On the occasion of its 50th birthday, the Schirn Kunsthalle Frankfurt is dedicating a large, interdisciplinary exhibition to hip-hop and its profound influence on the current art and culture of our society from February 29 to May 26, 2024.

Hip-hop emerged in the Bronx in New York in the 1970s as a cultural movement among black and Latin American youth. Through large block parties, he quickly developed into a culture based on the four pillars of MCing or rapping, DJing, breaking or break dancing and graffiti.

From the outset, hip-hop criticized prevailing structures and cultural narratives and offered new opportunities to express diasporic experiences and create alternatives to existing power relations.

This was accompanied by growing social and political awareness and knowledge creation, which are regarded as the fifth pillar. Today, hip-hop is a global phenomenon that has driven numerous innovations in music, fashion, technology, and visual and performing arts.

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Based on the origins of hip-hop in the USA, the exhibition “THE CULTURE” presents over 100 works, mostly from the last 20 years, including paintings, photographs, sculptures and videos as well as fashion by internationally renowned contemporary artists, including Lauren Halsey, Julie Mehretu, Tschabalala Self, Arthur Jafa, Kahlil Joseph, Virgil Abloh and Gordon Parks. It is divided into six subject areas: pose, brand, jewelry, tribute, advancement and language.

“THE CULTURE” highlights the political, cultural and aesthetic features that have made hip-hop a global phenomenon and established it as the artistic canon of our time. The exhibition also addresses contemporary issues and debates — from identity, racism and appropriation to sexuality, feminism and empowerment.

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Sebastian Baden, director of the Schirn Kunsthalle Frankfurt, emphasizes: “Hip-hop is a socially influential and influential cultural movement that can be seen at the Schirn for the first time in Germany in an artistic exhibition context.

Together with international partners, we are showing the great influence that hip-hop has had on contemporary art and pop culture over the last 20 years. With a comprehensive supporting program, the Schirn also addresses aspects of the local hip hop scene — its connections, but also the differences with US history and contemporary debates about empowerment and identity.”

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Curators Asma Naeem (Baltimore Art Museum, Dorothy Wagner Wallis Director) and Gamynne Guillotte (formerly Chief Education Officer), Hannah Klemm (formerly Associate Curator of Modern and Contemporary Art, Saint Louis Art Museum) and Andréa Purnell (Community Collaborations Manager) about the exhibition:

“The influence of hip-hop on culture is so significant that it has become a new canon. This competes with the western art historical tradition, which many museums are guided by and develop their exhibitions. Hip-hop showcases alternative ideals of artistic quality and excellence that focus on Afro-Latin American identities and stories.

The exhibition makes it clear that many of the most convincing visual artists of the present day deal directly with this canon in their practice. The visual culture of hip-hop, with its subversive tactics and commitment to social justice, appears everywhere in today's art, in painting, performance, fashion, architecture as well as in technology.”

The exhibition was organized by the Baltimore Museum of Art and the Saint Louis Art Museum and is presented in collaboration with the Schirn Kunsthalle Frankfurt.

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THE SECTIONS OF THE EXHIBITION

In six sections, “THE CULTURE” presents artistic works in a dynamic dialogue with fashion and historical ephemera. Some works are directly related to hip-hop songs, which can be accessed and listened to in the exhibition via QR codes.

The fashion highlights of the exhibition include looks from the collections by Virgil Abloh for Louis Vuitton, the legendary streetwear brand Cross Colours, Daniel 'Dapper Dan Day and Gucci.

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The famous historical ephemera include a copy of the album Beat Bop/Test Pressing (1983) by Jean-Michel Basquiat and Rammellzee, a Vivienne Westwood Buffalo Hat (1984) that Pharrell Williams made famous at the 2014 Grammy Awards, and several of Lil' Kim's iconic wigs redesigned by original hairstylist Dionne Alexander.

