Exhibition of postage stamps of the USSR from the private collection of Stanislav Stepanov "USSR - SPACE POWER"

On July 1, in the Kaluga Museum of Fine Arts (103 Lenina st., Conference hall), an exhibition of USSR postage stamps from the private collection of Stanislav Stepanov "USSR - SPACE POWER" will open, to the 60th anniversary of Yuri Gagarin’s flight into space and the anniversary of the establishment of the Kaluga region…

The Kaluga Territory is almost a place of power, the land, which became the point of birth and accumulation of ideas that made it possible to achieve what people could only dream of for many centuries - to fly into Space. This greatest historical event could not but leave an imprint on all further human activities. Artists, as creators of new objects, meanings and images, were among the first to respond to what had happened.

The exhibition of postage signs, presented in the halls of the museum, is a clear confirmation of this. These are unique exhibits from the personal collection of Stanislav Nikolaevich Stepanov, which reflect the birth and development of cosmonautics in the Soviet Union during the period from the launch of the first artificial Earth satellite in 1957 to the collapse of the USSR in 1991.

The exhibition is based on postage stamps and blocks dedicated to the exploration of outer space by the Soviet people. These are specific releases for a specific happened or memorable event, the countdown of which goes back to October 4, 1957.

Preparations for the launch of the first artificial Earth satellite took place in complete secrecy. Naturally, no one prepared postage stamps - they had to be done urgently. They did not wait for the circulation and made an overprint “4 / X - 1957. The first in the world of arts. satellite of the Earth "on the stamp dedicated to the centenary of K. E. Tsiolkovsky, December 28, 1957. From that moment on, a new grandiose direction of collecting opened in Soviet and world philately, a new topic: astronautics.

A selection of exhibition sheets opens with this overprinted stamp. And the first space issue of 1957, of two stamps with a denomination of 40 kopecks, dedicated to the launch of the world’s first Soviet artificial earth satellite. Then, with a short interval, the second satellite, the third one was reflected on the stamps… And finally, in April 1961, the expected unexpectedly happened - everything went to that - the first manned flight into outer space. It was a Soviet man - cosmonaut Yuri Alekseevich Gagarin, on the Soviet spaceship Vostok.

The epochal event was reflected in the postage stamps of the USSR in April - June 1961. The issue consisted of three stamps, one of which was with a coupon. On the coupon the words of NS Khrushchev: “Our people were the first to blaze the road to socialism. He was the first to enter space, he opened a new era in the development of science… ".

And then, the events of the same heroic plan of space exploration developed so rapidly that the postal department barely kept up with issuing new emissions: "Vostok-2" - Titov; the world’s first group flight - Vostok-3 and Vostok-4, Nikolaev and Popovich; flight "Vostok-5" and "Vostok-6", Bykovsky and Tereshkova - the world’s first woman-cosmonaut; the world’s first flight of Soviet cosmonauts on the three-seater spacecraft Voskhod, Komarov, Feoktistov, Egorov; first manned spacewalk, Leonov… In addition to manned flights, spacecraft launches to Mars, Venus, and the Moon. And this is just five years, from scratch!

And then went: commissioning of the Orbit space system; an experimental space station was created for the first time in the world; for the first time in the world, lunar soil was delivered to Earth; for the first time in history "Lunokhod-1" on the Moon; manned flights of "Soyuz" - as for work; the joint Soviet-American flight "Soyuz - Apollo"; flights of international crews under the Intercosmos program; orbital space complex; the international project "Venus - Halley’s comet"; the first orbital flight of the Buran spacecraft. By tradition, there was a brand for each start. And there was a stamp for every Cosmonautics Day. And even a series, and even a block.

All in all, during the USSR, more than 300 space-themed postage stamps were issued, which are now presented in the museum exhibition.

The exhibition will run until August 1.

Stepanov Stanislav Nikolaevich , civil engineer, ethnographer, collector, poet. Was born in 1959 in the city of Norilsk, Krasnoyarsk Territory. Since 2012 he has been living in the city of Maloyaroslavets, Kaluga Region.

Supervised construction work at zero cycles in the cities of Norilsk, Talnakh, Kayerkan, Dudinka, Oganer. In 2012 - a researcher at the MBU "Museum of the History of the NDP" (on the topic "Norillag", period 1935 - 1956).

Gathers collections: "Electric samovars and tea ware of the USSR of the middle and late XX century"; “Household items and labor tools of the prisoners of the“ Norillag ”; "Poet V. V. Mayakovsky in collectibles"; "The Great October Socialist Revolution in Philately, Numismatics, Faleristics", etc.

The author of the collection of poems "2 times 13". Publications in collections: "Ivanovsky meadow", anthology anthologies "Norilsk writers", etc. Member of the Kaluga regional organization of the Russian Union of Professional Writers (Russian Union of Professional Writers).

Engaged in educational activities. Awarded a letter of gratitude from the Ministry of Culture and Tourism of the Kaluga Region "For educational work and fruitful work with the museums of the Kaluga Region" (April 2018).