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Cover Story: Anatomies: A Cultural History of the Human Body

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David High’s jacket design for Hugh Aldersey-Williams’s new book <em>Anatomies</em> merges style and content, epidermis and viscera

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When asked to distinguish style from content, Jean-Luc Godard demurred. “To me style is just the outside of content, and content the inside of style, like the outside and the inside of the human body,” said the film director. “Both go together, they can't be separated.” Style and content, outside and inside, epidermis and viscera—these were among the intertwined oppositions that designer David High faced, and ultimately embraced, in creating the cover for Anatomies: A Cultural History of the Human Body, a new book by Hugh Aldersey-Williams (W. W. Norton).

Anatomies: A Cultural History of the Human Body by Hugh Aldersey-Williams; die-cut jacket design by David J. High, 2013 (W. W. Norton)

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