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POSE

The artistic works in this part of the exhibition “THE CULTURE” explore what is conveyed through gestures, posture and the way someone presents themselves. Michael Vasquez, Nina Chanel Abney and Tschabalala Self explore binary-gender and racist stereotypes, explore the line between appreciation and appropriation, look at the relationship between audience and performers, and ask which bodies are considered dangerous or vulnerable and who decides about them.

For some, self-expression is a means of survival, for others an opportunity to assert themselves, and for others a tool to turn fixed ideas about physical forms of expression on their head.

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BRAND

The concept of the brand is not limited to differentiating and marketing commercial goods. Rather, it also includes the way in which a person uses available communication technologies, including social media, to position themselves in public. In recent decades, hip hop artists have acted as unofficial advertising partners for major brands that matched their style and desired public image.

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The appropriation of luxury brands to create something unique, such as by legendary designer Daniel R. Day, better known as Dapper Dan, questions the concept of the original and underlines the unpleasant relationship between luxury labels and those who are deliberately excluded from them. Regardless of whether they design fashion, record music or make art, the artists blur the lines between those forms of art and (self-) marketing.

The exhibition features works by Kudzanai Chiurai, Larry W. and a video in collaboration with Athur Jafa, Malik Sayeed, and Elissa Blount Moorhead. They address consumption, display of luxury goods and complex and entrenched ideas of masculinity that can be observed in many hip-hop stars.

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JEWELRY

While style is often defined by class and politics, hardly any other culture dresses as eccentrically — and as influential — as hip-hop. From Lil' Kim's colorful wigs to the exuberant gold chains of Big Daddy Kane and Rakim, some of the most significant and unique styles have their origins in hip-hop.

Artists such as Miguel Luciano or Hank Willis Thomas show sparkling jewelry, sparkling grills on the teeth or the iconic Nike Air Force 1 sneakers — they are primarily worn to be seen. Works by Murjoni Merriweather, Yvonne Osei and Lauren Halsey celebrate both synthetic hair as a self-confident form of jewelry in black communities and hairstyling as an independent art form.

Hip-hop jewelry is able to counteract Eurocentric beauty ideals and question concepts of taste and social conventions.

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TRIBUTE

From name-dropping in a song to portraying deceased rap legends on a T-shirt or as a tattoo — tributes, respect and “shout-outs” as a sign of thanks are an essential part of hip-hop culture. Such references show who has influence and who is important; they honor and honor the heritage and legacy of deceased artists and create networks among themselves.

Highlighting individual artists and styles contributes to the canonization of hip-hop — in this way, certain works of art, songs and rappers are celebrated collectively for their artistic achievement and historical influence.

For W Magazine, Carrie Mae Weems photographs musician Mary J. Blige with a crown, the Non-Fungible Token (NFT) Heir to the Throne (2021) by Derrick Adams is inspired by Jay-Z's debut studio album Reasonable Doubt (1996) and Roberto Lugo creates a Street Shrine 1: A Notorious Story (Biggie) [Street Shrine 1: A Notorious Story (Biggie)] (2019) made of ceramic.

As a global art form, hip-hop has become a benchmark for 21st-century artists. With the tribute to hip-hop and its conceptual and social development, visual artists grapple with the idea that the once homogeneous, white and consistent canon of art history is fluid and becomes permeable to their own biographies and backgrounds. In this way, the artists question what is considered beautiful, who is iconic and whose story is valuable.

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ASCENT

Death and ideas of resurrection or ascension and life after death often appear in hip-hop songs: from mourning for a deceased friend to the constant danger of moving around urban space as a black person to thoughts about immortality arising from fame.

The exhibition features works inspired by themes of spiritual advancement in culture, such as Ascent [Ascent] (2018) from the DURAGS series by John Edmonds. With the video work M.a.a.d. (2014), Kahlil Joseph paints a lush, contemporary portrait of Compton, California, the hometown of Pulitzer Prize-winning hip hop artist Kendrick Lamar.

A song title by Lamar also gives the title to the collage Promise You Will Sing About Me (2019) by Robert Hodge. In this way, artists also use hip-hop as a form of expression to process, grieve and remember loss.

