About This Stamp
With this Priority Mail® stamp, the U.S. Postal Service celebrates Monument Valley, an iconic landscape of the American West.
Reminiscent of a vintage travel poster, this stamp features artwork that emphasizes the vast stone formations of Monument Valley while highlighting the vivid colors of the sky, the earth, and the area’s distinctive plant life. The digital illustration is based on photographs of Monument Valley, including a view facing northwest at sunrise.
Known to the Navajo as Tsé Bii’ Ndzisgaii, Monument Valley is part of Monument Valley Navajo Tribal Park, which includes nearly 92,000 acres on the border of Utah and Arizona. Although the most famous view of the valley spans only around five square miles, its spectacular vistas and rock formations are synonymous with the American West in the minds of people around the world. Monument Valley has appeared in numerous movies, especially Westerns, and has served as the setting for countless television shows. The valley is of great geological significance, and according to the traditions of the Navajo, the stone formations in Monument Valley have sacred stories to tell.
Monument Valley Navajo Tribal Park is open to tourism all year round. Drivers may access and enjoy some areas along a 17-mile loop road, while other areas are accessible to outsiders only through guided tours. The park is part of the much larger Navajo Nation, which encompasses more than 27,000 square miles in Utah, Arizona, and New Mexico. Visitors are required to obey Navajo Nation laws and regulations during their time in the park. Monument Valley Navajo Tribal Park is currently closed to visitors because of COVID-19.
Designed by art director Greg Breeding, the stamp showcases a digital illustration by artist Dan Cosgrove.
Stamp Art Director, Stamp Designer
Greg Breeding
Greg Breeding is a graphic designer and principal of Journey Group, a design company he co-founded in 1992, located in Charlottesville, Virginia. He was creative director until 2013, at which time he began serving as president and continued in that role through 2023.
Breeding’s fascination with modernism began while studying design at Virginia Commonwealth University. His affinity with the movement continues and motivates his ongoing advanced studies at the Basel School of Design in Switzerland most every summer.
As an art director for postage stamp design since 2012, Breeding has designed more than 100 stamps covering a diverse array of subjects, from Star Wars droids and Batman to Harlem Renaissance writers and the transcontinental railroad.
His work has been recognized in annual design competitions held by Graphis, AIGA, PRINT magazine, and Communication Arts.
Breeding lives in North Garden, Virginia, with his wife and enjoys nothing so much as frolicking on the floor with his grandchildren.
Stamp Artist
Dan Cosgrove
A native of Cincinnati, Ohio, Dan Cosgrove graduated from the University of Cincinnati in 1978 with a major in graphic design. After briefly working for the National Park Service in Denver and as a designer at Cato Johnson in Cincinnati, Cosgrove moved to Chicago in 1980 and began a freelance career in digital and traditional illustration.
Cosgrove's designs have appeared in numerous ads, posters, covers, and on packaging. Recent clients include Cunard Line, Dunlop Tire, Fiat, J P Morgan Chase, Miller Brewing Company, Netflix, The New York Times, Shell Oil company, SohoPress, and The Wall Street Journal. In recognition of his work Cosgrove has received awards from Communications Arts and the Society of Illustrators (Gold Medal).
The 2008 Express Mail® and Priority Mail® stamps featuring Mount Rushmore and Hoover Dam were Cosgrove's first projects for the U.S. Postal Service. Since then, Cosgrove has illustrated 27 additional Express Mail and Priority Mail Express stamps. Recent designs include Florida Everglades (Priority Mail) (2023), Great Smoky Mountains (Priority Mail Express) (2023), Monument Valley (Priority Mail) (2022), and Palace of Fine Arts (Priority Mail Express) (2022). He also created the stamp art for USS Missouri (2019).
Cosgrove and his wife live in Clarendon Hills, Illinois.