Jay Z: World's Greatest New Performance Artist - Music

meccalecca
Voice of Reason

Gender: Male
Location: The Land of Enchantment

So, 2 days ago, Jay Z performed for something like 6 hours in a world renowned art gallery down the street from where I work. The performance was based around Marina Abramovic's recent performance piece at the MOMA. Many very high profile artists were there. And big time art critic Jerry Saltz wrote a review praising the performance.

http://www.vulture.com/2013/07/jerry-sa...jay-z.html

As someone who studied fine art, and works deep within the fine art world, I feel nauseous. It's not so much that I feel like Jay Z raps like an autistic child. It's that the shallowest of the art community have filled his ego with the idea that he is a performance artist. What he did was the equivalency to his recent use of "Smells Like Teen Spirit" in his new single "Holy Grail." Jay Z has taken something highly regarded and re-appropriated it without any sensitivity to the sentiment of the original content.

I respect Jay Z as a business man, but this man is little more than a materialistic ego-maniac. He's apparently now added fine art to the bling he brags about.

I look forward to a counterpoint.
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Applerill
Autistic Princess <3

Gender: Female
Age: 30
Location: Chicago

Agreed.

JMan

Which album is this Teen Spirit thing on? I wanna try the album.

junodog4
Future Grumpy Old Man

Gender: Male
Location: Calgary

meccalecca wrote:

So, 2 days ago, Jay Z performed for something like 6 hours in a world renowned art gallery down the street from where I work. The performance was based around Marina Abramovic's recent performance piece at the MOMA. Many very high profile artists were there. And big time art critic Jerry Saltz wrote a review praising the performance.

http://www.vulture.com/2013/07/jerry-sa...jay-z.html

As someone who studied fine art, and works deep within the fine art world, I feel nauseous. It's not so much that I feel like Jay Z raps like an autistic child. It's that the shallowest of the art community have filled his ego with the idea that he is a performance artist. What he did was the equivalency to his recent use of "Smells Like Teen Spirit" in his new single "Holy Grail." Jay Z has taken something highly regarded and re-appropriated it without any sensitivity to the sentiment of the original content.

I respect Jay Z as a business man, but this man is little more than a materialistic ego-maniac. He's apparently now added fine art to the bling he brags about.

I look forward to a counterpoint.

This is what happens when you're surrounded by people who tell you how awesome you are.
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meccalecca
Voice of Reason

Gender: Male
Location: The Land of Enchantment

junodog4 wrote:

This is what happens when you're surrounded by people who tell you how awesome you are.

haha. yes exactly. and the more rich and famous you are, the worse it gets.
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Kool Keith Sweat

I assume you're referring to The Artist is Present. Though Jay Z's performance might draw comparison to Abramovic's performance because of setting, her presence at his performance, and Jay Z staring her in the eyes for a bit, I don't think the two are very comparable. Hers was a very static performance, and the length of time sitting in front of her was enough to cause discomfort; Jay's was a very dynamic performance, and the length of his stares was minimal, making the whole thing seem like a pretty normal concert. This is probably where your frustration comes from, and it's understandable, because it might seem like a cheap copy.

My problem comes from your accusation of misappropriation. Art tends to appropriate other art, and there's always going to be somebody that believes it's misappropriated. Free jazz began because more whites started playing jazz and many black free jazz musicians wanted to create an identity out of something that could not be replicated, so they improvised. How do you think the blues musicians felt when they heard Zeppelin and the Stones ripping their tracks? And there's countless cases of samples being used to the discontent of the original musician (Massive Attack's "Exchange" comes to mind). And though it's harder to spot, artforms bleed into each other. Artists appropriate what they will and it seems like only if it's considered 'bad' by some consensus that it is misappropriated.

Performance art and music aren't necessarily mutually exclusive either. What do you think musicians are doing on stage? And what is 4'33", performance art or music or both or even neither? This Jay performance also isn't much different than the recent The National one, where they played at MoMA for six hours, except they didn't 'explicitly' reference a particular performance artist, yet I didn't hear much uproar about that performance.

Ultimately, I think you just wanted to rant about Jay and tried to wrangle up a decent reason to make a thread about it. I'm not even a fan of Jay outside of a few handfuls of songs.

meccalecca
Voice of Reason

Gender: Male
Location: The Land of Enchantment

ppnw wrote:

I assume you're referring to The Artist is Present. Though Jay Z's performance might draw comparison to Abramovic's performance because of setting, her presence at his performance, and Jay Z staring her in the eyes for a bit, I don't think the two are very comparable. Hers was a very static performance, and the length of time sitting in front of her was enough to cause discomfort; Jay's was a very dynamic performance, and the length of his stares was minimal, making the whole thing seem like a pretty normal concert. This is probably where your frustration comes from, and it's understandable, because it might seem like a cheap copy.

My problem comes from your accusation of misappropriation. Art tends to appropriate other art, and there's always going to be somebody that believes it's misappropriated. Free jazz began because more whites started playing jazz and many black free jazz musicians wanted to create an identity out of something that could not be replicated, so they improvised. How do you think the blues musicians felt when they heard Zeppelin and the Stones ripping their tracks? And there's countless cases of samples being used to the discontent of the original musician (Massive Attack's "Exchange" comes to mind). And though it's harder to spot, artforms bleed into each other. Artists appropriate what they will and it seems like only if it's considered 'bad' by some consensus that it is misappropriated.

