A House Divided

Chris Ware, House Divided, 2022
Chris Ware created The New Yorker's July 4th cover. In House Divided, Ware updates a 1961 Saturday Evening Post cover illustration by John Philip Falter, now in the George Lucas collection.

John Philip Falter, Sunday Gardening, 1961 (used as July 1, 1961 cover of Saturday Evening Post). George Lucas Collection
Falter's illustration was more about class than politics per se. Ware told The New Yorker that his picture represents "an uncompromising moment of nonconsensual reality" and the sense that "something very, very, very bad is about to happen."

Comments

The sad part, in the 2022 version, is that these neighbors could be siblings.
Civil wars in families are the worst.
Anonymous said…
Several years ago, I visited the home of a family into Norman Rockwell artwork. Although I admire Rockwell's technical finesses, his style after awhile becomes sort of like getting stuck with a woman who favors wearing way too much perfume. I had a similar reaction several weeks ago when visiting the Louvre.

I'm still anxious to see the Lucas museum and probably will find its collections requiring more time to go through than, by comparison, a lot of the avant-garde material at places like MOCA or the Broad.

Beyond that, the Ma Yansong design of the Lucas probably will have characteristics reminiscent of the Peter Zumthor design of LACMA. Or visa versa. But LACMA's director still should have worked harder to modify the 1965-1986-era campus, if only to be both more transparent and ethical, and also more budget conscious.

But all of this may be moot if the political angle reflected in those magazine covers causes the house of cards to collapse.