Olivia Rose spent most of Thursday morning knee-deep in Red Delicious apples.\u00a0<\/p>\n
The Manhattanite, an artist, was busy engraving 80 pieces of the produce with iconic New York Post front-page displays \u2014 from the 1963 assassination <\/a>of President John F. Kennedy to Zohran Mamdani\u2019s mayoral crowning<\/a> on Nov. 4 \u2014 for a Tribeca exhibition she called \u201cApple Stand.\u201d<\/p>\n Carving The Post\u2019s covers into the crops, harvested from an apple orchard upstate, is simply Rose\u2019s way of honoring New York City \u2014 and its favorite tabloid \u2014 with the\u00a0fruits\u00a0of her labor.\u00a0<\/p>\n Olivia Rose carves New York Post cover art into shiny, red apples. Emmy Park for N.Y.Post<\/p>\n \u201cThere are millions of different stories that have happened in this city,\u201d the millennial, a landscape architect, told The Post of the showcase, which debuted to 200 spectators<\/a> at Blankmag Books, 17 Eldridge St., early Thursday evening. \u201cThis is my way of collecting those stories and giving them back to the city through my artwork.\u201d<\/p>\n To make exact replicas of the headlining designs, Rose relies on an $8,000 XTool F2 laser-engraving machine, rather than a knife and an unsteady hand. She procured the 60-watt device last spring \u2014 right around the time she got the idea to transform food into her unconventional canvas.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n \u201cI was in my studio, and I wanted to try something new, and I just grabbed what was next to me. It was fruit,\u201d Rose told The Post. \u201cThe engraver is so fast. Each apple in the exhibition took about one minute and 20 seconds to complete.\u201d<\/p>\n Prepping for the avant-garde undertaking, however, takes much more time.\u00a0<\/p>\n Rose devoted countless hours to combing through The Post\u2019s full archive of front pages, cherry-picking her favorite layouts, and uploading the images to a graphics editing system \u2014 retouching certain covers for laser precision or removing tatters from decades-old prints. <\/p>\n She then shrunk each image down to 2 inches to perfectly fit onto the face of the apples.\u00a0<\/p>\n Rose, a landscape architect and laser designer, engraves legendary Post front-page art into Red Delicious apples in celebration of her love of NYC. @originalrose\/Instagram <\/p>\n Rose told The Post she was excited to recreate its \u201cRed Apple\u201d cover this month.<\/p>\n \u201cThe Post\u2019s covers are its marketing \u2014 they pull you in,\u201d Rose added. \u201cThere\u2019s something very attractive about how the art and the writing aren\u2019t\u00a0overworked, but are still very poetic.<\/p>\n \u201cThe paper is like your friend, who\u2019s a little out of pocket, but fun.\u201d<\/p>\n It\u2019s high praise from a lifelong New Yorker and print media fan.\u00a0<\/p>\n \u201cLike an apple, The Post has always been accessible,\u201d said Rose, who sells her festooned fruits for $50 a piece. \u201cIt\u2019s meant for everybody. There are no barriers.\u201d<\/p>\n We couldn\u2019t have said it better ourselves.<\/p>\n The native New Yorker applauded The Post for being accessible and enjoyable to its worldwide readership. Emmy Park for N.Y.Post<\/p>\n The artist told The Post that the \u201cObama Beats Weiner\u201d piece is one of her favorite apple covers. Emmy Park for N.Y.Post<\/p>\n The inspiration for the cover above.<\/p>\n Rose chose to spotlight the crisp, juicy delights in her ode to NYC after learning the roots of its eponymous nickname, which was a popular expression for jazz musicians<\/a> in the 1920s and \u201930s who moved onto bigger gigs \u2014 \u201cBig Apples\u201d like NYC, in other words \u2014 after working in smaller towns.<\/p>\n It arrived here as a tourism tool for decades to come.<\/p>\n \u201cThe fruit became a symbol, a marketing tool \u2014 everywhere you go, there are things marked with \u2018Big Apple.\u2019 I really admire the city for self-branding,\u201d she said. \u201cJust like the New York Post.\u201d<\/p>\n Rose showcased her laser-engraved artwork at Blankmag Books beginning on Thursday. Emmy Park for N.Y.Post<\/p>\n