No surprise, I love the art on the Merc cover this week, one of a series of manufactured photos from French artist Alain Delorme’s series Totems. Here’s a couple other excellent images from the series, which you can see all of here:
I squinted hard at my screen the first time I saw this series a couple months ago. I’ve come to believe that absolutely anything is possible in China (Live crab vending machines? A 100-year-old woman with a horn? Comically overloaded vehicles? Okay.) but these were too much. After a little more squinting, it’s obvious: Yes, they’re photoshopped. And, yes, they’re awesome. Here’s what an art critic has to say about Totems: “They are all different but have something in common: they cross the images as they cross the town, without ever settling in. These migrants coming from all over China are the heart of the new ‘world factory’.”
Those are very cool. And, yes, that made a great Mercury cover.
This might be the best cover of the year, and it kinda feels like it was “buried” by using it this week.