Announced January 29th:
“This issuance honors artist Ellsworth Kelly (1923–2015). Kelly pioneered a distinctive style of abstraction based on real elements reduced to their essential forms. His artworks include paintings, sculpture and works on paper. The 20 stamps on the pane feature 10 pieces, each represented twice: Yellow White (1961), Colors for a Large Wall (1951), Blue Red Rocker (1963), Spectrum I (1953), South Ferry (1956), Blue Green (1962), Orange Red Relief (for Delphine Seyrig) (1990), Meschers (1951), Red Blue (1964) and Gaza (1956). A detail from Blue Yellow Red III (1971) appears in the selvage. Derry Noyes served as art director and designer for this issuance.”
These stamps will be issued May 31, 2019 in Spencertown NY, about 12 miles from Stockton, Mass.. Further updates will appear below, in order announced.
The Scott catalogue numbers for this issue are:
5382 Yellow White
5383 Colors for a Large Wall
5384 Blue Red Rocker
5385 Spectrum I
5386 South Ferry
5387 Blue Green
5388 Orange Red Relief (for Delphine Seyrig)
5389 Meschers
5390 Red Blue
5391 Gaza
a. Block of 10, #5382-5391
Updated April 25th:
[press release]
U.S. Postal Service Honors the Art of Ellsworth Kelly with Stamps
What: The U.S. Postal Service will celebrate the career of artist Ellsworth Kelly with the issuance of 10 stamps celebrating his talent as a painter and sculptor. With these stamps, the Postal Service showcases examples of his wide-ranging body of work.
The first-day-of-issue event is free and open to the public. News of the stamp is being shared with the hashtags #EllsworthKelly and #EllsworthKellyStamps.
Who: Steven W. Monteith, vice president, marketing, U.S. Postal Service
Jack Shear, Ellsworth Kelly Foundation
When: Friday, May 31, 2019, at 11 a.m. EDT
Where: Ellsworth Kelly Studio
Spencertown, NY 12165
RSVP: Dedication ceremony attendees are encouraged to RSVP at usps.com/ellsworthkelly
Background:
Characterized by precise shapes rendered in bold, flat colors, Ellsworth Kelly’s art encompasses painting, sculpture and works on paper, drawing on careful observations of light and shadow, negative space and line and form. In painting shapes—like a tennis court, a smokestack on a tugboat, or the roof of a barn—as flat planes of color, Kelly removed their dimensionality and turned reality into abstraction. He was also one of the first artists to create shaped canvases and to integrate art with modern architecture, taking great care about the size of a painting, its boundaries, and its placement in relation to the walls and floor.
The 20 stamps on the sheet feature 10 of Kelly’s artworks, each represented twice: “Yellow White” (1961), “Colors for a Large Wall” (1951), “Blue Red Rocker” (1963), “Spectrum I” (1953), “South Ferry” (1956), “Blue Green” (1962), “Orange Red Relief” (for Delphine Seyrig) (1990), “Meschers” (1951), “Red Blue” (1964), and “Gaza” (1956). A detail from “Blue Yellow Red III” (1971) appears in the selvage.
Art Director Derry Noyes designed the stamps.
The Ellsworth Kelly stamps are being issued as Forever stamps and will always be equal in value to the current First-Class Mail 1-ounce price.
Customers may purchase stamps and other philatelic products through the Postal Store at usps.com/shop, by calling 800-STAMP24 (800-782-6724), by mail through USA Philatelic or at Post Office locations nationwide.
Updated April 27th:
From the Postal Bulletin:
On May 31, 2019, in Spencertown, NY, the United States Postal Service will issue the Ellsworth Kelly stamps (Forever priced at the First-Class Mail rate) in 10 designs, in a pressure-sensitive adhesive pane of 20 stamps (Item 478600). The stamps will go on sale nationwide May 31, 2019, and must not be sold or canceled before the first-day-of-issue. The Ellsworth Kelly pane of 20 stamps may not be split and the stamps may not be sold individually.
