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This Week's 'New Yorker' Cover Turns Manhattan Into A Delightful Bookshelf
By
Jen Carlson
Published Mar 22, 2017
Modified Mar 22, 2017
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By
Jen Carlson
Published Mar 22, 2017
Modified Mar 22, 2017
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I've really been appreciating The New Yorker covers lately. They're like a little gift, arriving weekly, and while it may take you anywhere from two to fifty-two weeks to ultimately get through an issue, their covers deliver instant satisfaction. Or political commentary. Or depression. But, like, beautifully. Anyway, this week's cover, by Luci Gutiérrez, is a simple, visual delight called "Shelf Life." It's very New York, and also kinda hygge, even if unintentionally so.
"I drew a bookshelf, and the lines made me think of the streets of a map,” Luci Gutiérrez says, about her cover for this week’s issue. Another inspiration for her image: Wunderkammern, the cabinets of curiosities created in the Renaissance to display collections of extraordinary objects. “I don’t have this particular piece of furniture, but I wish I did. I keep strange and pretty objects,” Gutiérrez says. “It can be a chocolate paper wrapper or a Japanese mask... they provide me with a way to remember the place they come from.”
Each shelf represents a neighborhood, with Central Park depicted by a large plant, Alphabet City by some blocks, and so on. Next to a stack of cash for the Financial District, the bottom shelf features a hole meant to represent the 9/11 memorial.
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shelf life
the new yorker
Jen Carlson
Jen Carlson is a former WNYC and Gothamist editor.
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