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In the Review’s early years, our covers often featured the opening paragraphs of the first article in the issue, drawing newsstand patrons in with writing by V.S. Pritchett, William Styron, Norman Mailer, or Susan Sontag. This design was gradually replaced by a tabloid approach, with large block headlines announcing the contents, and until 2024 the last excerpt to appear on the magazine’s cover was W.H. Auden’s poem “The Ballad of Barnaby,” on December 18, 1969.

Fifty-five years later our art editor, Leanne Shapton, resurrected the old format for the December 5 issue, printing the first four paragraphs of “The Second Coming,” Fintan O’Toole’s essay about Donald Trump’s reelection, on the bottom two thirds of the cover.

Text has always been the central element of the Review’s covers, but Shapton’s designs emphasize art in equal measure. The twenty issues we put out in 2024 have featured watercolors, oils, prints, photographs, and sculptures by contemporary artists, as well as a 1982 charcoal portrait by Tom of Finland and a 1957 finger painting by a chimpanzee. Below, a gallery of last year’s covers, including four that were commissioned for special issues, alongside interviews Shapton conducted with three of the artists.

January 18
Hugo Guinness: Toast, 2023

February 8
Moira Frith: Rockpool Dance, 2021

February 22
Corydon Cowansage: Drops (Green, Turquoise, Peach), 2023

March 7
Friedrich Kunath: My Work Is Done Why Wait,
2022–2023

March 21
Nathanaëlle Herbelin: Oiseaux, Version 2, 2022

April 4
Andrea Ventura: Epidemic of Nostalgia, 2021

May 9
Tom of Finland: Untitled, 1982

May 23
Dan Perkins: Slider, 2017

June 6
Congo, a chimpanzee: 19th Painting Session, 12 August, 1957

June 20
Henry Taylor: yellow cap sunday, 2016

August 15
Guim Tió: Butes, 2023

October 3
Lauri Hopkins: Bump, 2024

October 17
Jason Fulford: Sea Circus, 2009

November 7
Paolo Ventura: The Red Curtain, 2021

November 21
Cecily Brown: Plage (girl on a beach), 2021

December 5

The Spring Books Issue, April 18

Cover art by Henning Wagenbreth

The Forms of the Tools

“I always liked to make things. My father and grandfather’s toolbox, which was handed down to me, was the most magical thing. Even the forms of the different tools were fascinating to me. I liked to hammer, to saw, to sew, to glue, to carve, and to paint—to invent things.”

The Fiction Issue, July 18

Cover art by Iris de Moüy

La Parisienne

“The best way to learn to draw is to look at the world with an endless curiosity.”

The Fall Books Issue, September 19

Cover art by Julien Posture

Ways of Seeing

“The big questions I’m excited about are: How do some ways of seeing become hegemonic? How is looking tied to economic value or political power? How are nonhuman ways of seeing (for example, how a computer sees) changing our own?”

The Holiday Issue, December 19

Cover art by Tamara Shopsin

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