Conversations with Contemporary Artists: Virgil Abloh

and Atlanta and I'm glad that you had a chance to walk through the exhibition but you've been very busy recently and you've had a lot of things going on just this last week I was wondering if you could tell us a little bit about your off-white womenswear runway show you just had and also the celebration around your Baccarat crystal clear collection I know things have been fairly recent for ya appreciate it yeah just come literally my suitcases are just behind that wall from Paris had a runway show just a couple of days ago where you know I'm fortunate to debut ideas that I've crafted over the last 20 years on the same sort of platform that you know fashions major recording system exists which is Paris you know those brands that are showing on the same schedule are you know 50 60 years old and our esteemed because of their history and for me it's important that our history you know the collective history or the collective nuances of the culture that exists in this room that they make their way to Paris and they make their way on that recording system of fashion of a contemporary sense so you know I debuted a show that was you know that features sculptures of mine next to fashion of mine it was a show that was sort of you know multi-sensory in a way and that end result is my sort of offering to the discipline of of culture not specifically fashion or art well fantastic appreciate that one of the things I wanted to ask you about actually is goes to your background and because for my own self I have it there's a little bit of commonality I was a design curator who was came to the museum field actually originally wanting to pursue architecture and then architectural history and so I found your own background in architecture very compelling and enjoyed seeing the project that's included in the exhibition and there's a great illustration in the exhibition catalog which I encourage everyone to go get a copy at or museum store after our talk there's there's a great illustration caption architect architecture versus architect and you talk about this an interview in the book and there's a part in particular where you mention whatever you study gets you labeled but that you quote create fashion from an architect's perspective can you tell us a little bit more about that and what you meant yeah you know first and foremost you know by Nature my practice is sort of very cognizant of art history you know I think we're obviously of the generation of the Internet so access to the past is what makes our generation current times much different than everything that's come before it so early on when I was young you know like the job of the youth is to sort of question the presiding generation before it and I think that's always happened throughout culture but in in terms of an artistic sense I pretty much you know early on knew how the difference the different sort of genres of creativity are labeled and I made a personal decision to sort of ignore those you know just sort of my experiment you know it's kind of when you think of it in hindsight how ludicrous could it be that if you you know between the ages of like 19 to 20 something you decide to study one thing and for the rest of your life you're labeled as that one thing that you did for those three or four years and you know that could be you know you studied art are you legal or you know painting or something and I think that's such a obviously when you sort of dwell on it it's such that's how the world sort of works and it's also a metaphor for how humans categorize things that way they can understand them you know obviously there's topics of diversity includes sort of open-mindedness and all these things that are sort of pop-culture sort of nuances of today but it stems much deeper in the brain than that it's like how do I recognize this is a water bottle they all sort of need to look the same it looks different than pop and it looks different than wine but you can put wine in a water bottle what does that mean you know what does that do and all of a sudden there's intrigue and there's so all that to say in the creative discipline I decided that architecture was just a way of thinking it wasn't a practice that I was going to be labeled as the rest of my creative life that art fashion music you know it's all if you study a tear up from those practical matters it's literally creativity and then the the childhood childlike sense it's just matter of playing with mediums and materials to make an expression so my practice as you can see by the exhibit when you walk through it you know things start blurring the lines of you know Commerce and art or fashion or sculpture or painting in a way to put forth a proposition and not just sort of leave it up to this long-winded rationale that I'm giving you you know it has to manifest itself into a physicality and I need to leave the room and that that needs to sort of bits toast bestow itself on you you know and so that's sort of a window into how I think and how it manifests itself into you know objects like a shoe or a sculpture just as a follow-up on that and there's you know the sense that architects one hand want to reflect the world and on the other hand want to change the world do you think that's a fair assessment of how how that profession approaches and do you feel that there's truth in that yeah I think you know that's why in the sort of stratosphere of of human operation why art is important you know if all these create creative expressions are sort of linked to the idea of art or expressing oneself or sort of summarizing the collective emotion of humanity at the time and in making a you know a sculpture or a work of art that's why I put the role of an artist sort of above that of of like politics or sort of even civic duties you know I think that you know with it when it comes to creativity that is the sort of bridge that can connect people and open people's minds so to me there's a vitality in these things called creativity fantastic one of the things is you've noted one things it's remarkable not only about your body of work that how the exhibition and how its structured is seeing this scope of your work and we have these images on the screen behind us going through the installation of the exhibition so when you go through gallery by gallery and you see different moments around fashion painting sculpture furnishing performance jewelry etc and you've worked with so many artists and music and visual artists as well Jenny Holzer Murakami Arthur J feh what have really been the catalysts for you exploring just your curiosity and moving across different media and different approaches and particularly with some of these collaborations that can be seen in the exhibition yeah the overarching premise is and one of the most important works of art in the exhibit itself is ironically this slide that we're sitting on which is your elevator you know I didn't even make it and it's and it's one of the most important works and we can use this as a just an analogy of how I think you know you you hurt you as a community have this amazing sort of institution but also building you know it's a very important piece of architecture that your city has and you use that to sort of sort of catalog art of its time and my brain you know is immediately attracted to this idea of like catching the baton and so you have this building that has its history the of a museum that has a rich history on how it even came to be and I've sort of intervened with it by sort of analyzing it but catching the baton at a point what I my art practice starts in your building begins which is his premise of tourists and purest which it's probably the most presiding sort of compass within my work and it really speaks to like a modern-day segregation into you know like this past race this is past gender it's it's it exists in the art world as a means to sort of say thumbs up or thumbs down like this is good this is not this is art this is not this is