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It has been difficult months to Young Thug. Your latest studio album, Uy scutihe received a warm reception from fans, despite being his first project since the release of prison in 2024, after spending over 900 days behind the bars. This is visible in your countenance during interviews, where the weight of public imprisonment and scrutiny appears clearly on your face. Before the album’s release, a flood of prison telephone calls, leaked and revealing his feelings about everything – Gunna the Drake – spread quickly through social networks.

Even so, Uy scuti presents flashes of the brilliance of Thugespecially in your cover art, which is pure Thug at the height. The cover features a close-up portrait of the rapper transformed into a white person. On Instagram, he shared the image with the caption: “If you want to be the biggest… vire white !!” The gesture sounds refreshing in a subversive sense and conceptual art. Here is a musician entangled on the American Criminal Justice system, whose existence as a black man in the South carries a deeply rooted notion of how racism permeates every aspect of American culture – which becomes our racial conscience upside down.

In an interview with the Big Loon podclus, Thug He explained his reasoning behind the cover: “I think it was just a funny stop, but still serious enough for me to move on,” he said. “We always played and made fun of my neighborhood: ‘Dude, you want to be the biggest, turn white.’ It’s just a narrative that the world paints. And we only went with this narrative. ”

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Of course not everyone appreciated the vision of Thugger. Shortly after publicizing the cover on Instagram, the networks were flooded by disappointed fans ridiculing art. Of the jokes about their resemblance to the former NBA player Delonté West Comments that the cover would damage the album streams, Thug’s provocation for the first time did not have the expected impact. This is the same artist who posed naked on the cover of BARTAR 6 (2015) and that wore a dress on the cover of Jefferry. Perhaps a foreshadowing of the album reaction, it seems that their provocative ideas are not having the same effect as before.

Still, time will say Thug It has a point. There is something indeed impactful on the cover. From the historical-artistic point of view, she dialogues with works that we have seen in the past, which cause both discomfort and expose greater structural problems of our culture.

“I think it is clear that he is commenting on the ‘white is right’ narrative, which still permeates not only the US but also Africa – especially with easily accessible whitening creams in countries in Africa and India,” he says KO NNAMDIEcurator and gallery owner in New York. “The cover really reminded me of the 1988 work How Ya Like Me Now?from David Hammonsthat portrays Jesse Jackson of blue suit, red tie, blue eyes and white skin. ”

Nnamdie Remember that this piece also generated enormous public outrage. So much so that, after being installed in open space in Washington, DC, was attacked with hammers, forcing its removal to a closed space. After, Hammons He incorporated his own marts into the exhibition, organizing them into a semicircle, almost like guardians of painting.

Years later, the Whiteface again captures the public imagination. The recent incursion of Druski It was received in a much more positive way, perhaps because of the convincing way in which it was made. “Have we seen other black characters use Whiteface before? Yes. Tyler, The Creator You have done this in several clips. The brothers Wayans Also, in The white” Nnamdie. “The fantastic of this cover is that you end up giving him the same grace as it would give to a white person – that is, it seems like a common one. And for the first time, this black man so recognizable, an icon, just looks like any person.”

As in any work of art, the context in which it exists says a lot – and given the year that Thug There was something fascinating in the boldness with which he offers what sounds like a comment on how black and white artists are promoted in different ways in the music industry. In his interview, he plays: “You want to be the biggest in this world, it has to be the Eminem. ” Although said in a joke, it is difficult to ignore the greater salesplaceability of white rappers compared to black rappers, especially in recent years.

“I think it’s great that Thugger can play with this interpretation or expand it, making it more complex, ”he adds Nnamdie. “I find it smart, because it makes people look their own mirror of their projections.”

+++ Read more: Young Thug cries when talking about Gunna’s ‘betrayal’ in a new interview

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