
                         Roanoke Times
                 Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: SATURDAY, December 25, 1993                   TAG: 9312250014
SECTION: NATL/INTL                    PAGE: A-3   EDITION: HOLIDAY 
SOURCE: Associated Press
DATELINE: RALEIGH, N.C.                                LENGTH: Short

CHRISTMAS STAMP BOOSTS TRAFFIC AT N.C. MUSEUM

A Christmas postage stamp is leaving its stamp on the North Carolina Museum of Art.

Attendance was up last month, and the museum shop has done a booming business since the Postal Service unveiled this year's Christmas stamp featuring one of the museum's paintings.

Giovanni Battista Cima da Congeliano's "Madonna and Child in a Landscape" had hung in the museum for more than 30 years with little fanfare. Now, it graces greeting cards, postcards, key chains, tie tacks, lapel pins, earrings, cuff links and a miniature Christmas ornament.

"You wouldn't believe the response," said Elizabeth Holloway, a spokeswoman for the museum. "In our wildest dreams we had no idea it would be this popular."

Last year, the Postal Service chose the 1497 oil painting in the museum's Italian Renaissance gallery for the 1993 traditional Christmas stamp. The museum's name appears at the bottom of the stamp along with the artist's name and the painting's date.

The Postal Service began printing Christmas stamps in 1963.

by CNB