This stamp issue honors artist Ellsworth Kelly (1923–2015). Kelly pioneered a distinctive style of abstraction based on real elements reduced to their essential forms. His artworks include paintings, sculpture, and works on paper. The 20 stamps on the pane feature 10 pieces, each represented twice:
- Yellow White (1961),
- Colors for a Large Wall (1951),
- Blue Red Rocker (1963),
- Spectrum I (1953),
- South Ferry (1956),
- Blue Green (1962),
- Orange Red Relief (for Delphine Seyrig) (1990),
- Meschers (1951),
- Red Blue (1964), and
- Gaza (1956).
A detail from Blue Yellow Red III (1971) appears in the selvage. Derry Noyes served as art director and designer for this issuance.
Availability to Post Offices: Stamp Fulfillment Services completed an automatic push distribution to Post Offices of a quantity to cover approximately 30 days of sales.
There is a special dedication postmark available for this issue: 
How to Order the First-Day-of-Issue Postmark:
Customers have 120 days to obtain the first-day-of-issue postmark by mail. They may purchase new stamps at their local Post Office™ or at The Postal Store website at usps.com/shop. They must affix the stamps to envelopes of their choice, address the envelopes (to themselves or others), and place them in a larger envelope addressed to:
FDOI – Ellsworth Kelly Stamps
USPS Stamp Fulfillment Services
8300 NE Underground Drive, Suite 300
Kansas City, MO 64144-9900
After applying the first-day-of-issue postmark, the Postal Service will return the envelopes through the mail. There is no charge for the postmark up to a quantity of 50. There is a 5-cent charge for each additional postmark over 50. All orders must be postmarked by September 30, 2019.
Technical Specifications:
Issue: Ellsworth Kelly Stamps
Item Number: 478600
Denomination & Type of Issue: First-Class Mail Forever
Format: Pane of 20 (10 designs)
Series: N/A
Issue Date & City: May 31, 2019, Spencertown, NY 12165
Art Director: Derry Noyes, Washington, DC
Designer: Derry Noyes, Washington, DC
Typographer: Derry Noyes, Washington, DC
Existing Art: Ellsworth Kelly
Modeler: Sandra Lane/Michelle Finn
Manufacturing Process: Offset
Printer: Banknote Corporation of America
Press Type: Alprinta 74
Stamps per Pane: 20
Print Quantity: 20,000,000 stamps
Paper Type: Phosphor, Block Tag
Adhesive Type: Pressure-sensitive adhesive
Processed at: Banknote Corporation of America
Colors: Pantone Black 6, Cyan, Magenta, Yellow, Black
Stamp Orientation: Vertical
Image Area (w x h): 1.085 x 1.42 in./27.559 x 36.068 mm
Overall Size (w x h): 1.225 x 1.56 in./31.115 x 39.624 mm
Full Pane Size (w x h): 9.28 x 7.08 in./235.712 x 179.832 mm
Press Sheets Size (w x h): 18.685 x 21.49 in./474.6 x 545.847 mm
Plate Size: 120 stamps per revolution
Plate Numbers: “B” followed by five (5) single digits
Marginal Markings:
Front: Header: Ellsworth Kelly 1923–2015
• Plate number in bottom two corners of pane
Back: ©2019 USPS • USPS logo • 2 barcodes (478600) • Plate position diagram
• Promotional text
Here are the first-day cancels for this issue:
The Digital Color Postmark for this issue measures 2.94″x1.19″ 
The B&W pictorial postmark measures 2.61″ x 0.88″ The “special” postmark for this issue measures 2.43″ x 1.29″
I am not enthusiastic about these. But they might be used to be creative with FDC cachets.
Up there with the Popsicle Stick stamps – Why These? This is Art? I won’t buy any…
The idea that “Art” (weirdly and inexplicably capitalized) has to be good in order to be art makes no sense. Of course, there is bad art, and art can be either good or bad; that’s clearly a separate discussion, or multiple separate discussions.
From Post Bull APR 25: WILL BE on Auto-Distrib. USPS # 4786xx
Can Only be sold in Full Pane of 20. PIC/DCP/ANY City Cancels #16 FDC-10 $9.90, #21 DCP-10 $17.00 ( Random Single ? ) No Any-City listings in postmarks yet.