fashion this is not and a purist state of mind I categorize as someone who has so much knowledge that they sort of propped the walls of art up you know really tall walls you belong here you don't you know that's why we that's why security exists sort of in museums to sort of make you feel like you can't touch this you know like this is worth so much or this is so important but at the end of the day it's you know it's a canvas with paint on it but that's I don't say that that's wrong but I'm what what the tourists and purist means isn't the compass within my work is it's not my opinion it's a social survey of why art is art why what makes a museum versus the gallery that's in the mall basically you know there's artwork there too but why is it held in different regard and so before I started making art before I started making my practice I realized that the purest mentality obviously is important it keeps things in a sacred space for future generations to understand it's the same way you know I studied you know have a graduate degree because you have to have knowledge of art history to sort of know what your stamp can be you have to know the nuances how we've gotten here but on the on the converse I categorize this term of like the tourists says tourists versus the purist and the tour and the tourist is exactly sort of what it means it's it's a generation of people that are eager to learn you know they're attracted it's like when you land in Paris you go to the Eiffel Tower because you want to see it you know when I land I go to my apartment you know I don't go because that's like oh I don't want to see the sort of the obvious thing of Paris but and I use it as an analogy for art it's like how many visitors come to the museum to see art they might not know that art history but it's valid and in what I what I analyzed before I started making my practice is that the tourists and the purest search you can just divide up the world in that sort of mentality and as it gets personal to my stories like I didn't feel like art world was for me you know I didn't see artists that looked like me I didn't see anyone that came from my let alone physical but like mental contemporary sense you know I listen to rap music I listen to I looked at hip-hop as my version of Paris you know I didn't know the designers when they started and what they represented and obviously I've made a lifetime investment into analyzing and coming up with the synthesis of tourists and purists but as it relates to my artwork it's you know my goal is to make the space where tourists and purists sort of cross paths and have to interact with each other and you know just in the 30 minutes that I was a spending time with locals here I heard a great story which is sort of checks my light list of of why this this exhibit is important is that I was told that you know you can see the little badger that people wear when they come to the museum and buy the museum sort of hosting an exhibit you can see the community around it sort of changed because whoever's attracted to the exhibit is sort of shapes the demographic of the people you see walking around the neighborhood and you know obviously even in an exhibit like this it's like the knee-jerk reaction is like is this art or where you know like let me see the Picasso level painting or something like that but obviously that's not the main you know my work isn't sort of as like knee-jerk reaction as that there's more layers to it and then the the ambition is to do exactly that make a place with my work to sort of have the tourists and the purist interact with each other that sits above diverse that sits above like a marketing ploy to like let's be inclusive let's do museum programs to invite the community in or it could be as blanket it's like let's sell more merch you know like the bookstore committee would love more money coming into it it's like why does why and obviously that's where I'm sure we'll discuss later like the idea of street wear and etc but ultimately the whole goal is to to make work that relates to the generation of people in public that are tourists that don't see themselves in institutions and that same rationale and sentence applies to my work at Louis Vuitton you know I'm the same way like I'm the kid that even to this day or when I was in my 20s like when I walked to the door the security guard goes like this like you know you can't really come in here they don't realize that I'm their boss but but but it also speaks to my mentality you know I think I'm very opinionated but I have a way of sort of expressing my opinion in a and I sort of a bigger picture larger goal like I'm not offended by the security guard who ironically were the same ethnicity but he thinks that I don't belong there but you know that's too low level to get distracted by the larger goal I think I think you know what's a more impressive image as me at the end of the runway for Louis Vuitton and that image coming to a young kid in Atlanta who wants to be a fashion designer that can tell his parents that he wants to go into fashion design instead of any other degree because he can use me as an example and so that's the that's the art practice fantastic so much music has certainly been an integral part of your life and work whether DJing and being the founder of being trill or creating designs for Donda working with Beyonce yeah pioneer on the transparent sound console scene in the exhibition and of course Atlanta is very much a music city beyond the presence of music in your life and within your shows are there similarities or particular parallels and the satisfaction you gain in shaping your both your playlists and your fashion I think more more of my what sort of triggers me is that in terms of black art you know like black production this the sort of door if you look at it like as the art world there's different doors into it you know their sculptures painting there's music there's dance there is you know fashion etc creativity as a whole what and this is like a generational thing in terms of like growing up especially in America and sort of being like I said of my descent and sort of saying I like creativity I like fashion I like art music is the only I say maybe music is this door that's that's easily accessible into the realm of like black production manifesting itself and sort of credited art in through history you can see how that that wasn't an easy in road to make you know if you look at the history of jazz or rock and roll you know those things and those artists pave their way for it to be sort of believable and you know being a kid from Chicago a city much like Atlanta with you know commenter Kanye West you know that creativity engine and working in music I saw as like a a sort of perfect starting place you know this is before fashion of today to to sort of think but it's all analogous you know it's all metaphor and so music you know why I was always attracted to DJing I think it's one of the best sort of metaphors in modern art to our time now is that a you know a black art form like hip hop is made from sampling you know Dilla or Kanye or the whole practice and you know as an art genre the idea is to take an old jazz record an old soul record chop it up and make it into something new you know that's a super profound modern art sort of concept you know to me it's on the level of Duchamp and a fountain or a urinal you know but it's ours you know it's but it's distinctly something that came in the 80s from black and Puerto Rican neighborhoods that turned hip-hop into an art form and then you know DJing specifically the idea of a mixer and two sources of music you know that that concept of blending two things together is you know monumentous it changes it's a it's a large concept that manifests and you know playing continuous music for literally to no end and basically what I've done in my practice and what exists in the exhibit is applying those concepts that came from black music production into realms that are far outside music and you