Egyptian goddess Nefertiti was the singer's inspiration for her costume seen during the opening of her Coachella performance. In her video for Hold Up, she notoriously channeled Oshun, an ancient goddess native to Nigeria and throughout west Africa who worshippers in the Ifè religion still pray and extend offerings to this day. Visuals seen in Lemonade and her costumes from her Coachella performance are all native to Africa. The use of the work for the Magna Carta Holy Grail album, which is Jay-Z's 12th album at the peak of his career, could be representative of his own personal transformation.īeyonce, on the other hand, often opts to unite art and religion. The work, which is informed by the story of two nymphs in Greek mythology, is housed in New York's Metropolitan Museum of Art and famously symbolizes metamorphosis. Jay-Z took it to the next level in 2013 for the album art for Magna Carta Holy Grail with a more literal arts influence: he took inspiration from Battista di Domenico Lorenzi's sixteenth century sculpture Alpheus and Arethusa. The outcome was fitting for how legendary the album has become. The gilded album art was designed by Riccardo Tisci and embroidered with a range of customized motifs. An early example of this is Watch the Throne, a joint album Jay-Z released with Kanye West in 2011. In recent years, both Beyonce and Jay-Z merged their taste for fine art into their visuals and costumes. While all roads have led to Apeshit, a global presentation of the most iconic art sharing the spotlight with the world's most iconic music artists, the Carters have had a long fascination with ancient art and religion. This is neither Beyonce or Jay-Z's first time blending art with their musical endeavors. Instead, it's a more nuanced commentary on their marriage and the state of the world entirely. But for the Carters, filming at the 225-year-old institution could represent more than the couple's knack for extreme luxury and bragging rights. Since the video's premiere, the meme keepers of the Internet have been at work cementing just how explosive the visuals were, even for the music world's most famous couple.

While the collaboration may have seemed inevitable-the couple released their first single together in 2002 performed a joint world tour in 2014 and are currently on their On The Run II tour together-no one, not even the BeyHive’s most devoted followers, could have predicted what was to come in the album's first video.Īpeshit, a hard-hitting track produced by the Carters and Pharrell Williams, was filmed inside the Louvre in Paris, the largest and most revered art museum on earth. I saw Jay-Z and Beyonc’s OTR II gig back in 2018 and knew that this would be one not to miss especially after being starved of gigs during the pandemic. Pei in the museum's exterior.Beyonce and Jay-Z shook up the world Saturday with the surprise release of their joint album Everything is Love. Beyonce, left, and Jay-Z in front of the Mona Lisa at the Louvre in their new music video. The video, which dropped in June, featured the couple in front of the museum's most iconic pieces, including Leonardo da Vinci's 'Mona Lisa,' Jacques-Louis David's 'The Coronation of Napoleon,' and the ancient Greek statue 'Winged Victory of Samothrace.' Jay-Z also rapped in one scene in front of the famous glass pyramid designed by I.M. At the Louvre, Beyoncé and Jay-Z Are Both Outsiders and Heirs.

'Elsewhere in the world, interest in the Louvre was bolstered by the Louvre Abu Dhabi (which recently celebrated its first anniversary),' Louvre staff said, 'and by Beyoncé and JAY-Z’s 'Apes**t' video, with its tribute to some of the museum’s greatest artworks.' The museum's staff credited the huge boost in visitors to the recovery of tourism in Paris after the 2015 terror attacks, as well as a big exhibition devoted to Romantic artist Eugène Delacroix.īut they also paid credit to the Carters. That's the most visitors ever to any museum in a year. Some 10.2 million people visited the museum in 2018, about 25% more visitors than in 2017, officials at the Louvre announced Thursday. It was one of 2018's most memorable music videos, and now the Louvre says Beyoncé and Jay-Z's 'Apeshit' is also partly responsible for the famed Paris museum welcoming a record number of visitors last year.

Beyonce jay z video in louvre