After much of the world went into social isolation earlier this year, magazines found themselves needing to get creative about cover shoots. Vogue Italia went blank, American Vogue published a previously unpublished portrait and Harper’s Bazaar UK asked Ashley Graham’s husband to snap pictures of the model for its covers.
InStyle US is following suit with the magazine welcoming Alicia Keys as its July 2020 cover star. Her husband, Swizz Beatz, and two children, Egypt and Genesis Dean, picked up cameras capturing the singer/songwriter looking radiant at home for the newsstand cover (above) and basking in the Southern California sun for the subscribers’ edition (below).
Meanwhile, Jason Bolden looks after the styling. Bolden outfits Alicia in design from brands like Salvatore Ferragamo, Chanel, Givenchy and Fendi.
In her interview with Christopher Bagley, which took place in early May, the singer reflects on everything from her music to family life, but one of her most powerful quotes is when she talks about the murder of 25-year-old Ahmaud Arbery.
‘’You know, we do a really good job of judging each other and assuming who people are when we don’t even know them’’, she said. ‘’To me, the most important thing we can do right now is take a second to see and appreciate each other as we are’’. She added that if we want to see change in the world, it must first start with us. ‘’I really believe that we are it – we are what we’re waiting for, what we’re looking for. The way we raise our kids, the way we choose to be with each other, the way we face the world – that is how things will start to shift’’.
Alicia shared similar sentiments when she addressed students on the Dear Class of 2020 special. ‘’It’s okay to not be okay right now’’, she said. ‘’I know so many of you are not thinking about your time at school. You’re thinking about what’s happening right now in the present. You’re thinking about marching and protesting and making sure that your voices are heard in a time that we cannot be silent. The world feels broken right now, it is broken right now in so many ways, but, you know, you’re taking your heartbreak and your outrage and you’re putting it into action. You are showing that your generation is the one that’s going to heal this’’.