“I was watching a crowd, and everybody was waiting for the breaks to come in. I said, I’m going to do something tonight. I’m going to call it the Merry-Go-Round. I’ll put on two copies of a record, James Brown, Give it Up or Turnit a Loose, and just play the break.” DJ Kool Herc is a founding fathers of Hip Hop. Here he tells Spin about the moment he debuted the “merry-go-round” at a function organised by Cindy Campbell, his sister, on 13 April 1973. Decades later, this instance of experimental DJing would be better known as the “breakbeat.” The party itself would rise to even greater renown as the birthplace of Hip Hop.
This year marks the 50th anniversary of a genre and movement that continues to influence music, fashion, visual arts and more. Baltimore Museum of Art and The Saint Louis Art Museum have organised The Culture: Hip Hop and Contemporary Art in the 21st Century to celebrate and reflect upon its lasting impact. Around 130 pieces from established and emerging names will be on display. Highlights include Hassan Hajjaj’s vibrant portraits of rapper Cardi B and Jean-Michel Basquiat’s iconic oilstick paintings. To illustrate the expansive world of hip-hop, these works will be accompanied and enriched by music ephemera and objects from key fashion moments, such as the work of the late designer Virgil Abloh. The show is organised into six sections exploring key themes: Language, Brand, Adornment, Tribute, Ascension and Pose.
The Culture is expansive, yet it does not claim to provide a definitive history of the movement. It provides a unique perspective adding exhibitions worldwide, including: Hip-Hop: Conscious, Unconscious at Fotografiska New York; Contact High: A Visual History of Hip-Hop at the Museum of Pop Culture and A Hip Hop Journey: 50 Years of Kulture at Leeds Art Gallery. Andréa Purnell, co-curator of the exhibition, states: “Emerging in 1973 as an unabashed declaration of Black, Latinx and Afro-Latinx difference, Hip Hop has always been a culture that reflects community. Now, with the 50th anniversary in 2023, it is a dominant form of expression and subject of artistic production, embraced by communities from all walks of life.”
Attendees are welcomed by the iconic photograph, A Great Day in Hip Hop (1998). Here, we see 177 influential rappers and producers gathered on a street in Harlem, New York. Famous faces in the crowd include Busta Rhymes, Queen Pen, Grandmaster Flash and DJ Kool Herc. The scene was captured by the esteemed photographer Gordon Parks (1912-2006). Originally published on the cover of XXL magazine, it preserves the zeitgeist of late 90s Hip Hop. Parks took inspiration from the earlier photograph A Great Day in Harlem, which featured 57 jazz greats pictured by Art Kane almost 40 years prior. With such an introduction, gallery-goers are encouraged to look back at the origins of Hip Hop before diving into its impact today. Adrian Octavius Walker (b. 1988) continues the legacy of these group shots with a 2022 update. The final piece is A Great Day in St. Louis, showing today’s creatives posed on top of Art Hill.
The Culture covers everything from the visual language of graffiti to the ways MCs and DJs communicate musically through sampling and spoken word. The show also explores branding and establishing an identity. Here, Moroccan photographer Hassan Hajjaj (b. 1961) is key. In Cardi B Unity (2017), the rapper sits on a stack of bright green crates and tilts her head towards the camera. The border is filled with bright green tubs, each covered in Moroccan branding. Emblazoned on her lace sleeve is the word “unity”. The image is part of a trio of photos originally taken for New York Magazine. Cardi B topped US charts in June with Bodak Yellow, making her only the second female rapper to do so since Lauryn Hill in 1998.
The Culture reflects on the pressing issues in the industry, in addition to celebrating the intersections between Hip Hop and contemporary art. Pieces on display engage with gender, sexuality, feminism, appropriation, and misogyny; the complex relationship with capitalism, commodification, and racial identity; as well as links to the art world and the art market. It’s a show rooted in the present moment. However, it also makes space for the important conversations that will shape the future of Hip Hop.
Saint Louis Art Musuem, The Culture: Hip Hop and Contemporary Art | 19 August – 1 January 2024
Words: Diana Bestwish Tetteh
Image Credits:
- Hassan Hajjaj, Moroccan (active England), born 1961; “Cardi B Unity”, 2017; Courtesy the artist and Yossi Milo Gallery, New York; © Hassan Hajjaj.
- Hassan Hajjaj, Cardi B. NY, 2017 © Hassan Hajjaj, 2017/1438. Courtesy of Taymour Grahne Art, London, UK. Published in Elephant.art (2019).