I could have done those stamps. Are they running out of ideas at the USPS?
The stamps, or (and more probably) the artworks they depict? But you didn’t, did you? And that’s a good part of the point.
These remind me so much of the CTOs that ex-USSR and Romania stamps that they came up with in truckloads quantity way back in 1980s
Maybe I am just in a “mood” today but these stamps are the reason I contemplate quitting collecting modern US issues. One day the USPS will push me over the edge.
These types of issues only serve to enrage collectors. There are so many other deserving subjects that could have been used. Does poor taste rule at the USPO?
In my opinion it does. Marginal subjects are especially regrettable when there are already too many issues for a reduced mailing-need world.
I don’t care if they want to issue stamps that depict Ellsworth Kelly, makes no difference to me, but what irks me is he gets 10 stamps and issues like the Moon Landing only gets two boring stamps! Come on Stamp Counsel get it together!
I agree!
Why does the USPS issue 10 stamps for a subject like this? A subject that only few, if any, people care about. Then only 2 stamps for the 50th anniversary of the first man on the moon. It is time the USPS starts listening to the public and collectors for their subject matter.
I agreee!!
Ellsworth Kelly is a national art treasure. But in a country which has no time for art and little understanding of it, we get the kind of clueless comments seen here. No one says you have to like any particular type of art, but please don’t go around knocking beautiful things because you aren’t educated enough to understand what you’re looking at. Instead read about art. Take a class. Then form an opinion. Just because you don’t like art has no bearing on whether or not a stamp is a good one. These are very attractive stamps. I don’t much like Madonnas, but believe me they’re on stamps by the hundreds. And you don’t see me complaining. This shallow art criticism based on “I don’t know much but I know what I like” is cartoonish and makes you sound like a yokel.
I know Ellsworth Kelly. I actually have a BFA and I mentioned that I understood his art being on a stamp. However, if you tell me Ellsworth Kelly is more important to American history than the Landing on the moon (my opinion) I think you are wrong. I just think 10 stamps for any artist is a bit excessive, but obviously there are quite a few art fanatics on the Stamp Counsel.
The truth is, no matter what the Stamp Counsel decides there is going to be some stamp collector that doesn’t agree. They can’t please everyone. That’s the long and short of it. No one has the same opinion, but we are all free to express ours even if it isn’t the same as yours.
I may not be a big Art Buff, but I Will Not buy these. The USPS has the right to produce whatever they want for stamps, but I thought at least they would produce stamps that would be SOLD to customers, and MAYBE be used for Postage. Bottom Line – Not My Cash. If a large majority are returned for destruction, I will Not Be Surprised. If they wind up winning the Worst Stamp Poll in Linns Stamp News, I Will Not be surprised.
It seems that you are using “but” in a highly idiosyncratic way, as the fact that you are not a big art buff would seem to make you less likely to buy them, not more. But we are customers, we have bought them, and we have gone through most of several sheets using them for postage. So…
I’m glad you bought some. Maybe you’d like to buy the rest of the stock that the post office will Destroy when they pull these out of circulation in a few years?
Are you willing to pay Full Price for the stamps before they go into the incinerator? I won’t.
The Sesame Street stamps are turning out to be like the Mr. Rogers stamps, Local Post Office selling all they initially received, and having to Order More from SFS.
With the USPS so far in the hole, they need more stamps that will SELL, not stamps they will have to destroy.
Well said.
They likely only pleased a few with this one.
Just think about Jackson Pollack, Andy Warhol, and other spatter artists. I hope I spelled their names right.
Why don’t they make some stamps for the famous subway artist, Keith Haring, who inspired many copycats and received little recognition. He was definitely original; inspired by outlining corpses on the ground, his artwork was used all over New York city and in advertising with little credit until he passed away.
There seems to be a trend developing with the USPS.- Are we becoming more and more like the Dune countries issuing stamps with useless designs? This is one of the main reasons my father gave up collecting after being a life long collector..With the higher postage costs and the large volume of issues the expense becomes prohibitive for many.