nihilistic intentions

newyorker:

“Ten years ago, my husband, the cartoonist Art Spiegelman, our daughter, and I stood four blocks away from the second tower as we watched it collapse in excruciatingly slow motion. Later, back in my office, I felt that images were suddenly powerless to help us understand what had happened. The only appropriate solution seemed to be to publish no cover image at all—an all-black cover. Then Art suggested adding the outlines of the two towers, black on black. So from no cover came a perfect image, which conveyed something about the unbearable loss of life, the sudden absence in our skyline, the abrupt tear in the fabric of reality.”

- Art Editor Françoise Mouly on “9/11/2001,” the first New Yorker cover following 9/11.

Click here for more photos of, and Françoise Mouly’s comments on, other 9/11-related New Yorker covers.

(via teethandthings)