More Rejected New Yorker Covers Revealed, Explained
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<p>In 2002, semifinalists were named in the World Trade Center site design competition and models of the architecture firms' proposed projects were put on display, garnering comments by people from around the world. Blitt sketched Osama bin Laden and his second-in-command reviewing the proposed designs.</p>
<p>Left: In the fall of 2005, videos began making the rounds showing what happens when pieces of Mentos candy are dropped int bottles of Diet Coke. The combination instantly triggers an explosion of foam. The phenomenon itself soon exploded on YouTube. Barry Blitt first tried his idea with two children and then with two businessmen before finding the right and frightfully funny combination—two Arab men. All versions made fun of terrorism, but only that one make fun of our own fears. The image ultimately did not run out of a concern that the Diet Coke and Mentos reference may just have been too obscure for many readers. <br/><br/>Right: Cliches about dangerous women abound. Beginning in 2002, female suicide bombers had started to appear in the Middle East, taking advantage of the privacy rules, especially in the Islamic world, that make women less likely to be body-searched than men. Danny Shanahan situated his female bomber with a burka (an anachronism) on the subway grating of a busy New York street.</p>
<p>Right after September 11th Carter Goodrich captured the outpouring of patriotic displays, especially among turban-wearing drivers.</p>