Behind the NYT Walking New York Cover

All it took was an artist with a big vision, plenty of volunteers and a helicopter. French artist JR is known for pasting giant photographs on urban surfaces all over the world. This large scale pasting for the NYT Walking New York cover was made in the heart of Manhattan, on Flatiron plaza, the triangle of pavement between Fifth Avenue, Broadway and East 23rd Street. Here's a time-lapse video that shows how it was done.

A picture of Elmar Aliyev, a 20-year-old waiter and recent immigrant to New York from Azerbaijan, was printed on 62 strips of paper. On April 11 the strips were affixed to the ground of the Flatiron plaza. The pasting took about three and a half hours and resulted in a 150-foot-tall image of Aliyev striding eastward. "The sun came up. Pedestrians began to wander over Aliyev. Just as JR had predicted, they often walked right over him without even noticing."

More: NYTimes.com