know making a practice and making works that sort of extend from the concept that first opened my mind let me follow up on that with just referencing the exhibition catalog again and the interview within the catalog you mentioned you identify yourself as African rather than African American and I should mention to the audience that your parents came from Ghana to the US yes and you talked about how you quote needed to in a way learn to be subversive and to embed in your work the messages of what an African artist looks like or what a black artists look like and that this exhibition book ends a story of where you came from and how you got here you have this amazing success as a designer an artist on the international stage as that approach changed or is it become even more of a driving force for you I think it's even more of a driving force you know the whole idea is just tell stories and to open doors you know that's what motivates me is that you know it's like why dedicate yourself to in life as an artist or a creative the goal is to be remembered for the work but also to open up doors for others you know to hopefully change the landscape of art you know I will be like sternly disappointed if the the hive Museum doesn't sort of have an exhibit from an artist that pre the show they might not have understood how it can sort of fit into their overall programming but post this exhibit sort of understand that what they were looking for in terms of art or artists can can formerly be different and I don't mean that overnight I mean that through the through the hard work that I continue to do the hard work that my creative community continues to do I see that as important you know in the exhibit I have featured a few artists from my tribe if you will Tremaine Emery Cali do it and Brendan Fowler but you know there's there's many more than that and I think to to the credit of the museum is allowing me to show my work you know shows a generation of artists that their work also fits within the museum context as well which to me makes it an all fulfilling effort well we're always winners in the museum field if we're putting forward great expressions of creativity and helping you know amplify those voices exactly and into your question even the beginning of your question about African African American etc like even when I hear those turns just know I'm so open minded that as soon as I hear a box coming a red alarm goes off in my head you know I start just I start thinking how antiquated it is and it's not and I understand that you know we're still we're fighting to be like this is a water bottle not Coke or milk but it's like and that's natural human tendency so I'm not delusional either you know that's how the world works but you can once I explain it or you see the sort of rationale I sort of used perception and then counter that with a sort of an upward trajectory expression so if I'm in Chicago you know people think I'm an African Oh or if like like when I get to the plane or something and the stewardess is like thinks that I'm a basketball player because I'm as tall as I am it's like I'm not offended but I get that maybe that's the closest box that I could be put in so you know make a funny joke that you know I'm a fashion designer or something like that but it's which is a funny joke and then they laugh at that and so I'm kind of like ah this is so this is too funny but you know what I mean so does like an upward trajectory analysis where obviously you know essentially still a kid my parents are from Ghana in West Africa all I knew my parents speak African got in the house so I get and then of course I travel to Paris and it's like there's different sort of an acknowledgement of what race is and then I travel to London but in it's just making estimation about understanding how people work but countering that with something that is positive has been like if someone asked me like what how did I do it you know I get that question a lot like you know I have an idea I'm trying to get it together I'm trying to get traction on it I I've been able to go from making a screen printed t-shirt to designing for the the biggest luxury house that's ever existed it's that I've I've not sort of closed off an opportunity based on humans sort of need to put things in a box I've offered a different route to think about it by my practice by my demeanor by my my ideas and that makes a huge difference on your ability to move through the different gatekeepers doors so you've been punching a lot of holes and boxes yeah exactly following up on that and can you talk a little bit about the section in the exhibition black gaze which is speaking specifically to race and racism inclusion exclusion within the the exhibition did you yourself have a specific idea that you brought forward to to Chicago to the MCA and say you know I have a very clear idea yeah now this section could work and what works might be featured yeah because I don't focus and tight you know my practice isn't focused on the sort of specific conversation of race because I equally think it can be sort of anti progressive as it can be progressive if they purely dwelled upon but when crafting an exhibit that captures the last twenty years of my work it was you know I approached every curator with the same sort of demand is that I can understand why there's an attraction to show me and my work but there has to be an acknowledgement of the of the certain sort of like purist mentality that was a barrier to exist and you know quite frankly I just wanted I wanted to make a connection point with what was my biggest hurdle when I started you know when I was just like I said when I began was I was seventeen I did not see anyone in the art world that looked like me or I related to and I wanted to in the exhibit sort of like almost in an architectural sense like soullow that sentiment so that a young generate a seventeen-year-old that looks like me now can go into the exhibit it's called the black gaze and say here within that space I see work that relates to his race but also how he's used it as a tool to sort of offer up a sort of creative expression so whether it's this painting of the cotton logo that I did or whether it's you know it's like crazy locally relevant sort of works that's in the video room and a photo graph of the first one of the first like off-white editorials it's playboy cardi first trip to Paris we had gotten him a passport for him to leave Atlanta and be the you know obviously he's like he's in my mind it's like Miles Davis of our time incredibly important but through the practice of off-white a young Atlanta artist who I think is Miles Davis living is in Paris seeing this whole other side of the world on in that image is captured just that was just me on my path trying to sort of make off-white represent my ideals but there's a community that comes with it ian connor as well is in an exhibit in the Museum of the High Museum of Atlanta that's that to a small community is a very big deal and that sort of shows like this sort of Trojan horse mentality that has like existed in my work since before and I also acknowledge within like the community of black artists you know there's a responsibility to sort of raising these issues so that they they they're prevalent at some level but for me it's not the sort of presiding voice but it is sort of the main foundation so the black gaze is that room where all the works are sort of soloed out in that room as well as the the neon sign is that you're obviously in the wrong place that you know that's a set design from my very very first paris fashion show and you know I took this I took the chatter that was existing within the fashion industry instead of letting them whisper it I just put it in neon light so they could read it when they walked in and you know it's like that to me is my my sort of like it's like a small example of how I'm taking that purest or like what could have been a stumbling block and using it to sort of frame an expression and you know