Lennon cover is number one
2005-10-18 11:10
New York - A naked John Lennon, a heavily pregnant Demi Moore and an arrow-pierced Muhammad Ali topped a list of the best US magazine covers of the past 40 years issued on Monday by the American Society of Magazine Editors (ASME).
The winners were chosen from nearly 450 submissions from magazines ranging from Time to Newsweek and Esquire to National Geographic.
"Clearly, the top-ranked covers were resonant and iconic, striking a deep chord with our judges," ASME Executive Director Marlene Kahan said.
"In total, these covers provide an evocative snapshot of our nation and its preoccupations throughout the past four decades," Kahan said.
The number one cover was an image taken by Annie Liebowitz for Rolling Stone of a naked John Lennon curled in a foetal position around a clothed Yoko Ono.
The magazine ran the cover in January 1981 in a special homage to the former Beatle who was shot dead outside his New York apartment the day before.
Second place went to the Vanity Fair cover of an equally naked Demi Moore, photographed towards the end of her pregnancy in 1991.
A 1965 Esquire cover depicting Muhammad Ali as a latter day St Sebastien, his body peppered with arrows like a human pin-cushion, took third place.
The top 40 list included three images related to the September 11, 2001 attacks, including the New Yorker's all black cover which ranked number six.
Esquire accounted for three of the top 10 covers, while the New Yorker managed two.