“I JUST MIGHT BE A BLACK BILL GATES IN THE MAKING”. The lyrics of Beyoncé’s lead single, Formation, from her sixth studio album, Lemonade (2016), demonstrate what a powerful black woman in the industry is. The Lemonade album was released in 2016, accompanied by a 65-minute film of the same title.
The album received universal critical acclaim and is the most acclaimed studio album of Beyoncé’s career. It encompasses a variety of genres, including reggae, blues, rock, hip hop, soul, funk, Americana, country, gospel, electronic, and trap.
She collaborates with several artists, such as James Blake, Kendrick Lamar, the Weeknd, and Jack White. In other words, it is a combination of art and experimental music of what America is.
In this album, she expresses her emotional journey after her husband’s infidelity in a generational and racial context. This piece of art, including the Lemonade and the visual album, is a monumental work in the music industry’s history. Not only did it win numerous awards, it also represented the art and culture of the African-American community and established a distinguished position for herself.
“…her shifts from the singular self as a brand, the hybrid self as the combined lady-freak, and the integrated self as a collective, politicized persona in music videos also signalled a shift in how I made sense of Beyoncé and Black women in popular culture.” (Aisha Durham)
The visual album premiered on HBO and counted 787,000 viewers. It is divided into several chapters, “Intuition”, “Denial”, “Anger”, “Apathy”, “Emptiness”, “Accountability”, “Reformation”, “Forgiveness”, “Resurrection”, “Hope”, and “Redemption.” “Gutsy and gorgeous, Lemonade is the film flouts genre, just like the R&B-rock-country-soul album. The poetic affection of the voiceover lets the audience sink into the music and the majestic camera shots. The aesthetic scenery and the outfits on her take us back to the origin of R&B and country music.
” It encapsulates many of the debates and discussions that would grow to animate the film and art worlds this decade — issues of representation on film, of who gets to control the final product, of mixing and remixing the past, of what political art might look like, of the potential reach of films by and starring black artists…… she did it all while challenging stereotypes and crafting a genuinely beautiful film that demands respect and earns it.” ( Alissa Wilkinson, 2019)
The masculine-defined, white gaze that boxed Beyoncé faded when she used her cultural body and the collective body of Black girls and women to stand in for love, lust, and liberation. It is an empowering album, an inspirational, well-thought-out work of art in every way.
Shih-kai Yang
Digital Audiovisual Media Class Blog 
Leave a comment