What’s that? Your letter arrived emblazoned with a pert pair of male buttocks with a handsome, moustachioed face peeking out from between a pair of impossibly muscular legs?
Why, that’ll be down to Finland’s new stamps – featuring the steamy renderings of famed erotic artist and queer icon, Tom of Finland.
The stamps, which are due to begin circulating in September are heralded as “confident and proud homoeroticism” by the Finnish postal system Posti.
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Literature on the website reads: “His emphatically masculine homoerotic drawings have attained iconic status in their genre and had an influence on, for instance, pop culture and fashion. In his works, Tom of Finland utilised the self-irony and humour typical of subcultures.”
Touko Laaksonen, the artist behind Tom of Finland, produced some 3,500 drawings, of which two were selected for the stamp sheet by graphic artist Timo Berry, who designed the stamp.
Berry said: “The sheet portrays a sensual life force and being proud of oneself. There is never too much of that in this northern country.”