TIME's Best Portraits of 2020

<strong>Megan Thee Stallion.</strong> "TIME 100 Most Influential People," Oct. 5 issue. Credit - Dana Scruggs for TIME

In 2020, showing your face to the world often meant keeping half of it covered. And yet—even partly obscured—our faces can’t help but tell the story of where we’ve been, and all we’ve been through, in the past year. The pandemic touched the lives of each of us. But as this gallery of portraits commissioned by TIME in the past year shows, even in the hardest times, we draw on reserves of strength we didn’t know we had. To understand 2020, all you need to do is read these faces.

This is a year that robbed us of so much—though it also challenged us to take stock of what’s left and move forward. Seven-year-old Sarah Rugendyke sits amid the ruins of her pink play castle in Cobargo, New South Wales, in the aftermath of a wave of deadly bushfires that ripped through Australia early in the year. A drag performer injured in Beirut’s port explosion, his rib cage tightly bandaged, his face masked to protect against COVID-19, looks straight into the lens, as if defying any force that would dare damage his house or destroy his beautiful city. A Manhattan devoid of tourists means less work for taxi drivers. But Mohamed Eleissawy, who has been driving a cab for 30 years, keeps going. Gloved and masked, his face framed by the driver’s seat window, he represents not just New York’s ability to endure, but the spirit of cities everywhere—places where people abide, adjust and rebuild when necessary.

The faces in these images also tell us a lot, without words, about what it means to be a determined problem solver: Chef José Andrés, through his organization, World Central Kitchen, mobilizes to get food to where it’s needed. His eyes alone, both resolute and kind, say, “This is how you do it.” The founders of Black Lives Matter—Alicia Garza, Patrisse Cullors and Opal Tometi—show the boldness and warmth you need to bring change to a country, and a world, that’s been all too slow to recognize injustice.

Our entertainers, too, galvanize us: Megan Thee Stallion, a modern goddess in a golden dress, projects the kind of deep confidence that’s built up in layers of life experience. And an enigmatic portrait of best-selling author Elena Ferrante is really a portrait of an idea of Elena Ferrante, a nod to the reality that as readers, we’re part of a writer’s world of creation; it’s they who create the universe, but we must be adventurous enough to step into it. The same is always true of a great picture: It’s an invitation to connect with a face, a spirit, a way of thinking.

These are the faces that tell the story of 2020, in all its pain and complexity, but also in its moments of joy. — Stephanie Zacharek