tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-176845622024-02-28T19:34:55.370+02:00Antique Hunter: Treasures of the Old AtticCollecting and selling old and vintage postcards, books, photographs, autographs, vintage toys and historical memorabilia. Antique hunting. Paper and non-paper antiques. Trade news, auctions, security advisories and sales reports.Antique Hunterhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03049444822607978910noreply@blogger.comBlogger10125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-17684562.post-26472182419211098672007-06-03T21:41:00.000+03:002007-06-03T21:51:12.496+03:00Another attic treasure<div style="text-align: justify;">Just as we wrote about one attic treasure of photography, another one came to light. <br /><br />The oldest commercially built photo camera, a so-called <span style="font-style: italic;">Daguerrotype Susses Freres </span>was auctioned at Vienna's <span style="font-style: italic;">WestLicht</span> gallery and auction house on May 26 for EU 588,613 ($ 792,333), making it the most expensive camera ever sold. <br /><br />The Vienna camera is the only known example of its kind. Before it was found gathering dust in an attic in Munich, Germany, it was regarded a myth among photography experts, any evidence of its existence lost for the past 170 years.<br /><br />Invented by French chemist Lois Daguerre, a daguerreotype is an early type of photograph. It produces a direct image on a polished silver surface that bears a coating of silver halide particles, deposited by iodine bromide or chlorine vapors. As there was no negative original like in modern photography, no copies of pictures could be made.<br /><br />The camera on auction in Vienna was first advertised for sale on September 5, 1839, weeks before another Daguerrotype, produced by Daguerre's brother-in-law, Alphonse Giroux was commercially available.<br /><br />The Giroux Daguerrotype is widely regarded as the first commercially produced camera. Around 10 of those cameras still exist in museums worldwide.<br /><br />The camera in Saturday's auction was sold to an online bidder, who wished to remain anonymous, <span style="font-style: italic;">WestLicht </span>said in a press release. Bidders from Korea, Japan, the United States and France participated in the auction.<br /><br />Starting price was at 100,000 euros. Ahead of the auction some experts expected an even higher price, but for <span style="font-style: italic;">WestLicht</span> owner Peter Coeln the price fetched was already "sensational."<br /><br /><span style="font-style: italic;">WestLicht</span>, a small private photo gallery and auction house, organizes photographica auctions twice a year.<br /></div><br /><br /><a href="http://www.earthtimes.org/articles/show/66571.html/">Link</a>Antique Hunterhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03049444822607978910noreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-17684562.post-670248404567718512007-05-24T05:31:00.000+03:002007-05-24T05:47:37.396+03:00Attic Treasure of Photography<div style="text-align: justify;">Since this blog is titled "Treasures of the Old Attic", naturally the could not pass a story about the most recent attic treasure. This treasure is as real as can be and, a bit contrary to the article below, experts estimate the market value of each of its pieces at a six-figure sum.<br /></div><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v655/gloomov/Steichen190.jpg"><img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 400px;" src="http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v655/gloomov/Steichen190.jpg" alt="" border="0" /></a><br /><br /><div style="text-align: justify;">Just how much cash they might have raised no one can say, but for students of photography the three glass-plate images that Charlotte Albright found in her attic in Buffalo, New York state, last summer are little short of priceless. Happily, the pictures are not bound for an auction house but rather the venerable George Eastman House museum in Rochester, which will display them this autumn. They are remarkable in many ways, not least because they are by Edward Steichen and - though a century old - are in colour.<br /></div><br /><div style="text-align: justify;">As is often the case with such discoveries, Ms Albright, a 96-year-old artist, did not realise what she had fallen upon when she found the three plates in storage in her home. She knew they came from her mother, Charlotte Spaulding, a photographer herself, and assumed she had taken them.<br /><br />But happily she instructed her lawyer to donate the three plates to the Eastman House. When he handed them to the museum's director, Anthony Bannon, in the car park of a Buffalo ice-cream parlour, the truth emerged. One was signed by the legendary Steichen.