Magazines had their own formula: a photographic portrait of an attractive or famous people with bold text that’s designed to pop right out at you.
The covers changed like the culture they influenced did. Karen X. Cheng and Jerry Gabra looked to explore the subject. “I compiled the past 100 years of magazine covers for a bunch of top magazines,” Cheng said in an interview. “Magazine covers have to compete with each other to stand out on the news rack, and it’s really interesting what 100 years of evolution has lead to.”
“Together, these magazine covers reveal a peek into our history. Sure, we’ve gotten more sexualized. More superficial. We read less. We have shorter attention spans,” she says. “But we’ve also gotten more open-minded. At each step along the way, society has pushed the limits of what’s considered acceptable.”
Playboy, 1953
People, 1974
Rolling Stone, 1967
Wired, 1993
National Geographic, 1888
Tiger Beat, 1965
Newsweek, 1933
Spin, 1985
Vanity Fair, 1983
Mental Floss, 2001
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