one of the things that I use often in my work is language you know whether it's diagonal lines on a street you know that's that's a form of a language that's universal or literally using text in the QWERTY keyboard to use quotes you know it's framing up a language and/or what communication system that I can express my ideas you recently mentioned in an interview the 2009 Tommy Tom Fashion Week photograph that included you now quote predicated the idea of democratization of fashion in quote yet is you've also discussed there was the need to make even your earliest work fit within the idea or the price of luxury goods this last year you collaborated with IKEA on the line of furnishings that are much more accessible by comparison is the idea at least of fashion like IKEA design becoming more democratic why did you decide to take on the design project for IKEA one of the largest motivation well you know since my background was in architecture and obviously there's this like turbulence in the this buzzword of street wear and how it applies to fashion is that I didn't I wanted to showcase to the sort of global community of brands and people in general that design is design you know and that means that labeling my designs are Street we're not the same designs as a fashion designer comes from a different descent is already that red alarm going off again is like putting things in a box because it easier to understand so at that level I wanted to showcase that design of a young generations mine doesn't have to just be in the closet you know I was noticing on Instagram that everyone's so proud to show like a photo of their outfit but not proud to show a photo their living room it means that there's like a there's a distinct separation of proudness you know like legitimately you know I believe that if you figure out how to make a beautiful chair a beautiful coffee table it can be just as cool as a pair of sneakers or a pair of thank you fashion you know and I you know I and these are things you know like it's that tourists and purest thing you know when I go to a purist home like the the couch might be the coolest thing in their apartment not just their you know comme des Garcons sneakers or something like that and you know I'm fortunate that's where it becomes I become super like what would have been seen as like a negative or stumbling stumbling block gives me my competitive advantage you know we're all essentially from the Midwest you know I'm from the Midwest literally but you know the south of America which II you could all be we could all be put in a box but what makes us different is what makes us unique you know our you know I was able to make it from having these nuanced experiences and having that inform inform my design on a global scale because mind you the the global scale yet doesn't know what per se Atlanta style is you know and in being a young designer a young artist you could look at that it's like oh I need to go to Paris I need to go to school at this certain place to sort of get that like special piece of paper or or accomplishment and I I would counter that with saying that what makes you hyper local to your understanding and community is what will make you distinct as the scale gets bigger and so the IKEA project was you know I designed a chair that was the chair that my African parents moved to the Chicago suburbs and they thought of as design you know I quite distinctly just put that object in the context of my modern work and it has a personal story but also it has its own sort of identity and it's it's not just pigeonhole to a t-shirt and a hat a pair of sneakers well throughout the exhibition as you had just mentioned you can certainly see the various nods to figures in the history of Arden design whether Duchamp is you have mentioned Caravaggio others and you've spoken about the inescapable presence of words and images in contemporary culture and branding so do you agree with I think you were called this in an article an interview in The Guardian last year was being called the Andy Warhol overtimes and do you see the adoption and adaptation of these images in your work as being in the same vein yeah I think and that's where it gets to like an understand there he goes again the little red alarm for being put but it's like you know the writer in the just another one came out last week that was like or just a couple days ago said Virgil is the karl lagerfeld of millennial which i could do a whole two hours on that like we know what our next talk is going to be exactly but it's fine you know that's again like that's what off-white sort of means by the way it's like it's it's like it's not black or white it's a off-white too as well as like it's a construct for sort of the biggest box that you could put your own ideals in is choosing right like making a decision to go left or right I know it's like a brain freeze but you could go left and right you know that's my that's why I call the brand off-white that's what the logics it's my internal measuring a compass to never decide and I know it hurts your brain and it does mine too but it's like I equally can take the compliment and then I can equally see the back handedness of it and it doesn't deter me from the trajectory because the the whole goal in the beginning was to how do I make you know it's like I grow up I'll uh you know like imagine a kid who grows up looking at listening Outkast video Andre 3000 dressing in snowboard boots and like you know felt like he's breaking every Convention known to hip-hop at the time so that's like in my brain as like look at this artistry or Kanye West or jay-z you know like those were the artists that I was speak spoke to me and I was like I see artistry you know like Pharrell with a like and ends actually it sort of my t-shirt but Pharrell with an Enzo Ferrari wearing like a gold iPhone that looks like Richie Rich or something like that out these are like that's my Warhol in real time and we're speaking in dialect so when I see when you go into Andy Warhol's catalog and you see his his logic of Fame and how it was affecting pop culture how he was taking images or ready-made objects like a brillo box and putting it in a new format or taking an image of Madonna and you know in the purest form that is trading on the secondary market or at auctions as art art but how come you know jay-z's album isn't sort of revered as the same as you know an artwork in a different format so you can quite essentially see you know Chief Keef in a sort of in the lineage of David Hammons sort of reworking of the American flag on my supreme t-shirt that doesn't exist in a commerce place but only exists in the museum's as me bringing those worlds together and in in long and short you're the comment of like of me and Warhol I quite frankly look at art history as something to stand on and build like I don't have enough time in my lifetime to spend trying to trick you to invent something you know that that's a purist sort of nomenclature to sort of keep a sort of artist looking like the generations of art before it but a little more that's it I'm going off on a tangent I'll stay on course it's good good change it yeah I have to have to throw out another comment that you said recently getting to an area which you've been influenced by and you have certainly shaped the idea of globally and that is streetwear and the quote of course is that from you is in my mind you said Street where's going to die and how many more t-shirts can we own how many more hoodies how many sneakers so my question is what takes its place what takes you know that's you know that's for the the artists in this room to to catch that baton you know like that's it's very much you know because I've learned from the past I learned you know those years that I was like wandering around Chicago saying like how do i I'm going into these fashion stores I want to make that stuff too I'm going into these museums like I want to I want to make something I'm not just gonna observe like who from my generation