International Stamp Exhibition - Germany / German Democratic Republic 1972 - 15 Pfennig

International Stamp Exhibition in the GDR "Interartes" For the International Stamp Exhibition in the GDR "interartes", the Ministry of Posts and Telecommunications of the German Democratic Republic issued four multicolored special postage stamps, two of them with surcharge. The sums collected will be handed over to the Philatelistenverband der DDR in the Kulturbund. INTERARTES 72 in the Staatliche Museen zu Berlin For the fourth time, stamps of the German Democratic Republic present exhibits of the State Museums of the GDR's capital city, Berlin. While the series of 1958 and 1959 saw the rescue and return of significant works by the Soviet Union, and advertised the 1966 edition for Babylonian art treasures, the most recent issue is INTERARTES 72, a stamp exhibition with international participation 14 countries, thematically dedicated to the field of art and culture and takes place from 4 October to 5 November 1972 in the Old Museum on Marx-Engels-Platz and in front of the world-famous Pergamon Altar in the Pergamon Museum am Kupfergraben. With this exhibition, the Philatelistenverband der DDR in the Kulturbund, in close cooperation with the Staatliche Museen zu Berlin, is taking a completely new, promising path by presenting the stamp exhibits, the themes of architecture, fine and applied arts, folk art, literature, music and the arts treat the performing arts, original works of art from the respective areas are set aside. Paintings, graphics and sculptures, architectural drawings and models, products of folk art, books and autographs of famous writers, musical instruments and scores, set design and posters and much more, enter into a direct, living relationship to the diverse message of the stamp exhibits. In this way, philately is for the first time placed organically in the great frame of art and culture. Specifically, the four INTERARTES commemorative stamps show the following art treasures of the Staatliche Museen zu Berlin: 15 + 5 Pfennig value The original depiction of a spearman from the bodyguard of the Persian (Achaemenid) King Dareios 1 (521-486 BCE) is one of the sights of the Vorderasidtisches Museum. These representations of such weapons bearers, the so-called "immortals," were mounted in colored enamelled reliefs of white artificial sandstone on the walls of the Apadana (= audience hall) of Dareios Palace in Susa, the Persian seat of government in the province of Elam. They were exposed by French excavations and arrived after the Louvre in Paris. The copy in the Museum of the Ancient Near East in Berlin came here in exchange for a relieving lion from Babylon. It is a ceramic masterpiece of enamel technique, which has its origin in Assyria and then especially in Babylonia. The contours between the individual colors are formed by dark glass threads, which are raised on the surface. The color scale (black, white, yellow, light blue and green) is richer than the Babylonian, but not as radiantly pure as that.