Correos issues this March 8 a block sheet dedicated to International Women's Day and with it begins, for the first time, a series within other series. All the women's stamps, although they belong to different philatelic series, will be united by the same design line.
All the stamp designs in which women are the main protagonists of this 2022 and the block sheet dedicated to the 8M have been designed by Isa Muguruza who defines her illustration for the 8M in this way:
For the generic stamp I considered the true meaning of feminism. It is a struggle that women exercise in order to achieve equal rights. Feminist women are therefore women who help other women and their union is what leads to real changes.
The union of women creates a beautiful and inspiring “landscape”, like a wild field. For this reason, I have drawn the hands of two women holding (helping) each other and from them emanating a lot of flowers. With this drawing I intend to inspire the new generations to continue with that `legacy` that these great women have left us and to continue advancing all together.
Faced with the challenge of inspiration to develop this whole new universe of women, she states:
The campaign itself has inspired me in itself. It is a campaign that honors 8 women who have done a great job in the feminist history and they themselves have been my main inspiration. This collection of illustrated stamps is a way of saying thank you for all your journey.
At the time of drawing them I did not want to stick with a simple drawing of the portrait, I wanted to go further and I thought it was nice that their busts were accompanied by a lot of flowers. The flowers act as a narrative link between portrait and portrait, giving a sense of collection, but they also have a great symbolic charge.
The flower as a symbol has been related to femininity and women throughout history. There is the relationship with roots, the land, fertility, even in all its movements and seasonalities that can be compared to our cycles. In addition, due to its shape, the flower has often been used as a symbol to represent the female reproductive system. Flowers represent diversity, beauty, connection with nature, life, growth, transformation and strength (they even grow on asphalt).
The metaphor of the flowers allows us to bring together several ideas that I wanted to convey: the work of the 8 honored women is like a seed that they planted and that we have to nurture so that it continues to grow.
Finally, the technique used by the designer according to her own words: My illustration is completely digital, from the first sketches to the last final art is made with photoshop. The color palette used is common in my work. Pink, purple, yellow and blue tones mainly. I also like to play with color, decontextualizing the images and making it seem that it is a dreamlike reality very far away from the one we find ourselves in.
My work also revolves around women as active muse within the work, I want to leave behind the role of women as passive muse who only poses. The women I draw are strong, independent, fighters and dreamers. Therefore draw these 8 large.