is gonna participate and of course I think you know one of the tropes of like behaving like an like an artist is is obviously keeping a distance from the community like that propping up the myth that I'm that we're not on the same level is like sort of the first trick to making yourself seem esteemed and like I consciously dispel that myth you know that's that though that it took me so many years to sort of get through just that nuance to be able to make work and I think it's a disservice to the future art generations to not have an understanding about how these worlds exists you know that tourists and purest thing was at least 10 years of thinking and meeting with people and trying to get my work seen in a different light so that you know is like an overriding sort of premise but what was the question I'll answer it what tears play oh yeah so I said the street where thing is like I don't at first I didn't want people to get it confused like I'm content or happy with being hey I have off-white it's a brand that's seemingly doing successful like I'm not that guy you know I'm not just like I'm not content with it seemingly being successful I want the whole genre of street where to live and exist and be considered a as credible as every other format of design and be you know sort of be a thought leader not just like a trend of the moment and and quite classically you know I was super shocked at how far that comment kind of virally went is that me it's like a leader of Street where it says it's gonna die frankly because you know nothing in terms of like and I consider an art movement there's not like one art movement that exists for forever you know it's like disco like during disco of course it was jazzy it felt like felt like the coolest expression of the modern that that time period it dies you know about rock and roll so it shows more that it's sort of it can be in a place now where that what that tells me is that it's like getting high off its own supply of a feeling like Street where should last forever like that to me is more it should always evolve like everything should evolve you know before I started practicing the vein of street wear that I did street wear had died three times before that which also told me that most people who are using the term now don't didn't understand that there was a history before now you know there was a movement in New York and the Lower East Side that birth supreme you know as brands like a life nom de guerre prohibit anything you know those were in the 2000s they boomed and then they all went out of business and then at the same time there was a boom in Los Angeles which is now still Fairfax but there was a number of brands that existed so there's like a there's it all together to say that I I want streetwear to be considered like an art movement I want it to be considered not just related to clothing or sneakers it's a way of making you know it's like a production method it's a logic that relates to contemporary culture it will die you know there's nothing that lasts forever so it shouldn't be seen as such and like I said when I started it's it's up to it's sort of a it's up to a younger generation to kick me off the seat and then be doing this lecture based on you know ideas of I that I can't think up that the next generation will think of well not not kicking you off the stage too soon hopefully I'll be here for a second okay server ting expectations so now that you were looking ahead to what comes next what expectations do you have for yourself and your work ahead the next phase is doing things such as this you know like there's a tremendous amount of like putting my head down and working and not explaining the work that has gotten me to this point but now now it's a little bit you know and I always use the analogy that my practice is pretty much like a Trojan horse type you know I knew that from the day one is that you know that sort of metaphor of building a practice to sort of like evade the gatekeeper mentality to ultimately show how the practice is a positive effort to diversify the sort of holy pillars that exist within fashion music or art you know and right now I would say that as culture moves you know fashion is very different than when I started you know especially even coming from Paris the idea of Fashion Week itself as has transcended you know a friend of mine said at the last Lou a lot you know it's like any sort of like independent mentality or underground sort of thought as like it's us versus then like I need to sort of you know prove that this sort of radical thought is the the new direction forward and in a friend of mine on the way to the Louis Vuitton show said he's like you realize that you're the establishment now I was like damn like that screws up every you know it screws up the whole fight or whatever but it's and of course that not that's only the surface level like I'm I'm I'm happy when the whole scene of all's and it's a different place you know I'm happy when I see like all of us in this room now what's the the the biggest weather there's two malls here that I sort of very well known what are they called Letty exactly Phipps Linux so that is so prevalent in Atlanta rap music how could I forget super big contribution to the world at large but we all know that all of us that are shoppers know when you get used memory you go into like said luxury brand and they wouldn't have like the logo t-shirt right or the one that was in the video and now that we go to said low luxury brand that's what you that's all you see you know season after season and you know that's a that's a distinct contribution of Atlanta to Paris luxury fashion so that's just one indication of how what was it the underground it's not just me that's now the establishment it's it's our culture has obviously reinvigorated sort of purist sort of things like in fashion so when you ask like what's my goal forward is to continue showcasing how contemporary culture is changing art you know and making objects of art making new works making new exhibitions that sort of put on the recording system of the art world that us as a young generation existed and we were doing valid work so that's why I said the comment about Street we're dying it was merely a prompt you know prompt to all those brands on your Instagram feed to to sort of analyze am i Street where is it is it just as simple as putting the logo of my brand on a t-shirt like is that gonna cut it after we've seen that a million times or is there a way to add more intellect to that narrative I have a friend if you look up the work at romaine Emery his his work is featured in my show he had just done he like he could quote him quote be labeled a street where artists and but I think that that's putting him in that red alarm thing again a box where his collection that he'd just done with Levi's he he made that same cotton wreath that you see in his artwork exist as a print on the pants and you know if it was just saying his name on a t-shirt that to me is just like what they call street wear you know it's like it should sell it has a name on it like that's enough no more design and instead I urge everyone to sort of Google it's denim tears Levi's and he launched his project with a video where he came to Atlanta Georgia and filmed his grandmother who was to pick cotton as like a main sort of in her family history talking about the idea of what that meant to be a black woman and her relatives and family picking cotton and how that relates and there we and that's when I say Street will die and it will sort of rebirth itself into more thoughtful practice like how beautiful in contemporary you have a brand that simply wants a collaboration with whatever new and cool and then you have Jermaine as an artist who can design clothing that has story literal stories of generations to tell in a garment made of cotton with Levi's and you know just simply that video in the way he released his project and also having work at the High Museum in Atlanta Georgia where his mom