The New Yorker recently delighted its North Brooklyn readers with its April 11th cover “Take the L Train,” which portrayed an immediately recognizable pair of bearded straphangers aboard the train we all love to hate, rendered by the adored Tomer Hanuka. This week, another North Brooklyn scene is front and center on this town’s favorite magazine: illustrator R. Kikuo Johnnson’s “Closing Set” presents a guitarist’s eye view of a roaring crowd inside Bushwick DIY venue Palisades.
In the New Yorker’s digital featurette Cover Story, Johnson explains that the image was inspired by his first time visiting Palisades. “Everyone in Brooklyn is a d.j., so I rely on my much cooler friends to take me out.” Johnson teaches at RISD and, well, illustrates New Yorker covers, so whether his “much cooler friends” could possibly be that much cooler is debatable, depending on one’s perspective on these things, but it’s endearingly humble of him to say!
“So proud and happy to have The New Yorker capture our essence,” reads a post on Palisades’ Facebook page that also observes that the cover hit shelves on the second anniversary of their opening day.
This is the New Yorker’s annual Entertainment Issue, which makes this even more of a special occasion. Congrats, Palisades, on a crazy new kind of cred!