Performance art and music aren't necessarily mutually exclusive either. What do you think musicians are doing on stage? And what is 4'33", performance art or music or both or even neither? This Jay performance also isn't much different than the recent The National one, where they played at MoMA for six hours, except they didn't 'explicitly' reference a particular performance artist, yet I didn't hear much uproar about that performance.

Ultimately, I think you just wanted to rant about Jay and tried to wrangle up a decent reason to make a thread about it. I'm not even a fan of Jay outside of a few handfuls of songs.

Very thoughtful response other than "I think you just wanted to rant about Jay and tried to wrangle up a decent reason to make a thread about it."

I've not voiced my opinion here about The National and Animal Collective infiltrating the art world, but in general, I've seen the fine art community desperately seeking attention from the youth by staging events such as this. I saw Animal Collective perform at the Guggenheim. As much as I enjoy the band, their performance piece was not at the level of art that the museum is known for.

It is not so much Jay Z or The National or Animal Collective that I blame for this. it's a shameless fine arts community desperate for attention, money and fame.

As you said, The Artist Is Present was a very different performance in execution. Far more powerful. Although I didn't get to sit with her, I did see that exhibition in person and know a few people who sat with her.

But it's very clear Jay Z was borrowing from the piece (by his own admission), attempting his own version. I understand that there has always been re-appropriation within art. I just think this particular case adds nothing to the original aside from cheapening it. The fact that it was performed in front of a room of elite members of the community shows that he is removed from the common people. The fact that he's dropping names like Picasso, Koons, and SAMO could have been a critique on the concept of art as commodity, but the execution proves little more than a brag of wealth.

It's a publicity stunt, and a pretty good one, which I give Jay Z credit for. My disgust is for a greedy art community embracing it as something more than that.
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Guest

To be honest, I'm more pissed off by his new album/Samsung advert. To think that this man was my favourite rapper for five or six years of my life makes me feel a little nauseous to be perfectly honest. His new album is easily the worst I've heard all year in any genre, largely because it just reeks of crass commercialism. For a long time now he has been a "business, maaaaan", but this album really fucking stinks. He's tried to cover as many bases as possible, making sure that there are at least two or three songs that appeal to every demographic, and I'm no exception. There are songs on the album that I think are great, and I actually feel ashamed to say it, because that means he's won. Magna Carta Holy Grail has confirmed all my worst fears about Jay-Z, things I didn't want to admit to myself. I'd managed to reconcile my earlier love of the man and his music during his recent, terrible output by simply convincing myself that he had "fallen off", as they say, but this latest album, partnered with this stunt and the way the album has been released and the inevitable fucking tours with Justin Timberlake and the television commercials that will crop up in its wake and whatever fucking fashion line or high-end liquor or sports team he adds to his brand next have me wondering whether I can ever enjoy his music again. I tried listening to 'Dead Presidents' earlier and couldn't shake the feeling that he had this in mind all along, that the music was always secondary. If I'm honest, it's fucking galling. Fuck Jay-Z.

EDIT: And yes, I do realise that Jay-Z has always mentioned in his lyrics that he's a hustler first and foremost, a man who prides money above anything else, including music. But on his earlier records his dedication to the craft of rapping and songwriting, married to a desire to always be rapping over the best and freshest beats available, undermine those lyrics somewhat in that they prove how much he genuinely cared about making great music. Despite his lyrical protestations to the contrary, the Jay-Z of old man who was making music for the love of making great music. I no longer get that feeling from his music. It just sounds like a man who is making what he thinks will sell, and it's disgusting.

Last edited by Guest on 07/12/2013 18:28; edited 1 time in total

Guest

I think Jay Z has managed to represent everything I can possibly dislike in a musician.

And with that, I prefer to never speak nor type that name again.

EyeKanFly
Head Bear Master/Galactic Emperor

Age: 33
Location: Gotham

ppnw wrote:

I assume you're referring to The Artist is Present. Though Jay Z's performance might draw comparison to Abramovic's performance because of setting, her presence at his performance, and Jay Z staring her in the eyes for a bit, I don't think the two are very comparable. Hers was a very static performance, and the length of time sitting in front of her was enough to cause discomfort; Jay's was a very dynamic performance, and the length of his stares was minimal, making the whole thing seem like a pretty normal concert. This is probably where your frustration comes from, and it's understandable, because it might seem like a cheap copy.

My problem comes from your accusation of misappropriation. Art tends to appropriate other art, and there's always going to be somebody that believes it's misappropriated. Free jazz began because more whites started playing jazz and many black free jazz musicians wanted to create an identity out of something that could not be replicated, so they improvised. How do you think the blues musicians felt when they heard Zeppelin and the Stones ripping their tracks? And there's countless cases of samples being used to the discontent of the original musician (Massive Attack's "Exchange" comes to mind). And though it's harder to spot, artforms bleed into each other. Artists appropriate what they will and it seems like only if it's considered 'bad' by some consensus that it is misappropriated.

Performance art and music aren't necessarily mutually exclusive either. What do you think musicians are doing on stage? And what is 4'33", performance art or music or both or even neither? This Jay performance also isn't much different than the recent The National one, where they played at MoMA for six hours, except they didn't 'explicitly' reference a particular performance artist, yet I didn't hear much uproar about that performance.

This all very much. I read about The National thing, I had a friend who was trying to go to that but didn't for some reason.

lethalnezzle wrote:

To be honest, I'm more pissed off by his new album/Samsung advert.

Me too. Also, the Nirvana sample previously mentioned just seems weird in "Holy Grail". The Timberlake parts are nice, but the "Smells Like Teen Spirit" part is just kinda weird IMO.
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