For the first time in the 20-year history of her magazine, Oprah Winfrey is not appearing on the cover of her monthly O, The Oprah Magazine.
Instead, Breonna Taylor is the face of the September cover.
Taylor, a 26-year-old emergency medical service technician, was killed when Louisville Metro Police Department Officers Jonathan Mattingly, Brett Hankison and Myles Cosgrove barged into her apartment on the night of March 13.
Winfrey revealed the cover on social media Thursday.
The image was created by digital artist Alexis Franklin.
“I am so happy to play a small part in this long-overdue, world-changing narrative on racial injustice and police brutality,” said Franklin, a 24-year-old self-trained artist. “The original photo is one Breonna took herself and has been featured in the news many times. Looking at it, I see an innocence, simple but powerful. It was critical for me to retain that.”
Winfrey addressed the cover in a column to her readers.
“We can’t be silent. We have to use whatever megaphone we have to cry for justice,” she wrote. “And that is why Breonna Taylor is on the cover of ‘O’ magazine.
“The September issue honors her life and the life of every other Black woman whose life has been taken too soon,” she said on Instagram.
The issue will be on newsstands and available for download Aug. 11. The cover reveal comes a day after it was announced by Hearst, O magazine’s parent company, that the magazine will be more “digital-centric.”
The last regular monthly edition of O magazine will be the December 2020 issue.
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