<br /><br />It turns out, in fact, that two of the plates are portraits of Ms Spaulding, made by Steichen. That the oeuvre of Steichen, who after the Second World War became director of photography at the Museum of Modern Art in New York until 1962, should now have two new additions is an event in itself. Last year, a platinum print taken by him in 1904 in Connecticut, The Pond - Moonlight, set a record for any photograph at auction, attracting a bid of nearly $3m at Sotheby's.<br /><br />"It is so rare that one has a chance to add imagery to an artist's oeuvre, never mind one of the stature of Steichen," Mr Bannon told The New York Times. "You think the ground has been pretty well covered, and then you find something like this."<br /></div><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v655/gloomov/Steichen2190.jpg"><img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 400px;" src="http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v655/gloomov/Steichen2190.jpg" alt="" border="0" /></a><br /><br /><div style="text-align: justify;">The miracle of these plates is that Ms Albright, who probably acquired them in 1939 when her mother died, kept them all this time storedin the dark. Any prolonged exposure to light would have led to a dimming of the colours. For the same reason, the Eastman House plans only to put them on display for a limited time, probably only a few weeks in October, on a light table, before putting them away to ensure preservation.<br /><br />So did Mr Bannon celebrate the find with a large sundae at the ice-cream place? "With a couple of century-old autochromes in my car, I wasn't going anywhere but directly back to the museum," he said flatly. "And I was driving very, very carefully."<br /></div><br /><a href="http://www.blogger.com/news.independent.co.uk/world/americas/article2573293.ece">Link</a>Antique Hunterhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03049444822607978910noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-17684562.post-91695812940974812632007-05-02T22:30:00.000+03:002008-12-09T05:57:35.263+02:00Artist William H. Barribal and his postcards<div style="text-align: justify;"><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj8zrRKl6zIDjQPDxVGCBMFqwSH1mcZgTf7_VVzRqp3pEJc3D0tXGeJzsDafpzPuE8ki6FMOgSA6ucZz2Lbpy58ZkDic8jnuS0QuS_Wx54DkHA2HfZ_w2Hxa3N0lfdQcKGCgIOOGA/s1600-h/9874.jpg"><img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj8zrRKl6zIDjQPDxVGCBMFqwSH1mcZgTf7_VVzRqp3pEJc3D0tXGeJzsDafpzPuE8ki6FMOgSA6ucZz2Lbpy58ZkDic8jnuS0QuS_Wx54DkHA2HfZ_w2Hxa3N0lfdQcKGCgIOOGA/s400/9874.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5060049059741156354" border="0" /></a><span style="" lang="EN-US">William H. Barribal (1873 - 1956) was a London artist who began his career as a lithographer before going on to study at the Paris Academie Julien.</span><br /><br /><span style="" lang="EN-US">Becoming an accomplished painter and designer by the first quarter of the 20th century, Barribal created such memorable images as posters for the Schweppes advertising campaign and the Waddingtons playing cards series, which are avidly collected today. He is also well-known for the bold Art Deco posters designed in 1920s and 1930s for the London North Eastern Railway.</span><br /><br /><span style="" lang="EN-US">Barribal also worked for various magazines, including the fashion champion Vogue, and between 1919 and 1938 regularly exhibited his work. His images of exquisite and fashionable Edwardian women have become classics and the work of many a modern fashion artist shows traces of the unmistakable "Barribal style".</span><br /><br /><span style="" lang="EN-US">It is only natural that late 1910s-1930s postcard publishers ranging from the famed M. Munk and Bruder Kohn of Vienna to London's Inter-Art Publishing Co. and Valentine's took pride in issuing postcards that featured Barribal's Art Deco images of beautiful women. Today these postcards are highly collectable and are considered to represent some of the finest examples of artist-signed glamour postcards.</span><br /><br /><span style="" lang="EN-US">Judging by the 2007 auction sales, a typical Barribal watercolor like the one shown below would sell for around $ 950 including buyer's premium:</span><br /></div><span style="" lang="EN-US"><br /><br /></span><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhh6JOFFVg9taAtuNq-ePRTzQpBcMnsBV-Lp4WPPvuVP4-ON1PX9qQt4YiVaiEwhnF7i9qsQ8VbtLPuomV2OSJKgY90ym3q8blnUdoEQLTzzvpUS_QQDmZ1KNMAz-b-t1Dzqxd9GA/s1600-h/Barribal.jpg"><img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 349px; height: 405px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhh6JOFFVg9taAtuNq-ePRTzQpBcMnsBV-Lp4WPPvuVP4-ON1PX9qQt4YiVaiEwhnF7i9qsQ8VbtLPuomV2OSJKgY90ym3q8blnUdoEQLTzzvpUS_QQDmZ1KNMAz-b-t1Dzqxd9GA/s400/Barribal.