Category: Postcards

The Year In Postcards

  • December 10, 2019

As I’ve shared on this blog several times, this past year I started Postcrossing, and it’s become a favourite hobby of mine. This post is about the postcards I sent and received from friends and family, and once again it was a great year.

I received postcards from all over the world! Specifically from Scotland, England, Budapest, The Netherlands, Australia, Hawaii, Tonga, Norfolk Island, Denver, China, India and probably one or two other places I’ve forgotten. The above photo shows just a few of them, and as usual they ran the gamut from scenic to funny to saucy.

I love them all of course, but the above – sent by SMC from Colorado – gave me the absolute giggles. The cowboy just looks so serious 🙂

Naturally I sent myself/KLS a legion of cards (more than one per vacation day on average) and once again I relaxed in many a hotel room sketching, drawing or even painting on the back of such cards. Many of these illustrations went to one of you, but I made sure to send many home as well. Here’s a selection:

Australia was when I developed a few extra skills in watercolor, and I think you’ll agree my likenesses became photorealistic. The above examples – all sent to KLS from Oz – weren’t chosen randomly: for some reason each of these three are often repeated as topics of my postcard art. I’m sure many of you have received a Grimace by now?

The above was drawn in Florida back in May, and on that trip I think I made a few strides toward more realistic renditions in this and a few (requests) I sent others. I also did a series (ten or so?) of Dobby the elf from Harry Potter cards that I sent from Florida. When I do such things I usually choose who gets which one randomly. I hope you liked your Dobby 🙂

In California I dabbled with many more likenesses, and using watercolor pens even went so far as to attempt blending and shading! I even did matching portraits of the Supernatural boys that I feel cane out pretty good:

Alas my cards are in disarray, and the necessary task of sorting them so I can better prepare a post like this must wait until the new year. I’ve also got lots of them now – going back >25 years – and will have to upgrade my storage.

Very soon I’m off again to Australia and Japan. Needless to say I’ll be sending cards again so watch your mailboxes in the new year. And if you have any art requests – I’ll be using watercolors again – please let me know…

Postcrossing Century!

  • October 19, 2019

The other day I received my 100th Postcrossing postcard! I thought it appropriate to give an update to celebrate the occasion!

In the 10 months since I sent my first card I’ve received cards from 27 countries and sent them to 32. While I have sent cards to Australia, South America and South Africa, I have yet to receive any from there, so I’m still waiting to have a card from every continent (bar Antarctica of course). Here’s the stats:

Cards ‘expire’ after 90 days, which means you can request a new address even if one doesn’t arrive. While the South African one was technically expired, it eventually arrived and was registered by the recipient who lives on a tiny island off the west coast of Africa and said his mail service is sporadic! I’ve had three other expired cards to date, all to Eastern European countries.

You can see Germany is above and beyond the most popular country for Postcrossing, but I have to say I’m most surprised by China. While it’s a bit scary to be given addresses in that country (since it’s difficult to write Chinese characters!) I’ve never had one not arrive so I must be doing ok 🙂

The cards themselves run the gamut, but since I have requested classic tourist cards, animal cards and pinup cards I tend to mostly get those. I’ve made it clear I’m interested in the stamps as well and get a great selection from all over the world.

The Russian scientist stamp is great isn’t it? Germany has a few series of lovely connected landscape stamps and Japanese stamps are always graphic and very pretty. Take a look at the effort this guy put in to cram as many stamps as possible on his card from Japan:

Or these two Chinese cards:

Of the cards themselves I love them all, but some have been particularly notable. I’ll feature two here, both Australian postcards but neither being sent from Australia! This one came from Germany:

And this one from Taiwan:

The latter is particularly great since the card itself is old – maybe 1980s – and I imagine she either found it in her parents collection or in a used bookstore! (And no, there’s no way people sending cards to me would know I am Australian which makes both of these even more amusing!)

These days I can send up to 11 cards at a time, and receive about 10 a month on average. At that rate I’ll get to 200 sometime around next August. Let’s hope at least some of those come from the Southern Hemisphere!

B’s Postcards

  • August 6, 2019

Bernard has a large collection of postcards, most sent by me! They date all the back to within the first month of me arriving in the USA, and span a mind-boggling array of trips across many years.

And on many – especially in the last five years – I drew or painted things. This post is a humble showcase of my prodigious skills at postcard art.

For starters, how about some political figures. Can you guess who is shown in the top left?

That’s also Gandhi in the bottom left, not Batista!

And here are some entertainers:

Florian Schneider, Gary Numan, Yeri, Gene Simmons. All astonishing likenesses 🙂

Not impressed? How about Mr T:

Or Tegan Jovanka:

Or even Bowie and Freddy:

Lastly some characters:

As it turns out art has been dominated by two topics: Gudetama and Grimace, and I could have filled a post with pictures of them alone. Instead though, just one of the latter:

Breathtaking!

Like what you see? Leave a request in the comment within the next few days and you may get your very own from San Jose!