his grandmother still living his mother had passed away he's able to and his dad is also like an Emmy award-winning CBS correspondent in this one product launch of quote-unquote streetwear oh he has the jacket on stand up and just show people so I'm not like making this up yeah so this is the Levi's denim tears and it's a very like specific I know I'm probably going over some people's heads but it's it's a very important thing that you know this is another young black artist not a fashion designer not sort of fitting into any box that's telling compelling stories of family history in clothing and that to me is what I think the future is if the whole genre Street where is prompt to think a little bit deeper and to tell sort of more intellectual stories than just blinking garments with names on them thank you so much right I'm going I'm going to wrap up my questions here because I know we're running very close on time we have a couple of questions that we'd like to take from the audience but I will ask you to if you could continue on that that theme a little bit further because I know one of the questions that we received from so so many of you out there some form of is there something further you would like to say in terms of your hopes for budding designers out there those successors and I'm also going to add one other question on that do you have a muse that's a good both good premises I think and that's the beauty of coming and sitting in a room with you all is that you know this is very different than every room in the whole entire earth right and it leans a little bit about I was saying about you know being proud of where you're from and the history of where you're from it's exactly what the world stage needs exactly now you know we have we have different cities that are always the note of mode of communication and being in the city like Atlanta with a rich history with a certain panache for the way it thinks and does and operates that's what the world is calling for when it says things like diversity or sort of you know new ideas and new perspectives so Menino my sort of message of advice to a young generation or or anyone to sort of asking me is like how can I sort of further my practice you know first and foremost it's just doing it instead of talking about it I find nine times out of ten that there's this hesitancy to sort of make the ideas 3d and real and it seems like an oversight but that is extremely important you know and then making sure that it it has a reason for existing is the sort of more important aspect like it's simply like if someone comes to me and is like hey I want to do design I want to do what you do my question in response is always why you know even if there's like a lag of having an answer that means that a it's the focus isn't sort of expressing an idea it's more just doing what they feel is as a measure of success and just like the narrative and my friend and the the jacket and the story is that he's telling a story and it manifests itself in an object and the story has to be the captivating part and once you have the story down it's it's a lot easier to for that object to communicate to people when it's out in the real world so that was the first part of the question what was the there was a the muse of the muses were so many people you know from my you know I did a little like meet and greet for 30 minutes and I have I got like 30 ideas just from meeting local Pinot I already told one story about the stickers in the neighborhood but the other story I told is I took a photo of an awesome woman's jacket she was wearing off-white she's probably sitting somewhere around here and I my Instagram I put museum board directors clothes or something like that but you know I'm use reality that's why that's the one part of street wear that I embrace is that my ideas come from real people they come from you know like me and like I was shopping at a mall to learn fashion like my fashion school was literally going into Marc Jacobs like I learned so much by seeing those fabrics and seeing those designs and real and that gave me the perspective of what I use every day in my studio to create so I love local stories I love meeting real people I get inspired by the most sort of mundane things so you know I probably have too many muses you can never be too many can there yeah I don't think so well I hear we have a few questions from from the audience this one is from Sam other than fashion music and interior design are there any other avenues in which you'd like to make a creative approach right now I'm into ceramics a lot I have a I like the materiality you know I you know I'm extremely domestic as I was like counter to a lot of things that I make you know I don't know I like I obviously I think pretty like limitlessly and that gives me sort of freedom and makes me sort of super sort of inspired you know I as you can imagine I wake up every day and just see any opportunity to create it doesn't matter the medium just try to tell stories you know that's to me is more more interesting now especially especially since I said Street where it's gonna die I need to figure out a new job you're gonna have to come up with something out to a new career we have a question from Lila if you could go back as a time travel question if you could go back to your 20 year old self what advice would you give knowing everything you know now that's a funny question because I would I wouldn't change a thing I'm pretty I like the I like you know I don't promote also like skipping any steps you know I pretty I love the struggle you know you have to have a sort of like alia literally like a love affair you have to like love the pain of not having everything so easy and I think that's a valuable lesson to a young generation like of course I'm speaking from the perspective of like the tourist trying to encourage more kids to sort of break through the gatekeepers door like while it's still cracked open but I'm equally just in that same way I'm not decisive and going left or right you could go both it's super important the purest nature of making sure that the art world or design world is is respected that it's valid that the inroads are upheld I know I think I'm not the type of person to sort of wish things were a different way like you know I understand why there needs to be Democrats and Republicans and I don't think that there should just be one of the other that the balance the natural balance that happens between put two sort of polar opposites gives us the world that we have today which is a democracy and I think in this is getting above like notions of art or good or bad or cool or not it's like how how do we as humans organize the reality of the world and the fact that we're a community by default like we need to learn to live together we need to learn to be positive I think one thing that might have been missed in my sort of renting my sort of rambling this whole times I'm a perpetual optimist like no matter what I think the world will be fine and to be a better place with us on it that is the only way that you know that's that's something you have to decide on I think as a as a personal person and as a community in itself and every action hopefully follows that guiding light and so now that you know that about me and my practice you can understand sort of the works in it it's like the idea is to open the doors for other artists who may not have seen themselves in museums pre the show post this show can literally go to the hardware store they can go to the fabric store they can go to their local screen printer and they can site via that book that's that I've published that this is from 2020 on and inroads to go to a museum curator after you've made a bunch of your t-shirts after he's made your mixtape after you DJ 2 million parties or after you've made you know a dress for Beyonce or something you know like that that that quantifies as an artwork a and it's if there's a story being told that's a valid story that it quantifies itself with being