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THE

POPULAR
RELIGION

LUCAS ARIEVILLO
LUCAS ARIEVILLO
LUCAS ARIEVILLO

“When someone comes up and says something like “I am a God”,
everybody says: Who does he think he is? I just told you who I thought
I was: A GOD.”

KANYE

If you think about the last 10 years of art in general, no other artist
has been as controversial and influent as Kanye West. Being mostly
known for his egocentric personality, Kanye Omari West climbed his
way from an inspiring beat producer in the into the modern
American mount Olympus of fame and power, and, in 2010, the
rapper reached the top of it, releasing his fifth album “My Beautiful
Dark Twisted Fantasy”, which is considered one of the all-time best
music albums, not only in RAP but in the music industry as a whole.
Do not misunderstand “Mount Olympus”, because I do not use this
metaphor as figuratively as you may think. Andy Warhol may have
touched the subject first; however, Kanye is the first artist to openly
talk about the god-like aspect of celebrities and their lifestyle.
Including himself among the contemporary deities, West has written
and talked about this philosophical matter several times before, and
has even released a song titled I am a God in his 2013 album Yeezus,
which also is a derivation from the name of the Christian God, Jesus.
I just talked to Jesus
He said, "What up Yeezus? "
I said, "Shit I'm chilling
Trying to stack these millions"
I know he the most high
But I am a close high
Mi casa es su casa
That's that cosa nostra
I am a God
KANYE WEST – I AM A GOD

The picture shown above belongs to Kanye’s 2010 music video for
the song POWER. The one minute and forty seconds video, that now
has more than 70 million views, is a personal argumentation from
the artist, towards the public, regarding his own public image and
self-perception. Trapped in a visual medium, West resorted to heavy
usage of symbolism and pagan imagery to transmit an intricate
message.
The Sword of Damocles, represented by the word above his head is
probably the object that stands out the most. The blade that could
fall at any time represents an anecdote firstly written by Diodorus
Siculus and later on made popular by Cicero in his series of books
Tusculanae Disputationes. The story refers to the constant danger
faced by those in position of power and the eminence of their death.
Kanye knows he stands in modern society as a form of a god.

He is showing the public that as long as he is powerfully famous the
media and other artists, also represented by the 2 regicides on the
video, are constantly trying to kill his image or take advantage of it.
I`m living in that 21st Century, doing something mean to it.
Doing it better than anybody you ever seen do it
Screams from the haters, got a nice ring to it
I guess every superhero needs his theme music
No one man should have all that power
The clock’s ticking, I just count the hours
Stop tripping, I’m tripping of the powder
Till then, fuck that, the world’s ours
And they say
21st Century schizoid man
Colin Powells, Austin Powers
Lost in translation with a whole fucking nation
They say I was the abomination of Obama’s nation
Well that’s a pretty bad way to start the conversation
KANYE WEST – POWER


That is only a fraction of the complexity that has been obfuscated
from his art by his eccentric ways; which is also a common
personality trait among geniuses. Kanye WEST is one of the few
remaining artists who still attempt to innovate in several different
fields at the same time, and has very much succeeded not only in his
unique sound and lyrics, but also in clothing, footwear and staging.
He said himself that he feels an uncontrollable urge to create in
everywhere there is a space for it, and gets extremelly frustrated
when he can't do it, from water bottle designs to architecture. If
there's aesthetics involved, KANYE is the biggest and most
misunderstood name on the industry right now.

Is hip hop just a euphemism for a new religion?
KANYE WEST – GEORGEOUS

VENUS
The 21st century Divine Comedy will probably be a story
written by Harvey Levin, about his journey through crushing
irrelevance to a celebrity Instagram profile.
What is heaven if not a Jenner lifestyle, a life that our
mundane hardworking brains can't even comprehend, to do
whatever you please, wherever you please whenever you
please, to dictate what the rest of the world finds fashionable,
to be, at the second you step on the real world underneath
your four mansions mount Olympus, overwhelmed by
faithful followers wanting just to touch your skin and get a
brief second on your side, to have seventy million people
wanting to know if you have had breakfast or not, to never
face a single real problem and live in pure joy while the
masses beneath you, that happily watch your life so closely,
struggle to make a living. All before you are even 20.

What is the purgatory if not being stuck in a third world
country with two different jobs that earn you just enough to
live with the minimum, and to die in insignificance, to face
crowded subways on your way home to eat microwave
meals and watch the teenage modern gods with their
Lamborghinis and caviar and call it entertainment, to feel
that your life has no more value than a Kardashian sex tape
and that you take no part in the society that really matters.
All of this in a world where 783 million people don’t have
access to clean water and 2.5 billion don’t have access to
adequate sanitation and are living not only in a metaphorical
hell, but also in a literal one.

Out of this whole history, what dazes me the most is how
America was able to convince the rest of the world to
worship their muses, heroes and ideas to the point we do
right now, where our own kind wouldn’t even dream to be as
influential as their own, no matter how famous we are in our
homelands or how much money we have, we will always be
stuck in demigod quota.
The fact that I have to write this in English just to get any
type of visibility saddens me, but that is the least of my
problems, when the cigarettes I’m smoking, the clothes that
I’m wearing and the music I’m listening to, are all American,
my phone, my favorite films, and several other aspects in my
life, are industrialized in America and sold to me and every
other person on the south of the continent, as our sole
purpose is to be a giant consumer market from uncle Sam.