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5060055248789029906" border="0" /></a><br /><br /><div style="text-align: justify;">Yet Barribal postcards are much more convenient for a collector - these small masterpieces demand much less place and are far more affordable. The price range for vintage Barribal postcards is between $ 17.50 to $ 30.00, depending on the image and condition. The image of the bathing belle above and those below are among some fine Barribal cards which have recently arrived in our store.<br /></div><br /><br /><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjFB0wxK-nW-P0BEml3ULLPpZbC50QLDmStDo0ICWhc5DPlZatAdbSN1QAcIKrWfnqegniZz2lQMSO14n6I9g0LakXRPalLSefuqA9QbZHn17KnHGG8yIPwll1a5b4vkm3jKYWdNQ/s1600-h/9883.jpg"><img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjFB0wxK-nW-P0BEml3ULLPpZbC50QLDmStDo0ICWhc5DPlZatAdbSN1QAcIKrWfnqegniZz2lQMSO14n6I9g0LakXRPalLSefuqA9QbZHn17KnHGG8yIPwll1a5b4vkm3jKYWdNQ/s400/9883.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5060057533711631410" border="0" /></a><br /><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiNJUWJ30ph1oz-nyXXe5Kdwo9gNl2Z5twfbukTjqGcd-jvXiNgxm0NiHZJxPXcCPf9Tla1G6_EfRVvcB028yhQe41AVJsXoNL76MnfcjG3UXqP4PNmwIrFQDJAdqLzXkijkLZ4aw/s1600-h/9882.jpg"><img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiNJUWJ30ph1oz-nyXXe5Kdwo9gNl2Z5twfbukTjqGcd-jvXiNgxm0NiHZJxPXcCPf9Tla1G6_EfRVvcB028yhQe41AVJsXoNL76MnfcjG3UXqP4PNmwIrFQDJAdqLzXkijkLZ4aw/s400/9882.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5060058392705090626" border="0" /></a>Antique Hunterhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03049444822607978910noreply@blogger.com6tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-17684562.post-82003339239499205752007-04-20T17:45:00.000+03:002007-04-20T18:06:35.710+03:00Security Advisory: New eBay Fraud Method Detected<div style="text-align: justify;">After a somewhat lengthy absence caused by work overload, we're back with a promise to constantly update this blog with exciting new stuff -- but first things first, and that is a security advisory concerning a new online fraud method involving eBay.<br />This technique of the never-tiring fraudsters involves sending an unsuspecting eBay seller a message purportedly related to some sale debate. Typically, it would resemble a proper eBay message and read something like, <span style="font-style: italic;">User so-and-so has left you a message... Please click here to respond...</span> The link would then take a seller to a fake site reproducing eBay graphics and designed to learn eBay account password and other sensitive information.<br />As usual, the best way to recognize a fraudulent e-mail is to carefully check the eBay number of bogus "disputed item", or right-click on e-mail headline and hit "Properties", which would give a very good idea where mail really came from. The same procedure can be repeated with the actual link contained in the e-mail <span style="font-weight: bold;">without any attempt at opening it. </span>It is crucial not to attempt to open any links in any suspicious mails; sellers should remember that communication concerning any trading disputes or questions from potential buyers should better be conducted from the eBay site.<br /><br /></div>Antique Hunterhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03049444822607978910noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-17684562.post-1133979591195268992005-12-07T20:11:00.000+02:002007-04-20T17:18:01.274+03:00Christmas card for $ 16,000<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://i10.photobucket.com/albums/a147/Blogrunner/picture.jpg"><img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 400px;" src="http://i10.photobucket.com/albums/a147/Blogrunner/picture.jpg" alt="" border="0" /></a><br /><br /><div style="text-align: justify;">A 162-year-old Christmas card -- one of the first ever printed -- sold at an auction over the weekend for $16,000.<br />The hand-colored card, which shows a family celebrating around a table, is one of about 10 surviving from an original batch of 1,000 printed in 1843, auctioneer Henry Aldridge said.<br />The cards were commissioned by Sir Henry Cole, a Londoner who is generally recognized as the inventor of the commercial Christmas card.<br />The card was bought at the auction in the town of Devizes in southern England by Jakki Brown, editor and co-owner of "Progressive Greetings" magazine and general secretary of the Greeting Card Association.<br />Aldridge said he was "pleased with the price and that the card is staying in this country within the greetings card industry."