in the High Museum we have a question from Macomb be with your various collaborations how do you translate your unique design language to those different brands and stay true to yourself while being consistent for me it's about it's a tough one but the like for me cohesiveness is key cohesiveness and abstraction you know I find that great art has like a level of abstraction that sort of allows it to sort of be ubiquitous I would say so when I work in different mediums and obviously the challenge of doing this show is that you know I could have easily done sort of like a past look at the work I've been making for 20 years and it'd been spread out in all these different directions not making any sort of cohesive sense but it's like I have my my my history and the stories I'm trying to tell then I also have like a very distinct toolkit of ways of thinking but also signifiers that I exist that's the quotes or that's the diagonal lines or that's using industrial sort of nomenclature to sort of mark things that exist there's also the impact of Duchamp sort of claiming a regular object as an art piece you know and like I said before those are certain canons that exist within art that not only served his practice but serve the sort of foundation to put other practices on top of so I have my five or six sort of rationales and then I can make you know I can make a duffel bag for Louie and reference to chains but I can also make two chains album cover which is the one that just had literally two chains on it you know or I could make an Ikea rug that says keep off those in in all those random sort of operations of output it's like I'm saying I'm saying the same type of like knee-jerk joke if you will or I'm saying I'm using the same type of language to communicate those ideas across variants of a varied array of of outputs okay we have time for maybe just two more quick ones I think and we'll this one's from Dakota what do you feel is your role / responsibility as an african-american man in the fashion industry I'll answer them fast cuz I want to do some real q and A's you know like put the mic out there and get some real questions I think my role is to answer it super fast just to be a role model and to show that you know a race doesn't matter but be open up doors so that if a young african-american applies to Louis Vuitton after me that they take the time to sort of review that candidate because they know that my practice you know worked out to a positive effect we have a question from katana what is your ultimate goal as a creator just to dispel - I think my ultimate goal is to open doors you know I think I've said it a couple times that's that's what makes me sleep at night you know is that through you know there was moments when I thought what I was doing was impossible like there was moments that I was like you could imagine me sitting around my living room when I was like I want to design for Louis Vuitton how am I gonna figure this out seemed like it wasn't I want to design for a fashion house I don't want to be an independent you know and I I firmly believe that it wouldn't happen but obviously and I'm an OP nut I'm an optimist and I don't give up at that so I made the space for that to exist so that's the that's the mode going forward well Virgil I'd really like to thank you for sitting down with us today having this conversations been really fantastic having you here and visiting the High Museum visiting Atlanta certainly we all wish you great success going forward we know that you're gonna continue doing great things I'm gonna be looking for those ceramics we're working on the next stage as well but do you have any closing comments or thoughts you like to offer us closing comments are the questions I think I'm breaking a rule either you have to do on a microphone you can we take one of these yeah and we're gonna we're gonna or we got it see there we in real time you know breaking rules we're gonna be here for the next six hours what time is somebody what time to have to go to the airport I'll stay here till then what I will my flights it'll stay here take a photo for the gram it's lit there we go I see you how many of you are listening to that new young nudie album or wait we're gonna do that again I should have recorded it so by a show of hands how many people are waiting for a whole lot of red the party's album okay okay cool cool how many of you downloaded the new young nudie album okay cool now we can get to it all right my name is McCune B I go to SCAD Atlanta I just wanted some yeah so I just want to make a quick note of this we had met like three years ago in London when you had the initiation we got that t-shirt the photo yeah my memory sharp yeah and so funny that I had spoken to you about coming to Atlanta before you had even planned the High Museum and funny enough you you had it here yes well yeah so my question is what's been your most challenging collaboration or work and how did you like tackle it like was the most challenging again it's like I don't look at the challenge as long as I know that like there's a way for it to come out I don't look at the challenges as like a super negative thing you know IKEA was of like a tough one you know it takes when you see furniture is something that's mass-produced at that scale that's not fashion you it takes you know that took three years of work and it took you know a year of thinking of what seems like you know very minimal ideas that take an incredible amount of time to come to fruition also like collaboration is you know can be as difficult like Thanksgiving dinner with your family you know how it's people coming together that have different ideas and someone talks about politics and it's like everything goes up the window that's like collaboration is a meta it's in a similar way can be that like a lot of brands can be like hey we want to do something and then I'm like hey let's take your logo off the thing and then that turns into like a stalemate of ideas or but you know I don't I like the I like the challenge of trying to do something you know because obviously my work is super collaboration super prevalent in the work and I like the challenge of it next question we have over here hello my name is Luka I have a quick question a FET to rename off-white whoa do you rename it that's a good question super good it took me forever to come up with that let me see if I would rename it it would be oh it's easy it would be gray thank you I like that speed design that's literally how fast like that's how I do it all has to be conversational next yeah I can hear you I am gonna be the next generation of Donda these people sitting right here fire and so I believe you're just talking about that like real people how you mentioned that everybody just looking around here it's a mood board full of references images like so much history and telling stories for you and all the other people that have made such an impact moving forward with the next generation handing that baton over what are some things just I'm imagining a mood board like what are some things you would just rip off in hand to the next generation to put on their mood board what I one thing I had a meeting yesterday about because I'm working on off-white cosmetics that's my next like wave give give you early ideas that haven't hit hypebeast yet and in that meeting my team was like what makes what would be different you know my team has like 30 years of experience and they they said obviously there's a million brands like they're almost an idiot for wanting to do cosmetics now you know the Sephora shells are full like you know just cuz you could sell sneakers doesn't mean that you could sell whatever and I said they said what would make starting a cosmetics brand different distinctly by today then that you know 50 60 years ahead of it and then that opened my mind crazy because that's my sort of window and advice to you is in technology or anything there's no greater gift than being young and having lesyk you know most people