Il Foglio Review
The cover of "Foglio Review" as described by Andrea Bettega
A sense of disorientation, vertical geometries and symbols of orientation in a mysterious landscape. The story behind “Nel bosco”, the cover of the new issue of Foglio Review, on newsstands from 25 April 2026
This month’s Review cover takes us into the woods, a mysterious place with an ethereal atmosphere where one can easily lose one’s way. But it is also a place where one might encounter guiding figures to show us the way. We asked Andrea Bettega to tell us about his illustration.
What was the creative process that led you to illustrate the cover of "Il Foglio Review", entitled "In the Woods"?
When I began designing the cover for this issue of Review, I immediately thought of the feeling one usually experiences when immersed in a woodland. It is often a sense of disorientation; the senses are activated to find points of reference, to map out the space. Depicting a landscape is usually easier with horizontal proportions, so the vertical format of a cover forces you to rethink the conventions, to work out how to emphasise certain shapes at the expense of others, and that is what I did with these trees: I sacrificed the upper canopies to focus on the texture formed by the trunks, emphasising the verticality and creating a complex geometric composition.
The natural scene depicted on the cover appears mysterious and dense. How did you go about creating a connection between the woodland and those who live there or walk through it?
The density of a woodland is akin to the folds of a curtain; I worked with this in mind: the figures appear as if emerging from a gap between one curtain and another. Fleeting figures, which in an instant may once again be swallowed up by the narrative fabric.
How did you approach the composition and choice of colours?
I always aim to create a focal point in my illustrations, and here the choice of colours played a key role: the protagonists of the story shine with their own light, as if a warm spotlight were shining on them, whilst the rest of the scene is shrouded in a cooler, more mysterious palette.
What is the significance of the five-tailed fox, and what connection is there with the girl on the cover?
The fox is a guide, a vision that comes to the aid of the girl who is searching for a point of reference in the woods. Its multiple tails are like signposts; they can point in various directions, and make the animal something metaphorical, intangible, almost magical. From this, it becomes clear that the fox becomes an abstract symbol: there are many paths; it is up to us to find our own way out of the tangled situations of everyday life.