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North Saskatchewan River - Dorothy Knowles

Art Canada

Stamp Info

Name Value
Date of Issue April 7, 2006
Year 2006
Quantity 150,000
Denomination
89¢
Perforation or Dimension 13
Series Art Canada
Series Time Span 2004 - 2012
Printer Lowe-Martin Company Inc..
Postal Administration Canada

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Stamp Price Values

Condition Name Avg Value
M-NH-VF
Mint - Never Hinged - Very Fine Only available to paid users
U-VF
Used - Very Fine Only available to paid users
* Notes about these prices:
  • They are not based on catalogue values but on current dealer and auction listings. The reason for this is that catalogues tend to over-value stamps.
  • They are average prices. The actual value of your stamp may be slightly above or below the listed value, depending on the overall condition of your stamp. Use these prices as a guide to determine the approximate value of your stamps.

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Layouts

Souvenir sheet of 2 stamps

Quantity Produced - 150,000
Current Purchase Price: Only available to paid users
Original Purchase Price: $1.40
Perforation: 13+
Dimension: 150 mm x 87 mm (horizontal)
Printing Process: Lithography in 9 colours
Gum Type: P.V.A.
Tagging: General, 4 sides
Paper: Tullis Russell Coatings
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Souvenir Sheet OFDC

Quantity Produced - Unknown
Current Purchase Price: Only available to paid users
Original Purchase Price: $2.40
Cancellation Location: Unity, Saskatchewan
Perforation: 13+
Printing Process: Lithography in 9 colours
Gum Type: P.V.A.
Tagging: General, 4 sides
Paper: Tullis Russell Coatings
Add to List

About Stamp

There are many things about Dorothy Knowles' paintings that deliver a sense of awe and wonder, but perhaps none more so than their very scale - some as big as six by eight feet. Look at one of Knowles' landscapes and you can almost believe that she took a complete prairie landscape and dropped it, in its entirety, onto her canvas. Now, those distinctive prairie landscapes appear on a pair of stamps celebrating her artistry. As part of its ongoing Art Canada series, Canada Post has issued a domestic rate (51¢) stamp featuring Knowles' 1971 watercolour "The Field of Rapeseed," and a U.S. rate (89¢) stamp showing her 1989 oil painting "North Saskatchewan River."*

"This series recognizes that postage stamps are ambassadors for Canada," says Alain Leduc, Manager of Stamp Design and Production at Canada Post. "Art is a wonderful way of representing our country internationally, but it also helps Canadians across the country gain a better understanding of each other."

Knowles' work is a case in point - her paintings have long been recognized as a unique response to the immensity and richness of life on the prairie. Born in Unity, Saskatchewan, in 1927, Knowles was a farm girl who grew up to study biology and lab technology. After graduation, she attended summer art classes at Emma Lake, Saskatchewan, studied art in night classes at the University of Saskatchewan, and in 1952 enrolled in an art class at Banff. She was encouraged to further her training in England, and attended Goldsmith's College School of Art in London. Soon, painting became her life's work. In the late 1950s and early 1960s, Knowles experimented with abstraction, but in a 1962 workshop, Clement Greenburg encouraged her to return to painting from nature and her love of painting the vast landscapes for which she is renowned was born.

Since those early days, Dorothy Knowles has exhibited frequently, and her work is now collected by museums across Canada. When she was made a member of the Order of Canada in 2004, the Governor General's citation noted that "her evocative paintings have come to symbolize the prairie landscape."

Designer Hélène L'Heureux was inspired by the distinctive colour tones of Knowles' "The Field of Rapeseed".

"The design for the Art Canada series is unobtrusive, in order to make a case for the paintings. The asymmetrical borders of the stamp offer a contemporary look, while still focusing attention on the art," L'Heureux says. "When designing the souvenir sheet, however, I wanted to highlight the very bright colour palette this artist uses. We chose her unique shades of saturated yellow and muted blue, and extended them across the souvenir sheet to suggest a vast landscape. The mosaic pattern was inspired by the mosaic made by adjacent farm fields - it's an abstract prairie landscape."

* Both paintings are in the collections of the Mackenzie Art Gallery, Regina, Saskatchewan, and can be viewed online at http://www.mackenzieartgallery.sk.ca.

Creators

Designed by Hélène L'Heureux.

Original Artwork

Dorothy Elsie Perehudoff Knowles, "North Saskatchewan River", 1989 Mackenzie Art Gallery, Regina, Saskatchewan

Similar Stamps

Reference

Canada Post Corporation. Canada's Stamp Details, Vol. 15, No. 2, 2006, p. 8-9.

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