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Newsweek cover

JUNE 19, 2013

I was asked to create a cover illustration for the new edition of Newsweek.   The story is a profile and history of the plight of Black men in America — where things have been, and where they are headed.   The subhed of the story is "There are more African-Americans on probation, parole, or in prison today than were slaves in 1850.   It is not a crisis of crime.  It is a crisis of people being left behind."  
One of the concepts behind the story is that America tends to put Black men in boxes, in the inner city, away from the rest of the country.  So I derived the image from that idea, placing a Black man surrounded by the bricks and chain link fence typical of the inner city.  I then added the city skyline to show some context and to help frame the magazine's logo.  The bricks and background coming together to create the American flag.   Nice design and art direction from Robert Dileso at Newsweek.
detail

on the iPad

© 2024 Edel Rodriguez