14 DAY TRIAL // Kanye West is taking art to a whole new level with a short film directed by himself, “Runaway.” It stars Kanye himself and model Selita Ebanks, and marks Kanye’s directorial debut.
The video, while not officially a music video, showcases no less than 9 brand new songs off his upcoming album, “My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy,” and is so packed with stunning visuals that it stands in a whole league of its own.
While many were quick to brand Kanye’s vision a bit too much to be to their taste, seeing in the long, highly elaborate scenes only a means to feed his own ego, critics are raving about it.
“Runaway” tells the story of a Phoenix fallen from the sky, a very pretty metaphor for Kanye’s own road to the bottom and back after the Taylor Swift incident.
Though Kanye takes the Phoenix and tries to introduce her to the world without stressing how exotic and special she is (at one point, he tells someone he didn’t even notice she had feathers), the world is simply not prepared for her.
Towards the end of the video, after she realizes Earth is no place for her, the Phoenix returns whence she came from in yet another visually stunning scene.
According to media and culture expert Jacqueline Cruz speaking to MTV News, “Runaway” is so heavy with symbolism one would actually require a degree to understand it all, more than is at the surface.
Not only does Kanye play with images in the hope of rendering feeling – or, better yet, of stirring it in the viewer – but he’s also juggling colors with the same purpose.
“It was very expressive. You could tell he wanted people to feel it... the imagery, the contrast – a lot of shots where it was black with a splash of red, he used a lot of warm colors contrasted against the dark images, so I thought that was strong, because red provokes angry emotions,” Cruz says for MTV.
“It showcases Kanye as an artist, addressing contemporary issues, like race and the different roles played in society,” the expert believes.
The Phoenix doesn’t only stand in for Kanye’s journey back into the spotlight, but also as for the eternal battle between man and nature, with the latter always coming out as the loser.
“I think [she] embraces nature and how, in a sense, we’re ignoring it. And how she has fallen and we are trying to civilize her, and she can’t; it’s destroying her. She’s losing her wings. She’s not really sure who she is,” Cruz says.
For others, though, Kanye’s “Runaway” is simply important because it exists and it gets people talking. This is more than a music video because it was a huge risk and because, in the end, it serves no concrete purpose.
In return, it’s getting people to pay attention to it, which they probably wouldn’t have if this was a regular music video. And most of its images will linger on even after it’s over.
They say only art can do that. See below for Kanye West’s “Runaway” video and judge for yourself whether that’s truly the case.
*Be advised that some discretion is recommended.