Else Lasker-Schüler stamp

Props to Julia Warbanow for choosing contemporary fonts for postage stamps! This is Schick Toikka’s Chap (2016), used for a stamp to be issued on 7 February 2019, commemorating the 150th birthday of Jewish German poet and playwright Else Lasker-Schüler (1869–1945). From the Deutsche Post website:

As Germany’s most important expressionist poet and exponent of avant-garde literature, she is at the center of Berlin’s bohemia at the beginning of the 20th century. Her extravagant lifestyle also contributes to this: she rejects the traditional role of women in bourgeois society. At the same time she opposes abortion, advocates for contraceptives and free love, and advances as a symbolic figure for the liberation from conservative constraints. Not least because of her appearance – black pageboy cut, wide trousers, colorful robes and eye-catching jewelry – Else Lasker-Schüler is considered an eccentric bird of paradise, who likes to stroll through the streets of Berlin, disguised as her alter ego “Yusuf, Prince of Thebes”.

The image shows a detail from a drawing by Lasker-Schüler, titled Jussuf (© Sammlung Kamen, Insel Hombroich).