Modern Philately
commission of
MODERN PHILATELY
Reinaldo Jacob
What is MODERN PHILATELY*
Philatelia Moderna, recently created as an “Experimental Class”, has as its main objective to encourage collectors of recent or modern philatelic material, issued since 1991, allowing them to present their collections at the highest level in a FIP exhibition.
Modern Philately also seeks to demonstrate to postal administrations that there is a large number of philatelists who collect and study the material recently issued by them.
The FIP board is now making this class available at all worldwide and specialist exhibitions that comply with special regulations (SREVs) for the following exhibition classes: Traditional Philately, Postal History, Postal Integers.
In the near future it is intended to include the following classes: Aerophilately, Thematic Philately and Fiscal Philately.
For a collection to qualify as Modern Philately, it must contain philatelic material issued by postal administrations from 1991 onwards (FIP reference).
Issues of stamps and other philatelic materials released after 1991 are qualified as material to be used in the collections of Philatelia Moderna. However, the year 1991 must be understood as a chronological reference to be observed.
There is no prohibition on the use of material with an issue date prior to 1991, as long as the predominance of the material presented in the collection is within the criteria of Modern Philately, that is, “from the year 1991 onwards”.
The Modern Philately collections will be judged according to the respective SREVs currently in force for the Traditional Philately, Postal History and Postal Interios classes. The score given to each item is shown in the table below.
Item Score
Presentation 5 points
Treatment (25) and
Importance (5) 30 points
Search and
Development 35 points
State (Condition) and Rarity
State (10), Rarity (10)
Difficulty of Acquisition (10) 30 points
Total 100 points
The distribution of points presented recognizes that the material contained in the Modern Philately collections is worthy of study and, in many cases, difficult to acquire, research and present, since the time since its launch is small, and sometimes still it was not possible to specify its importance and/or rarity.
FIP medals will be awarded to the presented collections and they will be registered in the FIP Register Awards. A certificate of participation will be awarded to collections that score below 60.
The acceptance of entries in the Modern Philately category, for world or specialized exhibitions sponsored by the FIP, is a recommendation to the national commissioners and is at the discretion of the Organizing Committee of each exhibition.
Exhibitors in the Modern Philately class are entitled to enter 3 or 5 paintings per exhibition.
The acceptance of an entry in the Modern Philately category will not preclude the acceptance of entries in any other class. All other IREX requirements of the exhibition apply to this exhibition class.
* Text translated and adapted from Flash Magazine Nº 118 - April 2014