What if Rhianna Made German Classical Music?
Israeli-bord artist Roy Nachum designed anti’s current album cover. The cover’s art is called If They Let Us, Part I, and incorporates a young Rihanna and messages in Braille. The art is a part of a “Blind” series that shows the subjects with their eyes obscured and allows people who can’t see to experience visual art, indicating a shift in perspective. The final design aims to keep some aspect of that experimentation from Nachum’s design but still feel connected to German Classical music. Classical music CD cover art typically uses many textures, from worn music paper, oil paintings, and textures from instruments. Some of the most influential German classical composers, such as Ludwig van Beethoven, Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, and Johann Sebastian Bach, were around in the Classical art period of the 18th century. This period’s style played with organic aesthetics and the hero’s journey, reason, and philosophy.
The final design uses a Blackletter font that matches this period and background imagery reminiscent of 18th-century artwork. A photograph of Rihanna from the 2018 Met Gala, Heavenly Bodies: Fashion and the Catholic Imagination, is used to pair with the regal, powered wig illustrations of many the composters of this time. Classical music album covers sometimes use script fonts, so Rihanna’s name is in a script font to give excellent contrast to the Blackletter font.
