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“When I heard the news that the Freedom Tower will be now be the highest building in Manhattan, I thought: ‘Kids!’” Ana Juan, the artist behind this week’s cover “Defiance,” says. “When you are a kid, you’re with your friends, and you say, ‘My ice cream is bigger than yours!’” she adds laughingly. “It’s a kind of a race, even if it makes for a great skyline. Still, I can’t help wondering: ‘Why do humans need to build higher and higher?’ It’s a show of power—something that doesn’t necessarily hold much interest for me. We need better schools, or a better health-care system, or to take care of the cities we have… but I guess building ever higher is our way to show how great we are.”
Cover of the May 27, 2013 issue. For more on Ana Juan’s cover, “Defiance,” as well as a slide show of images of the downtown skyline after 9/11 and some of her many children’s books illustrations: http://nyr.kr/10IKny1
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“When I heard the news that the Freedom Tower will be now be the highest building in Manhattan, I thought: ‘Kids!’” Ana Juan, the artist behind this week’s cover “Defiance,” says. “When you are a kid, you’re with your friends, and you say, ‘My ice cream is bigger than yours!’” she adds laughingly. “It’s a kind of a race, even if it makes for a great skyline. Still, I can’t help wondering: ‘Why do humans need to build higher and higher?’ It’s a show of power—something that doesn’t necessarily hold much interest for me. We need better schools, or a better health-care system, or to take care of the cities we have… but I guess building ever higher is our way to show how great we are.”
Cover of the May 27, 2013 issue. For more on Ana Juan’s cover, “Defiance,” as well as a slide show of images of the downtown skyline after 9/11 and some of her many children’s books illustrations: http://nyr.kr/10IKny1
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Cover of the May 20, 2013 issue. Click here to interact with Christoph Niemann’s cover, ”Eureka”: http://nyr.kr/19hb1yM
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In the spirit of openheartedness and what life is really all about, I’ll go so far as to say that the fear of others may mask some deep-seated desire to understand, and maybe even to love. Because really, what is there to be afraid of? Few people today don’t know—or have in their families—at least one loving couple who are raising children, same-sex or not. And it’s really just the loving part that matters. That same-sex marriage could go from its preliminary draft of “diagnosable” to the final edit of “so what?” must indicate some positive evolution on the part of the larger human consciousness. My wife, being a biology teacher, puts it even more succinctly: “Why are all these people so worried about who everybody else is sleeping with, anyway?” (Score two for Moms.)
—Chris Ware on his cover of the May 13, 2013 issue. Get the story behind the cover: http://nyr.kr/10d7TyC
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“When I visited New York, one of my favorite things to do was to explore the various flea markets,” says Birgit Schössow, the German artist behind this week’s cover, “City Flair.” “And in the last few years, I’ve even ordered some beautiful costumes and dresses from the forties and fifties from New York’s vintage shops online. These little works of art are simply beautiful to look at from time to time, and to wear every now and then. There’s so much history in a costume that is already nearly seventy years old! It allows you to fantasize each story.”
She concludes: “I love the very feminine styles of that era; my cover was inspired by the fashion drawings of that time. But jeans are much more practical, of course.”
Cover of the May 6, 2013 issue. Get the story behind this week’s cover, “City Flair” by Birgit Schössow as well as a slide show of other New Yorker covers depicting city flair: http://nyr.kr/18827FZ
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“It’s not me on the park bench!” says Luci Gutiérrez, the thirty-five-year-old artist from Barcelona who drew “I Love,” the cover of this week’s issue. “But I wear these kinds of hats—very French—so, I guess there is something of me in her,” she says. “I think of them as typical young New Yorkers. I spent some months living there, and I love to draw the people.
Cover of the April 1, 2013 issue. Get the story behind this week’s cover, “I Love” by Luci Gutiérrez, plus a slideshow of loving couples in Art Deco New Yorker covers from the nineteen-twenties: http://nyr.kr/1027v7Y
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Cover of the Nov. 19, 2012 issue. Click-through for the story behind “Rhapsody in Blue,” the cover after Obama’s reelection from artist Mark Ulriksen: http://nyr.kr/ZfzUIQ
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A 1960 Arthur Getz cover.
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Follow the link for the story behind this week’s cover, “In Good Health” from artist Bob Staake, and for a slideshow of New Yorker covers that capture other Obama milestones: http://nyr.kr/N3Vdaq
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Next week’s cover, up online now. Get the story from the artist who created it.
