ApeSh*t Proves Beyoncé and Jay Z Troll on a Different Level

This weekend, The Carters dropped their long promised collaborative album, Everything is Love. They announced this drop with the visuals for their song, Apes**t, seen above.

The couple literally shut down the Louvre, populated it with dancers of color and filled its halls with trap beats. The visual feast that is this video is a very black triumph in a traditionally white space.

I live.

I am not the only one who thinks so. Rolling Stone also points out these elements:

"Some of their mission involves the strategic highlighting of non-white images already in the Louvre. Beyoncé and Jay-Z rap in front of an Egyptian sphinx, and in galleries filled mostly with neo-classical French paintings – white artists, white subjects – the camera singles out black faces...Beyoncé and Jay-Z set about interjecting blackness into a space that has never placed much value on it, claiming one of the centerpieces of European culture with gleeful defiance."

There is also lyrical defiance during the song. The fact that there has been a lot of press surround Rosanne recently calling Valerie Jarrett an ape (which led to her show that I have affectionately been calling "Klan-nish" being cancelled) and the Carters releasing a song only weeks later called "Apeshit" where they fill the whitest of spaces with Blackness isn't lost on me. Jay Z raps "I said no to the Superbowl: you need me, I don't need you. Every night we in the endzone, tell the NFL we in stadiums too."at the same time the camera pans to a line of young black men taking a knee, alluding to the peaceful protests made popular by Colin Kaepernick and other brave players.

Let it be known that The Carters are not here for the crazy and troll on a completely different level.

One Twitter user broke the video completely down by significance to the art pieces featured:

Y’all this #Apeshit video has me losing my shit. This moment right here is the fulfillment of my art history degree. Beyoncé’s vision and talent is unmatched. Stay tuned for some thoughts. #Beyoncé #EverythingIsLove pic.twitter.com/IMrVlyl6wf

— Queen Curly Fry (@itsmeheidi_h) June 17, 2018

1) The visual and lyrical message of #Apeshit is that Beyoncé and Jay-Z have MADE IT. They own the motherfucking Louvre which has been and still is a white-centric space with a history deeply rooted in colonialism. Thus, centering black bodies in this space is radical. pic.twitter.com/lLafST2Urd

— Queen Curly Fry (@itsmeheidi_h) June 17, 2018

2) The first shot of the duo is in front of the Mona Lisa, the most recognizable portrait in the museum. People from around then world flock to the Mona Lisa to take their picture with her (i.e. next image). Beyoncé (and Jay-Z I guess) is visually asserting herself as Mona Lisa. pic.twitter.com/smpysAEDyy

— Queen Curly Fry (@itsmeheidi_h) June 17, 2018

4) Winged Victory (Nike) of Samothrace, an Ancient Greek statue of the goddess of Victory. Beyoncé’s costuming mimics the folds of the statues drapery and positions her as Victory. She is clothed in white, imitating the statue’s current bleached state. pic.twitter.com/7tvexxCBbf

— Queen Curly Fry (@itsmeheidi_h) June 17, 2018

5) Here, Beyoncé once again models herself as a Greek statue, this time the Venus de Milo. However, in this shot she wears a nude bodysuit with wrapped hair, reframing both goddesses of beauty and victory as a black woman. This dismantles white-centric ideals of beauty. pic.twitter.com/W8vRT9hoNo

— Queen Curly Fry (@itsmeheidi_h) June 17, 2018

6) Most of the art featured in this video is from the Neoclassical period, meaning the Napoleonic era. Reminder, Napoleon was the worst and went around colonizing much of Egypt, Syria, etc. This painting is The Coronation of Napoleon by Jacques Louis David. pic.twitter.com/tagQgqouz0

— Queen Curly Fry (@itsmeheidi_h) June 17, 2018

10) This can be extrapolated as an allusion to historical white violence against black bodies, specifically sexual violence against black female bodies which are centered in #Apeshit as beautiful and powerful. pic.twitter.com/9GLNzmHifN

— Queen Curly Fry (@itsmeheidi_h) June 17, 2018

11) Next we see a celebration of black love in addition to black beauty. Subtext of this image is death (stab wound on chest), specifically the endemic murder of black men due to police brutality and the consistent devaluation of black lives. pic.twitter.com/d8vbMdpKrq

— Queen Curly Fry (@itsmeheidi_h) June 17, 2018

11) Next we see a celebration of black love in addition to black beauty. Subtext of this image is death (stab wound on chest), specifically the endemic murder of black men due to police brutality and the consistent devaluation of black lives. pic.twitter.com/d8vbMdpKrq

— Queen Curly Fry (@itsmeheidi_h) June 17, 2018

12) This is a portrait of Juliette Récamier by David. She hosted one of the most popular salons in the city and was a brilliant intellectual. However, the styling of these two women is much more similar to Marie-Guillemine Benoist’s Portrait of a Black Woman. pic.twitter.com/89VRMsGxiS

— Queen Curly Fry (@itsmeheidi_h) June 17, 2018

13) Benoist’s Portrait of a Black Woman is one of the only portraits of black women in the history of Western art until the 20th century or so. It was completed by a female artist, possibly in support of the abolition movement. Now we have a female creator + black independence. pic.twitter.com/QB9c09y2W2

— Queen Curly Fry (@itsmeheidi_h) June 17, 2018

14) This is The Raft of the Medusa by Gericault which was a political painting that criticized the incompetence of the Bourbon Monarchy (allusion to Trump?) but also features a black man at the apex of the image as the bearer of hope for those trapped on the raft. pic.twitter.com/cFkjzAMf86

— Queen Curly Fry (@itsmeheidi_h) June 17, 2018

15) It is also thought that this image is critical of slavery. Jay-Z is obviously juxtaposing himself with the man in Gericault’s painting in addition to other clearly problematic portrayals of black men from the nineteenth century which depict them as exotic or animalistic. pic.twitter.com/xsdaduibcB

— Queen Curly Fry (@itsmeheidi_h) June 17, 2018

18) Essentially, #Apeshit is not only a brilliant celebration of Beyoncé and Jay-Z’s success but a self-aware acknowledgment of their success in the face of historical/current oppression as well as an expression of gratitude to their predecessors who are too often forgotten. pic.twitter.com/fUDae55N5w

— Queen Curly Fry (@itsmeheidi_h) June 17, 2018

Or as another Twitter user so eloquently points out.

This bitch took over the Louvre, filled it with trap beats and beautiful black bodies and then released it on her OWN streaming platform on Juneteenth. Beyoncè trolls on a different level. Your Calabasas shoe merchant could never.

— Camilla Blackett (@camillard) June 17, 2018

What do you think about the new Carters video? Drop a comment below!