If You Don't Read This Item, We'll Kill That Dog
The American Society of Magazine Editors, confabbing for a few days in Puerto Rico — because it's really difficult, of course, to talk about magazines in New York, what with being so far from the beach and all — yesterday announced the 40 greatest magazine covers of the last 40 years, as voted on by 52 top editors.
No. 1 was Annie Leibovitz's 1981 Rolling Stone cover of naked John curled around clothed Yoko, and Leibovitz shot No. 2, too: Tina Brown's famous 1991 Vanity Fair cover of Demi Moore naked and pregnant. Nos. 3 and 5 were George Lois Esquires from 1968 and 1969, and between then came Saul Steinberg's New Yorker view of the world.
We were struck by the simplicity of the great covers — how few were overrun with dozens of cover lines, as nearly all mags do today.
Also, we noted that none featured Paris Hilton or Tom Cruise.
Judging a Magazine by Its Cover: the Top 40 from 40 Years [NYT]
ASME's Top 40 Magazine Covers of the Past 40 Years [Magazine.org]