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LANGUAGE

Hip-hop is an art form that is essentially about language: the visual language of graffiti, a musical language that includes scratching and sampling, and of course the written and spoken word.

Call and response songs, followed by rap rhymes and lyrics that are placed over the tracks, form the basis for hip hop music. In addition to chanting, graffiti is one of the most recognizable features of hip-hop. Since the 1970s, graffiti writers have been painting or spraying trains, parts of urban infrastructure and walls with bright colors.

Many writers sign their works with recognizable “tags.” They explore the recognizable forms of letters and numbers and push tags to the limits of readability.

The Schirn shows works by Jean-Michel Basquiat, RAMM:LL:Z( Rammellzee), Adam Pendleton and Gajin Fujita, among others, which implement central elements of graffiti on paper, canvas or large-format wooden panels. Some messages are understandable to everyone, while others are encrypted in links, technologies, or forms that require insider knowledge and claim not to be generally understood.

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The exhibition “THE CULTURE” at Schirn is continued at Kunstverein Familie Montez with the video installation ISDN (2022) by Stan Douglas and expanded by an exhibition about milestones of hip hop at the MOMEM — Museum Of Modern Electronic Music, an action by Diamant Offenbach: Museum of Urban Culture and a film series on the 50-year history of hip hop at the DFF — German Film Institute & Film Museum.

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Both the exhibition and the publication are supported by an extensive network of consultants, including members of the community, artists, and scientists working on hip-hop.

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‍ARTISTS OF THE EXHIBITION

Abbey Williams, Adam Pendleton, Adrian Octavius Walker, Alex de Mora, Alvaro Barrington, Amani Lewis, Anthony Olubunmi Akinbola, Babe Ruth, Baby Phat, Bruno Baptistelli, Carrie Mae Weems, Chance the Rapper, Charles Mason III, Cross Colours, Daniel “Dapper Dan” Day, Damon Davis, Deana Lawson, Derrick Adams, Devan Shimoyama, Devin Allen, Dionne Alexander, El Franco Lee II, Ernest Shaw Jr., Fahamu Pecou, Gajin Fujita, Hank Willis Thomas, Hassan Hajjaj, James Brown, Jayson Musson, Jean-Michel Basquiat, Jen Everett, John Edmonds, Jonathan Lyndon Chase, Jordan Casteel, Jose Parla, Joyce J. Scott, Julie Mehretu, Kahlil Joseph, Kahlil Robert Irving, Kudzanai Chiurai, L.A. II, Larry W. Cook, Lauren Halsey, Luis Gispert, Maï Lucas, Malcolm McLaren, Maxwell Alexandre, Megan Lewis, Michael Vasquez, Miguel Luciano, Miquel Brown, Monica Ikegwu, Murjoni Merriwu Weather, Nina Chanel Abney, NIA JUNE, Kirby Griffin and ApoetNamednate, Nicholas Galanin, Pharrell Williams, Rammellzee, Rammellzee and K-Rob with Jean-Michel Basquiat, Rashaad Newsome, Robert Hodge, Robert Pruitt, Roberto Lugo, Rozeal, Shabez Jamal, Sheila Rashid, Shinique Smith, shirt , Stan Douglas, Tariku Shiferaw, Telfar Clemens, Texas Isaiah & Ms. Boogie, The Isley Brothers, TNEG (Arthur Jafa, Elissa Blount Moorhead, Malik Sayeed), Travis Scott, Troy Lamarr Chew II, Chabalala Self, Virgil Abloh, Vivienne Westwood and Malcolm McLaren, Wales Bonner, Willy Avarria, Wilmer Wilson IV, Yvonne Osei, Zeh Palito.

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The exhibition runs until May 26. Tickets and further information can be found on the official website (see below).

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SCHIRN KUNSTHALLE FRANKFURT

Römerberg

60311 Frankfurt/Main

www.schirn.de

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Photos via Schirn Kunsthalle Frankfurt