LONDON, ENGLAND – SEPTEMBER 04: Drake attends the “High Boy” UK Premiere at Hackney Picturehouse on … [+]
Drake simply dropped his newest album on September 3, Licensed Lover Boy.
Many points of the album have triggered chatter—its a chart-topping launch, it steals Kanye West’s thunder for Donda and particularly, its meme-worthy, party-ripe album artwork.
The album artwork for Licensed Lover Boy, Drake’s sixth album, depicts 12 pregnant girls emojis, lined up sporting totally different coloured shirts, holding their infants of their bellies. It has sparked a debate as probably the most controversial hip hop album artwork covers of all time.
The album cowl for Drake’s new album, Licensed Lover Boy, by British artist Damien Hirst.
Hirst is a grasp of coveting controversy, although. He’s no stranger to that. Ever since he noticed his rise within the Nineteen Nineties London artwork scene, due to a relationship with artwork collector Charles Saatchi, he shocked the pre-internet period with sharks in tanks of formaldehyde, to diamond-encrusted skulls and his famed Drugs Cupboard piece with cabinets of colourful prescribed drugs.
The 12 girls holding their infants may tie into the truth that Drake’s album was delayed by 9 months. Some have criticized the quilt for not having a red-haired girl represented within the piece.
However for Drake, who has an art collection that features artists like Andy Warhol, KAWS and Takashi Murakami, that is only a piece of pop artwork for the meme-baited public, no much less. Plain and easy.
Drake owns an art work by Hirst—a print of his sculpture For the love of God, a 2007 piece, which is seen in Drake’s condo in Toronto. The rapper is a fan of sunshine artist James Turrell, and owns different pop artworks by British artists like Gary Hume and Gerald Laing. He additionally owns a hilarious neon mild sculpture by artist Patrick Martinez, which reads: “Much less Drake, Extra Tupac.”
Drake’s personal style in pop artwork, from his personal artwork assortment, exhibits why he selected Hirst to do his newest album cowl. As Hirst as soon as mentioned about his artwork: “Persons are afraid of change, so that you create a sort of perception for them by repetition. It’s like respiration. I’ve all the time been drawn to collection and pairs. A novel factor is sort of a daunting object.”
Artist Damien Hirst stands in entrance of one in all his work throughout a media preview on the Gagosian … [+]
Repetition is a typical theme in Hirst’s artworks, because the repetition of dots helped elevate the British artist into the primary model within the artwork world throughout pre-internet occasions. Hirst has created over 1000 spot work, from 1986 to 2011.
“To create that construction, to do these colours, and do nothing,” the artist writes on his website. “I all of the sudden acquired what I wished. It was only a approach of pinning down the enjoyment of shade.”
For Drake, the alternative might be true. In some ways, his music avoids repetition.
When he did an interview in 2010 in regards to the music video for Greatest I Ever Had, Drake mentioned one thing that rings true right this moment: “Once I learn the feedback, I used to be like, man, I assume nobody needs to snigger anymore,” he mentioned. “Everyone needs the fairy story, you already know?”