rube" Foster Andrew "Rube" Foster (1879-1930), who began his baseball career as a pitcher, is considered the "father" of Negro leagues baseball. He believed that a well-organized league would keep teams active longer and help increase exposure for individual players. In 1920, he established the Negro National League and its slogan, "We are the ship, all else the sea." In its first three years, the new league drew record crowds and profits, inspiring the formation of similar leagues across the country. Foster served as president of the Negro National League, which initially comprised eight teams, until 1926. In 1981, the National Baseball Hall of Fame honored him as the "foremost manager and executive in the history of Negro leagues baseball."
3. PMNEG_110618_09.JPG: Early sketches by Kadir Nelson include a pitcher in full flight, his right leg extended after throwing the ball, and a portrait of Andrew "Rube" Foster with a crowded stadium behind him. Nelson based his designs on historic photographs.
4. PMNEG_110618_13.JPG: Early sketches by Kadir Nelson include a pitcher in full flight, his right leg extended after throwing the ball, and a portrait of Andrew "Rube" Foster with a crowded stadium behind him. Nelson based his designs on historic photographs.
5. PMNEG_110618_17.JPG: Negro Leagues Baseball: The US Postal Service originally thought to honor the Negro leagues with a pane of stamps featuring four different players. Concerned that this approach might not do justice to the subject, the Postal Service instead turned to artist Kadir Nelson, the creator of several acclaimed paintings on Negro leagues baseball and the author and illustrator of "We Are the Ship," a history of the Negro leagues published in 2008. His vivid, energetic style appealed to the Postal Service, as did his passion for the Negro leagues. Nelson worked with art director Howard Paine to develop a new concept: a se tenant with a single painting spread across both stamps.
6. PMNEG_110618_21.JPG: Although it began as a generic baseball scene, the final stamp design captures the excitement of a real game. The foreground features "Rube" Foster. Behind him, dust flies and a packed stadium cheers as a player slides safely home.
7. PMNEG_110618_32.JPG: Legends of Baseball: The Negro Leagues Baseball stamps are not the first time the US Postal Service has honored players in the Negro leagues. The Legends of Baseball stamp pane issued in 2000 featured 20 extraordinary players from the major leagues, including three who started their careers in the Negro leagues. Josh Gibson ranked among the most popular players in the Negro leagues. Satchel Paige helped pitch the Cleveland Indians to the American League pennant at age 42, after two decades in the Negro Leagues. Jackie Robinson, who broke through the "color line" when he began to play for the Brooklyn Dodgers in 1947, also appeared on the pane. Artist Joseph Saffold and art director Phil Jordan designed each of the stamps to look like authentic baseball trading cards.
8. PMNEG_110618_33.JPG: Wearing a Kansas City Monarchs uniform, "veteran-rookie" Satchel Paige considers his next pitch. Paige played for the Monarchs from 1940 to 1947, helping lead the Negro leagues team to a string of victories.
9. PMNEG_110618_43.JPG: Catcher Josh Gibson is generally considered one of the most prodigious power hitters in the history of professional baseball. Here he wears a uniform for the Pittsburgh Crawfords, one of the most successful teams in the Negro Leagues.
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2011 photos: Equipment this year: I mostly used the Fuji S100fs camera as well as two Nikon models -- the D90 and the new D7000. Mostly a toy, I also purchased a Fuji Real 3-D W3 camera, to try out 3-D photographs. I found it interesting although I don't see any real use for 3-D stills now. Given that many of the photos from the 1860s were in 3-D (including some of the more famous Civil War shots), it's odd to see it coming back. Trips this year: Civil War Trust conferences (Savannah, GA, Chattanooga, TN), New Jersey over Memorial Day for my birthday (people never seem to visit New Jersey -- it's always just a pit stop on the way to New York. I thought I might as well spend a few days there. Despite some nice places, it still ended up a pit stop for me -- New York City was infinitely more interesting), my 6th consecutive San Diego Comic-Con trip (including Las Vegas, Los Angeles, and San Francisco). Ego strokes: Author photos that I took were used on two book jackets this year: Jason Emerson's book "The Dark Days of Abraham Lincoln's Widow As Revealed by Her Own Letters" and Dennis L. Noble's "The U.S. Coast Guard's War on Human Smuggling." I also had a photo of Jason Stelter published in the Washington Examiner and a picture of Miss DC, Ashley Boalch, published in the Washington Post. Number of photos taken this year: just over 390,000.
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