<br />The card was originally sent to a Miss Mary Tripsack, a close friend of the poet Elizabeth Barrett Browning, the wife of the poet Robert Browning.<br />"We don't know who sent it to Miss Tripsack. We can only assume that they must have been of means, as cards were a novelty at the time," Aldridge said.<br />John Calcott Horsley, a British painter, designed the card for Cole, who was the first director of London's Victoria and Albert Museum.<br />Cole printed 1,000 of the cards on a lithograph stone before having them hand-colored.<br />The card drew some criticism from Victorians because it shows some members of the family enjoying a glass of wine, but that did not keep the practice of sending cards from catching on.<br />Although wood engravers produced prints with religious themes in Europe in the Middle Ages, the first commercial Christmas and New Year's cards are believed to have been produced by Cole in 1843.<br /><br /><a href="http://www.boston.com/news/world/europe/articles/2005/12/03/one_of_first_christmas_cards_is_sold_at_auction_in_britain/">Link</a><br /> <br /></div>Antique Hunterhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03049444822607978910noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-17684562.post-1130619914528924862005-10-29T23:55:00.000+03:002007-04-20T17:30:35.639+03:00eBay fraudsters sentenced<div style="text-align: justify;">BBC News reports today that three eBay fraudsters arrested in May have been sentenced to jail:<br /><br />Three Romanians who conned eBay customers out of thousands of pounds have been sentenced to a total of eight years' imprisonment.<br />The "cell" tricked customers into paying for £300,000 worth of fictitious goods which never arrived.<br />The man said to be the gang's ringleader, Nicolae Cretanu, 30, of Forest Gate, London, was given a three and a half year term for the fraud. His wife Adriana, 23, and George Titar, 26, both got two and a half years.<br />The couple advertised everything from non-existent cars to concert tickets and used 12 aliases and an accomplice to collect the payments. Their accomplice Titar, of Stratford, London, collected payments from money transfer shops.<br />The two-year scam was successful because buyers on eBay have to pay before they are sent their goods.<br />People were told by email that they had been unsuccessful in their first bid but were offered a "second chance" to buy a similar item. But the goods they purchased never arrived and the trio managed to net at least £300,000 from the scam.<br />The majority of the cash was sent back to the gang's accomplices in Romania in what the police described as a well-planned and sophisticated fraud.<br />The racket was finally exposed after suspicious staff at money transfer firm Western Union alerted police.<br />Chief Superintendent Nigel Mawer who led the operation said the fraud was operated by a "significant cell of Romanians operating in London".<br />"We believe there were 3,000 victims of this fraud and this type of fraud is still continuing."<br />He said that up to a £1 billion worth of fraud of this type took place in the UK a year.<br />And he issued a warning to potential internet auction customers: "Don't use money transfer to send money to anybody who you don't know personally. It is not designed for that and Western Union support that and work with us on that," he said.<br />Chief Supt. Mawer added that the cell's accomplices in Romania had been arrested and were awaiting trial.<br />He stressed that internet auctions were essentially safe as long as customers followed the "good guidance" on how to buy safely. In this case people were duped into not following those rules, he said.<br />Responding to the case, eBay issued a statement saying it was sorry that anyone had suffered through their association with eBay but pointed out the transactions had not taken place on the internet site itself. The criminals used the site to gather information and initially to contact their victims but carried out the fraud separately.<br />"As soon as we were made aware of them we took action. By working with the police we helped ensure that the prosecutions were successful, showing that crime does not pay on eBay".<br />A spokesman said: "The criminals used the site to gather information and initially to contact their victims but carried out the fraud separately beyond the protected environment we provide. Payments were made using Western Union money transfers, which both eBay and Western Union strongly recommend against.<br />In fact, eBay.com in the U.S. has banned payment via Western Union and eBay.co.uk will soon be following suit."