Description

For the most personal album of her career, Beyoncé hid her face. The cover of Lemonade is a grainy, muted image of her leaning forward in a long fur coat, her blonde hair braided tightly back in cornrows, her lowered head and raised arm hiding her face from the camera. There is no name on the front and no direct look at the viewer. After years of perfectly controlled star portraits, the image feels guarded and wounded.

The picture comes from the film that arrived with the record. Lemonade was released on 23 April 2016 together with an hour-long visual album broadcast on HBO, built around words by the Somali British poet Warsan Shire, and the cover frame is taken from the section set to "Don't Hurt Yourself", her duet with Jack White. The coat is by the label Hood By Air, adapted from its "Daddy" collection. The Fader argued that it gave her "the choice between exposure and coverage," which is exactly what the cover image does.

The album dealt openly with infidelity, anger, forgiveness and Black womanhood, and the concept reportedly grew out of a speech given by Jay-Z's grandmother Hattie White on her 90th birthday, sampled on "Freedom". The quiet, faceless cover let the title and the music speak first. Lemonade became one of the most discussed records of the decade, and Apple Music later placed it tenth on its list of the 100 best albums.

Credit

Image from the Lemonade visual album (Parkwood Entertainment)