York, Pennsylvania artist Robert Karsten (1943-1996) never had his work published on the cover of the New Yorker, but in 1962 while still a teenager he did the next best thing: he painted a fake New Yorker cover on illustration board. Complete with New Yorker magazine logo, date (October 23, 1962), and price (25 cents), the watercolor depicts a country scene with birds sitting on telephone lines and more birds in the air. It is not really convincing as a New Yorker cover. On artistic grounds, the painting is not particularly compelling. The proportions are too long, but despite this the image is entirely above the horizon line; in other words, the viewer is looking up. The strap that should typically appear along the left edge of the image is absent, although there may or may not be a faint watercolor hint of it.
Could this have been submitted to the magazine as a proposed cover? It's possible, but the elaborate, hand-drawn logo would seem to be an odd way of going about that. More likely it's an artistic fantasy on a New Yorker cover.
The eBay seller suggests this painting depicts a scene from Alfred Hitchcock's "The Birds." As this movie classic wasn't released until 1963 and the painting lacks the requisite menace, that seems implausible.
Quick Links to the Attempted Bloggery Archives:
Proposed New Yorker Cover Art
Perry Barlow
Football
Alfred Hitchcock
Attempted Bloggery's Freshly-Bleached Index
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Could this have been submitted to the magazine as a proposed cover? It's possible, but the elaborate, hand-drawn logo would seem to be an odd way of going about that. More likely it's an artistic fantasy on a New Yorker cover.
The eBay seller suggests this painting depicts a scene from Alfred Hitchcock's "The Birds." As this movie classic wasn't released until 1963 and the painting lacks the requisite menace, that seems implausible.
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| Robert Karsten eBay Listing Ended April 7, 2017 |
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| Robert Karsten eBay Item Description |
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| Robert Karsten eBay Bid History A single bidder avoids a potential bidding war by using Buy It Now. |
What of the real New Yorker cover for that date? The actual magazine cover of October 13, 1962 is by Perry Barlow. It depicts a hurried player substitution between plays of a football game. The players seem very young so possibly it's a college football game we're seeing. It is raining. The loose painting technique captures the immediacy and the wetness of the moment. Barlow contrasts the energy of the players coming into the game in their fresh uniforms with the fatigue of the players coming to the sidelines covered in mud.
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| Perry Barlow The New Yorker, October 13, 1962 |
There are no rules for what can and can't constitute a New Yorker cover, but it is useful to note that the Barlow cover conveys a specific point of view that's interesting even after we've seen hundreds of football games. Karsten's fake New Yorker cover, on the other hand, doesn't tell us much about birds sitting on telephone lines that we don't already know.
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| Robert Karsten Fake New Yorker Cover, October 13, 1962 |
Quick Links to the Attempted Bloggery Archives:
Proposed New Yorker Cover Art
Perry Barlow
Football
Alfred Hitchcock
Attempted Bloggery's Freshly-Bleached Index
03026
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