The New Yorker imagines “the thrill and poignancy of a world reopening” from the Covid-19 pandemic with its new cover.
Istanbul-based artist Gürbüz Doğan Ekşioğlu depicted what appears to be a family peering outside from the darkness behind their door for the magazine’s May 24 cover.
Ekşioğlu actually submitted the piece in 2020 during the early days of the pandemic, said New Yorker art editor Françoise Mouly. “Today, the pandemic is far from over, but many countries are finally exhaling, and it seemed apt to publish Ekşioğlu’s image,” Mouly explained.
Although life in the US and the UK may be returning to some kind of normal, vaccination rates in Turkey hover around the 15% mark.
“We’re still under lockdown, there are many curfews, and we have to use masks everywhere. But one can hope,” Ekşioğl told Mouly. “I dreamed of returning to life while I was working on this image. Today, I am happy to be closer to that dream.”