<br />As well as pursuing the gang's "cohorts in Romania", Chief Supt. Mawer pledged to pursue asset confiscation procedures against the gang with a view to creating a compensation fund for their victims.<br />The sentencing comes after the trio pleaded guilty at Middlesex Guildhall Crown Court to conspiracy to obtain fraud by deception and money laundering earlier this year.<br />Their arrests in May were prompted by an investigation by Scotland Yard's specialist economic crime unit.<br /><br /><a href="http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/4385956.stm">Link</a><br /><br /></div>Antique Hunterhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03049444822607978910noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-17684562.post-1129918473538309632005-10-21T20:55:00.000+03:002007-04-20T17:23:11.101+03:00Advisory: New PayPal online fraud attempt detected<div style="text-align: justify;">Those involved in online trading or buying and online auctions would probably be interested to know about a new fraud attempt involving PayPal and using the <span style="font-style: italic;">phfishing</span> technique.<br />The new scheme is quite different from those exposed in the past (such as e-mails requiring that user confirm PayPal registration details and then directing unsuspected users to a fake PayPal site). In the new scheme, users are getting e-mails informing that they have just paid an excess of USD 100-150 from their PayPal accounts for goods like Rolex replica watches, and offering a link where users can supposedly "debate" the transaction. Needless to say the e-mail graphics does its best to reproduce PayPal graphics and that the links are taking users to fake sites designed to learn their names, PayPal passwords and other sensitive data.<br />There are two very easy methods to recognize a fake PayPal email:<br />- Right-click on e-mail headline, then choose "Properties" which would give you a very good idea where mail really came from;<br />- A fake PayPal e-mail most likely would not address you by your name such as real PayPal e-mail would and would include a link or a window to fill in details.<br />And if still in doubt a perfect way to avoid trouble is to open a new browser, securely log into your PayPal account and verify that it is in order.<br /><br /> <br /></div>Antique Hunterhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03049444822607978910noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-17684562.post-1129474535914581202005-10-16T16:58:00.000+03:002007-04-20T17:24:53.386+03:00Chinese propaganda prices: Postcard vs. Poster<div style="text-align: center;"><img src="http://i10.photobucket.com/albums/a147/Blogrunner/China.jpg" /></div><br /><div style="text-align: center;">Vintage Chinese propaganda postcard: "White Rabbits" Theater Play". C. mid-1950s.<br /></div><br /><div style="text-align: justify;">To complete for the time being the issue of Chinese propaganda collectibles, and assuming that you're as fascinated with these relics as we are, let us examine the question of <span style="font-style: italic;">what to collect</span>.<br /><span style="font-style: italic;">Posters </span> might naturally seem more attractive, but genuine vintage Chinese items from 1950s-1970s might be rather difficult to obtain, and collectors should be very careful as the market is abundant with quality, often very sophisticated reprints imitating age wear; sadly enough, unscrupulous sellers may sometimes conceal that they are in fact selling replicas.<br />According to our survey of <a href="http://www.ebay.com/">eBay</a>, world's largest online auction, Chinese propaganda posters usually sell for anything between 7.00 in case of known replicas to dozens of U.S. dollars. In this context, one definitely must not be confused by the low auction starting prices of around USD 0.99 per poster, since some sellers of such items set the shipping price with obligatory insurance at a staggering USD 25.00-27.00!<br />A poster collection, no doubt, is a good and visually attractive investment but if you're embarking on such an enterprise consider that a single framed poster may look good on the wall but a poster collection requires storage space, restoration etc.<br /><span style="font-style: italic;">Postcards</span> are like small posters and have several advantages: their very size, lower prices and the fact that one is by far less likely to encounter any replicas or reprints. While a collection of several hundred genuine posters would require serious investment and extensive storage space, a similar collection of postcards will easily fit into one or two albums. As to prices, the current range in most cases is between USD 8.00 to 20.00, with some exceptions in the down and upper layers, and it is fairly easy to predict that prices will rise within several years as they did since 1990s. <a href="http://www.blogger.com/search.ebay.com/_W0QQsassZniamniamQQhtZ-1/">Our auctions of Chinese propaganda postcards</a> usually open at less than USD 10.00, which we feel is the right starting price.