think you need experience you want to sort of to grow up but there's the biggest gift that you have is distinctly today and all your sort of bright ideas and sort of not sort of like whittling yourself down and to sort of having experience and I think my question would be back at you is like what is the interconnectedness amongst you and your friends that you guys feel on a regular day about the existing world and how can you formulate that into your project to the point that the presiding generation doesn't even realize how off-base it could be you know coronavirus like or you know I'll wrap it up but just think about it since since about holiday time into now I just have the epiphany that the world is sort of now sort of Moo it's recently been moving at the pace that Instagram Scrolls right that's how fast culture moves that's like the speed that's the speedometer and what we're at is like this waves of doom right so it's like around Christmas times like Australia's burning then we get out of that then it was what was in the next one exact oh yeah I ran remember that then it's impeachment then it's corona and then it was you know but and then it's of course before that it was plastic straws and I'm not saying like they were bad I'm just thinking like this is how the world like the world is figuring out its new pace and what I was saying is a young generation those are all or brexit those are all key points for you guys to sort of synthesize and how you want the adults to behave how you want these brands that you follow how you want your technology to support the algorithm of Instagram or support support this new utopia that you can create for yourselves and that will be the next Ober that will be the next snapchat that's the next post you know I'm just thinking ideas for youth to get rich in tech but you know like I super urge that sort of like analyze the existing world say what you want to change about it make a project that addresses exactly that and I guarantee it will get the attention of the outside well don't make a brand or something for something small-minded make it for a big lofty goal next one hi I'm Livie um I was gonna ask his like when you were talking about like not skipping out on those steps there's like a young inspiring artist like what steps do you say not to miss and like yeah I think one thing that it like finding a mentor that's tough on you you know that's enhancing that the pain you know because I don't believe in skipping steps and I've you know like if you want to be in museums you should be finding someone who works here and like begging to be their mentor you know if the idea is to work hard do the 10,000 hours and I think people think working hard is like thinking hard you know I mean like actually working hard you know like in like you can imagine what my output is how much how much how many hours I spend you know when I got here who's Erin she around was like oh she's ran away but she was like how can you have a conversation and be on your phone at the same time and it's like you know that's what got me here is literally doing two things at the same time and I get that the whole world shouldn't do that like work at the pace but find something that you're diehard and passionate about not something that you do 9:00 to 5:00 and then you're like oh I'm tired I'm gonna go get dinner with my friends you know like that's more important it's like anyone's name that you can reference Warhol Lagerfeld Marc Jacobs Steve Jobs the reason why those one-word names reference a whole body of work is that they tirelessly like put their whole dedicated their life to that Duchamp you know like these are these are people that have you don't have to do that that's just the path that I'm on and we have time for one final question here hey there I am crystal and you have to forgive me I think that I'm in a room full of people who probably know your history I am here my son Chris but you talked a lot about wanting to open doors for people can you tell us or me who opened that first door for you how did you get in and I'm not talking about after you had worked for Kanye and done that but what gave you the first opportunity before that step that's a good question it was such a good question like I have to think you know it first starts with my parents right I think and I'll get to I'll start thinking about as I move from that point my parents are you know imagine being an immigrant from Ghana and West Africa in like the 70s to Chicago and working a factory job you know leaving a third-world country is like you know that I've visited a number of times you know it's like the you know here you have like a like a sewer system that are pipes that are under the ground so that you can just sort of live your life without knowing what's happening with this sort of civic infrastructure and when I was a kid going to Ghana in West Africa like the sewage pipe is above the ground then it's open on the top you know the roads are dirt they're not like even paved and it's not bad or anything but that was the circumstance I was very cognizant that just by my dad and my mother ambition to make it to America I would have been a teenager living in that same scenario probably as happy as I am now but with a complete different set of opportunities at Hamm and so if I just stopped at that it just says you know a being a good parent to kids and fostering a community that you know that's that's the first gate that opens before you even realize that we're all on a path that's you know being great to your community but as more to your question probably how I got on the path of like design and you know I very much have the same sort of mentality as like I would work any opportunity I could get so the trick to your question is there's not a specific gatekeeper or there's a specific path it's doing the work when no one's watching right it's it's it's talking to any it's like talking to it's like a good reputation will like precede itself like if if there's somewhere you want to work if there's somebody you want to work with like helping the assistant to the assistant to the assistant is the express way to making that opportunity happened but most people they they're like I want to just get to the top I want to work for the person that I know you know it's like you might have to work for three you say you wanted to work at the museum say you wanted to become the the chief curator at the High Museum it's it's literally not trying to find the phone number for the person who is that in the position today and saying I want to be their assistant it's saying I'm gonna rent a warehouse and do a show an exhibit that changes the landscape of Atlanta artists to the point where that curator is going to find out that something is happening locally and they want to find out who did it and how they can be a part of it and then two seconds later they will be coming to you instead of being like oh I can't get my ideas you know that's sort of how that it's not a piece of advice that I can give you more than the mentality that I approach my practice that I think is more valuable well I'd like to thank all of you for joining us today and I'd like to remind everyone that the exhibition is open until 6 p.m. please go over there enjoy it you have one more week of this wonderful exhibition being here in Atlanta and most of all I'd like to thank Virgil thank you appreciate it

Channel: High Museum of Art

Views: 361,848

Keywords: virgil abloh, high museum of art atlanta, High Museum, High Museum of Art, figures of speech, virgil abloh interview, virgil abloh figures of speech, virgil abloh figures of speech atlanta, virgil abloh figures of speech special edition, Abloh, off-white, Fashion, High Fashion, High Museum Lectures, Fashion Art, virgil abloh louis vuitton, virgil abloh kanye west, Virgil Abloh Atlanta, virgil abloh off white, virgil abloh art, virgil abloh advice, Virgil Abloh art Museum, RIP

Id: lQdkxyXPPMc

Length: 82min 56sec (4976 seconds)

Published: Mon Mar 23 2020