21st Century Hip Hop’s 15th Century Look
Pop stars are modern day royalty: the money, the clothes, the gold. And when it comes to showing off lavish living, hip hop culturedoes it particularly well. So well, in fact, that rappers likeKanyeandDrakeoften make comparisons to monarchs renowned for decadence themselves. It was only a matter of time before the TumblrB4XVIcame along:
B4XVIis a growing archive of the similarities between pre-16thcentury art and hip hop culture. CreatorCecilia Azcaratetakes images from Old World paintings, often of royalty or religious leaders, and juxtaposes them with photos of some of the biggest rappers in the game. In Azcarate’swords, her Tumblr highlights “an invisible conversation between hip hop and art before the 16th century.”
This isn’t the first time we’ve seen these vastly different worlds intersect. The paintings of contemporary artistKehinde Wiley, the subject of anexhibitioncurrently up at the Brooklyn Museum, look simultaneously antique and brand new. But Azcarate hones in on personalities—people we know.”Hip hop is not afraid of showing pride for its own power,” Azcarate told Dazed. And this is where the genius of B4XVIcomes from. While you can chalk some of the similarities up to coincidence, others are pretty uncanny.
So do hip hop stars take their wardrobe cues from the wealthy subjects of medieval painters? Doubtful. But the images in B4XVI do make you wonder if there’s continuity across centuries, continents, and genres in the way we display power and influence — what Azcarate calls the “iconography of power.” Some of these comparisons seem as simple as accessories; furs and gold chains are pretty unmistakable symbols of wealth. But for Azcarate, the connections go even deeper: she’s trying to figure out whether there is a timeless representation of swag.
