Philatelic exhibiting is a way of formally presenting part of one's collection at stamp expos that is akin to poster presentations at academic meetings. There are different types of exhibits, which are judged at larger philatelic expositions according to rather detailed and sometimes arcane guidelines.
A few years ago I even took a summer seminar on exhibiting at the American Philatelic Society just up the road in Bellefonte, PA. I realized I probably had the stuff, potential themes, and the ability for exhibiting, but I wasn't that keen on the formality, competitiveness, and judging vagaries of the process. I decided in the end on this blog as a different and less rule-bound way to present some of my collection and my related and sometimes unrelated thoughts.
Nonetheless, I decided to submit a short exhibit for the American Topical Association's one-page exhibit show. I mean, it was just one page, online, and unjudged, so it is a rather low stakes way to get some sense of the exhibiting experience. And sure enough, coming up with a theme gave me another way to look at my collection. I delved into my international IGY stamps more than I have so far in this blog. I knew that many countries that participated in the IGY never issued IGY stamps; that some countries that came out with rather attractive stamps were not necessarily the most active IGY participants; and that not all of the IGY stamps were actually issued during the IGY itself. So my result is this pdf, also shown below. I opted to show at least one stamp from each of the 19 countries I counted that actually issued one or more IGY stamps during the IGY period (not later, or on anniversaries), and noting the themes of the stamps. It was hard to cram 19 stamps onto one 8.5"x11" page, so the font is small, the margins are wide, and elements are crowded. So although the design is not ideal, I made it work in two days of off-and-on work. This will help me think about my collection in some different ways.
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