Exhibition Souvenir Sheets

Philatelic Exhibition Souvenir Sheets

Philatelic exhibition souvenir sheets are small sized posters of Soviet era. They were issued in memory of all-union and some local philatelic exhibitions by philatelic societies to cover a part of expenses. Usually they are very similar to postally used miniature sheets with depicted real postage stamps on them, but were not intended to use as postage stamps, they were just souvenirs.

Some exhibits (usually big shows) had special first day postmarks to produce different souvenirs. So a part of sheets were postmarked.

Usually souvenir sheets, issued for all-union and for republic’s (capitals of states like Moscow, Kiev, Minsk) exhibits had a circulation of between 1,000 and 5,000 copies. Local sheets from smaller cities and towns are much rare – between 50 and 300 copies were printed.

A first souvenir sheet was issued in December 1932, that’s well known and now extremely rare Kartonka. Only 500 printed. Michel catalog – €25,000.

Only one catalog of Soviet exhibition souvenir sheets is known, it’s a L. Bukler’s catalog, issued in 2009 (in Russian). Only few hundred copies were produced, so it’s hard to find it now.