For Leonel Sagahón, the voracity with which books are marketed is such that the cover designs are increasingly important, since many times it depends on whether or not a copy continues on the news table. To share the relevance of this work, he covers 25 years of creative work in the Cara de Libro exhibition.
“Today the value that the cover has acquired from the point of view of communication and from the commercial point of view has become crucial much more than before, because the battle or struggle of each book to stand out among the rest of the novelties It is very strong, the commercial dynamics of bookstores is tremendous, a book that goes on sale in bookstores is first on the news table, in the best of cases it will remain three weeks. In those three weeks it has to gain preference over the other covers, the role it plays there is important, it depends on whether it can remain or be forgotten, before it was not so fierce,” he shared in an interview with The reason, Leonel Sagahón, who has designed book covers by Carlos Fuentes, Jorge Volpi, Vicente Guerrero, Enrique Serna, Beatriz Rivas and Jorge Ibargüengoitia.
The designer, in the exhibition that is presented until June 9 at the Abraham Zabludovsky Gallery of the Library of Mexico, exhibits 140 covers, in which he explains how he has provided graphic identity to important authors, in 25 years he has developed more of 450 covers for publishers such as Alfaguara, Grupo Oceano and the Fondo de Cultura Económica.
You can see, for example, the one he did for the book Reading the Mind. The Brain and the Art of Fiction, by Jorge Volpi, in which the face of a person appears from whose head birds emerge that could also be flying books; or the one he conceived for Cumpleaños, by Carlos Fuentes.
On May 9 and 16, Leonel Sagahón will give guided tours with the public at 4:00 p.m. Afterwards he will give a talk about his work and tell some anecdotes, like when he had to do the covers of Jorge Ibargüengotia.
