Last month, while digging through my parents' stuff in preparation for a move, I discovered some family treasures about which I will be writing in the new year. One surprise finding was this pair of holiday cards made by my grandfather Albert Kner, in 1950. They are paper collage, done in a style that I hadn't quite seen from my grandfather before. In fact, they are in a style that I have embraced: simple and bold shapes. Needless to say, I was excited and touched to find these and to feel this connection. I love the playfulness with which my grandfather chose the different papers and textures for these two images-- the velvet for Santa's suit, the gauze for the clouds, the silver for the wings of the angle.
Inside these cards, printed in letterpress green letters, it reads: "Merry Christmas and A Happy New Year from the Kners *1950*". I don't know how many of these my grandfather would have made and sent out at the time, but I can imagine him very methodically printing the inside text, methodically cutting out all of the illustrative elements for the covers in multiples, and then methodically affixing them.
The colors of these cards, 58 years later, is bright and alive.
