Week #31 ('20) Art Appreciation
Welcome to my weekly Art Appreciation post, where I provide a list of some amazing album covers, single art, and random art that have come out within the past week. I’ll give you the artist/photographer/painter/magician’s name, as well as any social media or websites where you can go and check out more of their work. Click here to go back and see some other Art Appreciation posts.
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The color red is a fascinating color. It’s a very antagonistic, attention-drawing color, one that demands attention from the viewer. It’s also a color of passion, which is what I think the artists this week were tapping into whenever they created the pieces you’re about to see. Whether it’s the feeling before a big title-fight, the fight for a fair and just world, and the unchecked aggression of dolphins and their ilk, the strong will of these musicians is conveyed just as much in the colors as it is in their lyrics and deliveries. Pay attention to the way these artists use red this week, for they all give their own spin on it.
Hell, look at Tha Soup Dude’s Kitchen: my color scheme is Red and Yellow, which I could lie and say that I’ve studied the human response to red and yellow in websites, but the truth of the matter is it’s inspired by the cover of Kanye West’s College Dropout, probably one of the most musically passionate albums there is. There ya go, a little TSDK lore for y’all.
Remember, use this post to follow and subscribe to these artists; they deserve as much recognition as the musicians they are attached to.
Artist(s): STEINER us
Forever, by Travis Barker (Feat. Run the Jewels)
Barker has always been associated with the skateboarding scene, so it’s appropriate that the art we have representing his new single go down that stylistic road of skater fashion. It’s a sort of cartoonish sliminess that makes this image so potent, the black-and-white portraits being made up of slightly off-putting visages of both Barker and the RTJ duo. Each of the individuals look like that could be any one of the massive number of tattoos on Travis’s body. To keep in step with the conspiratorial nature of Run the Jewels, there is a cool use of eyes to respresent how aware one should be in the modern age: you see Travis with the Reaper beanie on as if to say keep eyes in the back of your head, El-P sporting the double pair of eyes to maybe say to be doubtful of everything you see (or maybe representing that he always wears a pair of sunglasses), and then Mike with his opened third-eye telling us to be critical when taking in new information. A trifecta of wokeness.
STEINER us’s Instagram
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Artist(s): Action Bronson
Latin Grammys, by Action Bronson
You can see the influence of only the greats here: the shading from Caravaggio, the stunning realism of Van Eyck, the musculature of Michelangelo. I mean just look at this dolphin: this motherfucker is THIRSTY, and BUILT, and able to look in MULTIPLE directions. The you have the red banner, emblazoned by the immortal “GENESIS”, as if to tell us that the gods are here to take this rap shit over again. Those gods of course being our eventual dolphin overlords. (On the real though, I love how Action continues to create his own entirely unique works of art on canvas to represent his art musically; I mean, who knows better what your music is supposed to “look” like than the one who made it? Big respect to Action Bronson as a well-rounded artist and creative)
Wesley’s Instagram/Bronson's Twitter
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Artist(s): Manuel “Cep” Concepcion
The People’s Champ, by Flee Lord & Pete Rock
The People’s Champ is a hero, someone rooted for, someone who everyone wants to succeed in the face of adversity. For many out there in the world, that person was Muhammad Ali, who, next to Mike Tyson, is the world’s foremost heavyweight champion. He was a person who’s story was a relatable struggle, especially for the minority communities around the world, his achievements both statistically and socially being simply ground-breaking. It’s fitting that Flee Lord, a well known underdog in his own right, is channeling the spirit of Ali on this album cover here. Flee is by all accounts a people’s champ, a person who is now known in Hip-Hop as an incredibly prolific emcee who has almost never sacrificed his quality to make a deadline, and I think the imagery here suits his status in the game nicely. There’s a cool “fight night” motif going on here, with the boxing gloves and death-stare from Flee giving you the sense that the shit is really about to go down. Lastly, like the other images here, red is a huge part of what makes the image compelling; it’s a darker red, not an angry red but a determined red, with Flee realizing that this moment, a record with PETE ROCK, is his moment to really let the punches fly. Cep once again knocks it out of the park for underground hip-hop.
Cep’s Instagram/Cep's Twitter
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