Latvijas Pasts in collaboration with the social company BlindArt has released a new stamp and a cover featuring works of art created using the tactile painting technique, a way of painting adapted to visually impaired people. The drawings have been made by the pupils of Strazdumuiža Residential Secondary School. The first day cancellation of the stamp is scheduled to take place in Riga post office No. 10 located at 41/43 Elizabetes Street, from 8 AM to 8 PM on the 26th of July 2019.
The face value of the stamp Blind Talents – Painters is € 0.90, which corresponds to the cost of sending an ordinary Class A letter within the European Union. The print run of the stamp is 30,000 copies and its release is accompanied by the issue of a special cover with a print run of 1,000 copies.
The design of the stamp and the cover incorporates several works created during the classes of visual and tactile art at the development centre of Strazdumuiža Residential Secondary School by the pupils of grades 4 to 8, working jointly under the supervision of the teacher Baiba Pika. The most recent stamp and cover issued by Latvijas Pasts portray the works by a team of authors composed of Agnese Arāja, Konstantīns Bodrovs, Jakovs Burljajevs, Maija Fogele, Ilva Gailīte, Elīza Kupruka, Lelde Ķempele, Jānis Lejnieks, Laine Liepiņa, Amanda Nīcmane, Deniss Ovsjaņņikovs, Agnese Puisāne, Zane Puriņa, Jānis Putniņš, Romāns Timofejevs and Sofija Voronka. In turn, the layout corresponding to philatelic releases has been designed by the artist Ludis Danilāns.
The stamp created by the gifted blind persons includes the painting Garāmgājējs (A Passer-by), while the cover is decorated with the drawings Balerīna (Ballerina) and Gribu būt karalis! (I Want to Be King!). The first day postmark depicts the stylus, a centre-punching tool used in tactile painting.
Tactile painting is a special type of drawing adapted to visually impaired people. Paper is attached to a specially designed drawing object and a stylus is used to centre-punch the contour of the drawing object. The resulting silhouette of the drawing is turned over and painting with specialised finger paints or oil chalks is carried out by touching the tactile dots made in the centre-punching process. This painting technique has been used in fairy tale books published in Latvia, as well as in numerous exhibitions, receiving awards at the local and international levels.
