#Beyonce and jay z louvre video free

Raft depicts the tragic loss of life after the ship capsized off the coast of Senegal in 1816. The history of this work cannot be overlooked. In a recurring shot of Jay-Z, he stands before Théodore Géricault’s Raft of the Medusa, 1818-1819. They stand in a layered line down the stairs from Winged Victory, offering the goddess herself a plethora of moving arms in place of her missing limbs-transforming a white, static space into one of diverse movement and agency. Winged Victory of Samothrace (via Wikimedia Commons)īy including the Winged Victory of Samothrace, the Carters force us to wonder: Where does this art come from? How was it acquired? What violence led to the art’s ending up in a museum like the Louvre (or the Getty or the Met)? And how does that change the viewer’s experience of the art in this space? Beyoncé also physically inserts her body, and her dancers’ bodies, into this conversation. If the marbles were returned to Greece, runs the argument, the halls of western museums would be virtually emptied of their treasure.” Recently, similar conversations about provenance were alluded to in Black Panther. In “The Parthenon Marbles Custody Case,” scholar Shareen Blair Brysac discusses some of demands for restitution, while also introducing many curators’ hesitation against i t: “The possibility of their return causes sleepless nights for curators the world over. At the heart of one of the most heated restitution debates between Greece and France, Winged Victory now serves as a symbolic stand-in for the ongoing debates about art repatriation. In Winged Victory of Samothrace (190 B.C.E.), the now-iconic headless, armless female body is perched atop a low pedestal, as if about to take flight. The art they chose to highlight has particular significance, as explored through some of the biggest artworks, which serve as characters in the Carters’ video. Some have noted that Beyoncé and Jay-Z are commenting on the history of visual oppression in Western art, art that has been made to affirm and assert whiteness as the norm while erasing black culture. Much like the World’s Fairs, these exhibition spaces were founded upon Europe’s exploitation of colonies-asserting political dominance through a cultural looting and visual display of ownership. It could also be said that they are critiquing the museum as a colonial vault, highlighting the imperial roots of such museums as the Louvre. Over the course of the video, they re-populate this space with black and brown bodies. It could be said that they are using their elite status and wealth to buy out the physical vestibule that holds the paragons of Western (and white) art. It includes five densely-packed minutes of art, fashion, and performance filmed on an epic scale at the Louvre. Over Father’s Day weekend, Beyoncé and Jay-Z released a music video for their new track “Apeshit” from their collaborative album Everything is Love.

#Beyonce and jay z louvre video free

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