LA POSTE FRANCE on 16 May 1945 issued a First Day Cover stamp marking the centenary birth of French actress Sarah Bernhardt (1844-1923). This maxim card has a cancellation postmark for 12 April 1946, Conservatoire de Paris. The stamp illustration is based from a painting by Bastien Lepage. This brown-lilac stamp had a face value of 4F + 1F. An Intaglio print method was used to produce 4,500,000 copies.The designer was Pierre Gandon but credited to Charles Mazelin; Pierre Gandon was also the engraver.
The stamp bears Mazelin's name as the engraver's signature, but in fact it was never engraved by him. Why? After WWII a purge of Vichey government collaborators was in full swing. Gandon had been deprived of orders from the postal administration for three months having engraved the triptych of the Tricolor Legion in 1942 (poste-1942-45). The punch was finished engraving on 14 November 1944. Given this state of affairs and the contempt towards Gandon, it was difficult to issue the stamp with Gandon's signature. Mazelin agreed to put his signature in place of Gandon's.
Sarah Bernhardt (born Henriette-Rosine Bernard; 22 October 1844 – 26 March 1923) was a French stage actress. She is considered one of the greatest tragediennes of the 19th and 20th centuries. The first international "star", she was the first to have made triumphant tours on five continents, Jean Cocteau (1889-1963, novelist, playwright, poet, etc.) inventing for her the expression "sacred monster". In 1859, she entered the Conservatoire d'art dramatique de Paris in the class of Jean-Baptiste François Provost (1798-1865, actor, 258th member of the Comédie-Française, in 1839). After graduating in 1862 with a second prize for comedy, she entered the Comédie-Française, but was dismissed in 1866 for having slapped a member, Mademoiselle Nathalie (1816-1885, actress 272nd member in 1852). She signed a contract at the Théâtre national de l'Odéon (inaugurated in 1782). She was revealed there by playing "Le Passant" by François Édouard Joachim Coppée (1842-1908, poet, playwright and novelist) in 1869. In 1870, during the siege of Paris (17 September 1870 / 26 January 1871), she transformed the theatre into a military hospital and treated the future Marshal Ferdinand Foch (1851-1929, general and academician) there, whom she would meet again forty-five years later on the Meuse front, during the First World War (28 July 1914 to 11 November 1918). She triumphed in the role of the Queen in Ruy Blas (a five-act play created in 1838) in 1872, which led to her being nicknamed the "Golden Voice" by the author, Victor Hugo (Feb. 1802 - May 1885, writer, poet, playwright, politician, Academician, etc.
She was also linked with the success of artist Alphonse Mucha, whose work she helped to publicise. Mucha became one of the more sought-after artists of this period for his Art Nouveau style.
Source: Wikipedia
No comments:
Post a Comment