The Issue With Art.

W Magazine's annual art issue is like my version of the Sport's Illustrated Swimsuit Issue. I love a smart pairing of high fashion and high art; and W really focuses in on that blurred border between the two. This year the issue puts dark humor artist extraordinaire Maurizio Cattelan to work with middle aged model extraordinaire Linda Evangelista.

Cattelan's pieces: La Nona Ora, 1999.; Stephanie, 2003.; and Bidibidobidiboo, 1996.

Cattelan's work regularly takes the piss out of some pretty stodgy topics. He's killed a life-size, hyper-real effigy of the Pope in a meteor crash, staged a squirrel's suicide, and duct taped his gallerist to the wall. He's also created a bust of supermodel Stephanie Seymour in the fashion of a mounted trophy kill, and hoisted polymer women and taxidermied horses way above their natural latitudes.

"A Perfect Day" 1999


"Frank & Jamie" 2002


"Mini-me" 1999


"Untitled" 2007

In the editorial he did with Linda, he stayed a bit darker than usual. Although, the leggy model surrounded by a coop's worth of chickens while in her lacy underthings is humorous in its own way. Mostly though the shots are on the darker, more unsettling side.

I actually picked this magazine up and leafed through it at a newsstand. I forgot the simple tactile pleasure of feeling the texture of the paper in my hands while looking through a great magazine. I highly recommend it.