The Top 10 Everything of 2009

TIME charts the highs and lows of the past year in 50 wide-ranging lists

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9. Interview, November

Interview magazine cover

This is a hauntingly beautiful rendition of a visual pun — allusion meets illusion. The model for Interview's 40th anniversary issue is actress Kristen Stewart, who currently stars in the monster hit Twilight series. Using her as the model is a masterstroke of celebrity-cover timing, perfectly executed. The image is two photos — if you pull back, you can see her holding over her own face a same-scale, torn black-and-white photo of her, whose only color is in her blood-red lips. The ghoulish makeup is perfectly in keeping with current fashion photography, and it serves the dual purpose of enhancing the metaphor while making her look drop-dead beautiful. A final touch: the allusion gets heightened by more blood, this time on the fanglike letter I in the logo. That's why the lady is a vamp!

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