It's offered to your attention the layout of the Soviet postge stamp "April 12 - Cosmonautics Day" issued in 1986. The layout was created by the famous Soviet artist German Komlev who was the author of many Soviet postage stamps. The artist depicted the portrait of Konstantin Tsiolkovsky - the "father" of cosmonautics who at the beginning of 20th century foreknew and described in his works the future principals of space flights using jet power and rockets, the weightlessness problem, how to survive in spaceship and the necessary equipment for that and for "space walks".

The layout is originally handsigned by the author German Komlev on its cardboard case-frame on the right. It's also signed by author on the back.

Material - gouache painting on paper.

Size of the layout (height x width) - 9.8x13.8 inches (25x35 cm).
Size of the frame (height x width) - 12.2x17.3 inches (31x44 cm).

Condition - excellent. Supersize the whole painting, its back and the signature area.

Catalogue number of the stamp - 5712 (Solovjev stamps catalogue), or 5643 (Zagorsky stamps catalogue).

Provenance. The layout has been presented by the author German Komlev to his colleague - the famous Soviet cosmic artist Andrey Sokolov. After the death of Sokolov this layout was found by his relatives in Belarus, where Sokolov had a summer house. They held this great heritage for many years and only now decided to sell it.