<br />Finally, as a great introduction to the subject of Chinese propaganda, its history, artists and symbolism which pertains both to posters and postcards, we heartily recommend the richly illustrated and informative <span style="font-style: italic;">Stefan Landsberger's Chinese Propaganda Poster Pages</span> (see our <span style="font-style: italic;">Links </span>section).<br /><br /><br /></div>Antique Hunterhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03049444822607978910noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-17684562.post-1129466431890791362005-10-15T15:03:00.000+03:002007-04-20T17:27:18.548+03:00More on Chinese propaganda - postcard sizes and posters<div style="text-align: justify;">Our previous post was devoted to classic Chinese propaganda postcards and this seems to be a proper opportunity to speak of <span style="font-style: italic;">postcard sizes</span>.<br /></div> <div style="text-align: justify;"> Most old postcards from the late 19th and the first third of the 20th century come in the standard size which is about 8.5 or 9 by 14 centimeters (3.5-3.5'' x 5.5''), unless the postcard is of an <span style="font-style: italic;">unfolding</span>, <span style="font-style: italic;">oversized</span> or <span style="font-style: italic;"> small</span> variety which was relatively rare at the time. Many postcard dealers even don't provide a note of this size, assuming that to be self-understandable while referring to pre-1920s cards.<br />However, one may note that those Chinese classics are somewhat larger - about 10 by 15 centimeters (4'' x 6''). This format is pretty much standard for most modern glossy cards but it came into being quite long ago, emerging as of late 1920s in European countries such as Germany. Among postcard collectors and dealers, it is known as the <span style="font-style: italic;">continental size</span>. Thus when you next encounter the term in postcard descriptions you'll know right away what dealer talks about, as well as have some indication of the card's age.<br />One more word about descriptions: it is customary among dealers not to state the size of the card in question unless it is continental, oversized etc. A description that is not accompanied by postcard dimensions is an indication that the card is of standard old size.<br /> <br /></div> <div style="text-align: center;"> ~~~<br /></div><br /><div style="text-align: justify;">The Chinese of course not only produced propaganda postcards but also posters. The Dutch International Institute of Social History presents a nice <a href="http://www.iisg.nl/exhibitions/chairman/chnintro.html">collection of vintage Chinese posters</a> (make sure to browse their Soviet and Cuban collections as well), accompanied by a fascinating article on Chinese poster hunting authored by the collector himself, Stefan R. Landsberger, and titled <a style="font-style: italic;" href="http://www.iisg.nl/exhibitions/chairman/landsberger.html">"Confessions of a poster collector"</a><span style="font-style: italic;">.<br /><span style="font-style: italic;"></span><br /><br /></span></div></span>Antique Hunterhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03049444822607978910noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-17684562.post-1129425981578501432005-10-14T03:56:00.000+03:002007-04-20T17:28:32.670+03:00Classic Chinese propaganda postcards<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://i10.photobucket.com/albums/a147/Blogrunner/7546.jpg"><img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 320px;" src="http://i10.photobucket.com/albums/a147/Blogrunner/7546.jpg" alt="" border="0" /></a><br /><br /><div style="text-align: justify;">Classic Chinese propaganda postcards from the times of Chairman Mao are emerging from one-time obscurity to capture a prominent place among paper collectibles. These little gems printed in 1950s are surprisingly innovative, funny, interesting and can no doubt serve as an inspiration to many an artist and designer - not to mention their historic and aesthetic value. Prices of these cards are rising as well, often advancing into double figures (naturally, depending on image quality and card condition). The one shown above is titled "The Harvest is Rich and the Children are Fat".<br /><br /></div>Antique Hunterhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03049444822607978910noreply@blogger.com0