Emdashes. Modern Times Between the Lines.
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Sempé Fi: Cover Art
Sempé Fi (On Covers): Valley Forged
Filed under: Sempé Fi Tagged: art, Barack Obama, Barry Blitt, covers, Drew Friedman, Pollux
Pollux writes:
Obama looks good in a powdered wig. The head of Washingtonian hair sits easily and regally upon a head that bears a determined and presidential expression. One would think that the concept of dressing Obama in late eighteenth century clothing would produce an entirely jokey cover, but Drew Friedman’s illustration for the January 26, 2009 issue, called “The First,” strikes me as being grave, entirely conscious of some time in the distant future when the cover will be a valued relic of times past. I see it being used in history classrooms, accompanied by exercise questions (“How do you think the artist feels about Obama?” “Why do you think he chose to depict Obama this way?”).
Friedman’s color tones are earthy, dark, and subdued, evoking the anfractuous mixture of the weight of history and even greater weight of future expectations. The portrait is photorealistic, and sober, evoking also the enormous pressures faced by our first president. Both Washington and Obama are “Firsts,” and Friedman’s use of only browns and blacks and whites is a nod to the breaking of racial barriers, and to the intersecting of countless identities and Americas: the Venn diagram of these United States of America. Barry Blitt’s Obama cover encapsulates what many Americans feared Obama would be and do; Friedman’s captures what many hope Obama will be.
Friedman’s depiction of a periwigged Obama isn’t funny, and I’m glad that it isn’t funny.
About us
Hello! We're a small band of media enthusiasts, culture addicts, and journalists based in New York, Chicago, and Los Angeles. Emdashes, formerly a New Yorker fan site, is our collection of conversations—mostly civilized—about magazines, movies, politics, design, punctuation, and other things that stir us.
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Tell me more
Dashes, some say, “are particularly useful in a sentence that is long and complex.” Emdashes—like an em dash itself—provides a thoughtful pause amid the hubbub.
Emdashes, founded in 2004, is written and drawn by Emily Gordon, Martin Schneider, Pollux, Jonathan Taylor, and Benjamin Chambers, as well as occasional guest contributors. All posts before October 2008 are by Emily Gordon.
The site was designed by House of Pretty with illustrations by Jesse R. Ewing.
Additional drawings are by Carolita Johnson and Pollux (author of our web comic, "The Wavy Rule"). The Emdashes pencil logo is by Jennifer Hadley, based on a 1943 Dorothy Gray ad.
Other writing by Emily Gordon
- Writing on theater: reviews (for Time Out Chicago; imperfect but workable search results)
- Profile: Valerie Casey, Designers Accord founder, is spearheading the design of sustainability (for SXSW World)
- Feature: Rea Irvin: visionary art director, bon vivant, New Yorker founding father (for Print)
- Slide show: the Coney Island Mermaid Parade (for NYCgo.com)
- Feature: Muslim immigration iconography in the Netherlands, and an interview with Ayaan Hirsi Ali (for Print)
- Review: King's Gambit: A Son, a Father, and the World's Most Dangerous Game by Paul Hoffman (for Newsday)
- Homage: Celebrating lindy-hop legend Frankie Manning (for NYCgo.com)
- Inquiry: Does a New Republic redesign mean a change of tune? (for Print)
- Interview: James Surowiecki on what's next for the wisdom of crowds (for Assignment Zero)
- Interviews: four up-and-coming designers under 30 (for Print)
- Profile: novelist and dance critic Laura Jacobs (for Newsday)
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- Box Office Boffo
- World of Pollux
- Jonathan Taylor
- Carolita Johnson
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