The Hundertwasser Collection

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Beneath each stamp are links to the respective first day cover (FDC) and a list of pages where you can find variations of that particular stamps, such as maxi cards, imperforate stamps and the like.

If you're still waiting for all the images to download, you might want to open the site navigator (opens here in a small navigational pop-up window) and see what else there is to find here. (Please note, all the links open up in THIS window.)

I always try to keep this site up to date and as accurate as possible, but if you should find a mistake (or if there's something not here that you'd like to see) please drop me a line and let me know.

Now on to the stamps! Enjoy!

Austria

December 1975

FDC
Making of the Spiral Tree

6 April 1987

FDC


8 October 1993
FDC Maxicards Specimens

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The Memorial Issue
This is Austria's and Seidel's tribute to Hundertwasser .
Rumor has it that Seidel spent 15 hours a day, every day for two weeks transforming the graphic Blue Blues into this memorial minisheet with four color variations of Hundertwasser's work.

2 June 2000
Click on the image to see an enlargement of the stamps.

FDC
Maxicards

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Cape Verde

The story of the Cape Verde stamps is an incomplete one, but one that makes these issues all the more interesting to collect.

Hundertwasser created Vapor (the graphic on the stamp), Seidel engraved it and the Austrian Federal Printer printed the issue to be released on 24 April, 1982. For some reason, the stamp was never officially issued. It certainly seems as if they had been planning on it up to the last minute, though, as some first day covers were printed up and are now in collectors' hands.

Three years later, the original Vapor design was issued in two variations - one with a light hulled ship, the other with a dark hulled ship - and with a new value (30$) printed over the old one (10$). It is unclear whether these separate color variations were intended (or printed) for issue in 1982, as presently only light hulled versions of the 10$ stamp are known to exist.

To make the Cape Verde issues all the more interesting, there are also three differently colored, numbered minisheets which are often treated as graphic art and as such are more likely to be found in an art gallery than at a stamp dealer.

In order to give you an overview of all the diiferent versions, I will only show you one of each here. You can click on the link below the red, green and yellow versions to see all three minisheets in their entirety.


Unreleased	30 October 1985
	FDC Specimens


30 October 1985
Minisheets Specimens

Cuba

This is the first stamp ever issued with a Hundertwasser design. Issued as part of a set of 25 stamps depicting modern art, Hundertwasser himself had nothing to do with its realization.
The stamps were printed in se-tenant sheets with 5 different stamps on each.

29 July 1967

FDC

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France


15 January 1994
FDC

Liechtenstein

7 June 1993

FDC
Maxicards

His Final Project On the day he passed away, Hundertwasser spoke with the printer to finalize the details for these three stamps for the World's Fair in Hannover. After the conversation, he laid down to rest and died. These, then, are Hundertwasser's swansong. Below are slightly enlarged images of each design, again expertly realized by Professor Wolfgang Seidel. You can also take a look at the entire sheets of 20 (there are slight differences between the stamps on each sheet, although they are too slight to be visible in these scans).

9 May 2000
	FDC Maxicards

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Luxembourg


6 March 1995

FDC

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New Zealand

There was a lot of discussion about the "validity" of these stamps when they were issued on December 29, 2002. Many argued that they were not "real" stamps since they were issued by a private mail delivery service. Though this is by no means conclusive evidence, any fears I may have had were assuaged when I received two letters, two FDC's and a post card all sent to me from New Zealand to the United States using these and only these as postage.

The only real issue regarding the stamps' "validity" seems to be whether they belong alongside the stamps designed by Hundertwasser himself. That is a question each collector must decide for him- or herself.

No matter what, the most interesting thing about these stamps is not that there are only 2500 of them, or that they were issued in se-tenant strips of five, or even that one of each stamps is round. More than all of those, each stamp is numbered, making each stamp a document attesting to the limited printing of these stamps.