Never judge a book by its cover?

I remember in grade school we were sent to the library every week with the class for about an hour. During that time, we were to pick out books, and we were allowed to check two books out at a time. Since we had to check something out, I always made a point to check out the books that had the most interesting cover. If it did not have any art, there was no chance I would check it out; if it had appealing artwork (on my terms), I would check it out. Despite my motives for checking out books in the library, I think the artwork of book can tell a lot about its meaning, but not everything.
The artwork on the front of Lucy, "Savage Poems," by Paul Gaugin, illustrates much of my understanding of Lucy. First, the artwork itself is simple. Lucy has lived a life a simplicity thus far, for she has not had to deal with or experience many of the luxuries of life in Western culture. Where she is from, people, in the view of the Westerner, would seem primitive, living with the bare necessities. Despite its simplicity of color and detail, the facial expression of the subject is intriguing to me. She seems to be looking at something that the viewer of the painting can not see, implying that she knows something we do not. She is looking at things from a different perspective. This is reflective of Lucy, who sees many aspects of the American culture much different than we do. The difference is often so great, yet our love of our culture is also great, that we do not even see a difference or a problem. There are several examples of this in the novel, especially in regard to Mariah. Mariah is not fully aware of the vast difference in their understanding of ideas and events, yet they are quite apparent to Lucy. For this reason, I see the facial position of the person in this painting as looking at something that we cannot see. Sometimes we get wrapped up in our culture, like Mariah has, that we are unable to see its flaws, as Lucy is able.