The Postal Service recently released the Bald Eagle: Hatchling to Adult stamps set featuring five realistic illustrations of the bird at stages of life from 1 week old to mature bird of prey.
Derry Noyes, an art director for USPS, designed the stamps using naturalistic paintings by ornithologist and illustrator David Allen Sibley. Known for his detailed depictions of birds and guidebooks on avian wildlife, the stamps are his first project for the Postal Service.
“Distilling the variation in bald eagles into five postage stamps was very tricky — which life stages to show, what poses to use, or whether to show the whole bird or just a part,” Sibley said in an interview when asked about his approach to capturing the stages of a bald eagle’s life.
In the interview, Sibley traces his interest in birds as a boy to his current work and described his artwork being displayed on the stamps as “a great honor.”
The full interview is available on the USPS Stamps Forever website.
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