Tomashi Jackson
Life Like It’s Golden (Freestyle cypher in Leimert Park L.A. 1997/Grime show in London 2014), 2024
Acrylic, Yule marble paste, English China clay paste, stained white paper bags on raw canvas and white linen with brass grommets and gold leaf
190.5 x 175.3 x 17.8 cm
75 x 69 x 7 in
75 x 69 x 7 in
Further images
Both Freestyle Hip Hop and Grime are underground artistic movements that emerged among young Black people in working class enclaves in and around Los Angeles and London. Although their stylistic...
Both Freestyle Hip Hop and Grime are underground artistic movements that emerged among young Black people in working class enclaves in and around Los Angeles and London. Although their stylistic innovations would eventually prove to be lucrative to music and fashion industries, both genres grew from communities of practitioners and audiences who valued the art forms as culturally affirming disciplines first, while their gatherings were often surveilled, criminalised, and raided with varying extremes of force by local police forces.
The title is drawn from lyrics in the 2004 song Golden by singer-songwriter Jill Scott from her album Beautifully Human: Words and Sounds Volume 2. The entire statement in Scott’s song lyrics are repeated throughout the composition; “I’m livin’ my life like it's golden, livin’ my life like it's golden, livin’ my life like it's golden, livin’ my life like it's golden, livin’ my life like it's golden. Golden!” The words illustrate a self empowering spirit to live, fellowship, and create among generations of Black and Afro-Caribbean people in spite of historically consistent experiences with state governance being informed by general devaluation and dehumanising abuses of power.
The work is made of a single piece of white linen fabric attached to a piece of raw cotton duck canvas. Water soaked and unfolded white paper bags and handles are laminated into the surface. The image area is divided into two angled halves with thickly applied white marble dust paste embedded into the left half and China clay dust paste embedded into the right half, with a strip of exposed white linen across the centre. The dried China clay paste is stained with washes of bronze and gold acrylic pigment. Halftone lines painted in deep cadmium red acrylic pigment at various levels of water dilution translate a cropped image capture of a 1997 freestyle cypher in Leimert Park Village, Los Angeles from the documentary film titled, Freestyle: The Art of the Rhyme. Halftone lines of very pale lavender translate an image capture of an MC rhyming at a 2014 Grime performance showcase in London.
The title is drawn from lyrics in the 2004 song Golden by singer-songwriter Jill Scott from her album Beautifully Human: Words and Sounds Volume 2. The entire statement in Scott’s song lyrics are repeated throughout the composition; “I’m livin’ my life like it's golden, livin’ my life like it's golden, livin’ my life like it's golden, livin’ my life like it's golden, livin’ my life like it's golden. Golden!” The words illustrate a self empowering spirit to live, fellowship, and create among generations of Black and Afro-Caribbean people in spite of historically consistent experiences with state governance being informed by general devaluation and dehumanising abuses of power.
The work is made of a single piece of white linen fabric attached to a piece of raw cotton duck canvas. Water soaked and unfolded white paper bags and handles are laminated into the surface. The image area is divided into two angled halves with thickly applied white marble dust paste embedded into the left half and China clay dust paste embedded into the right half, with a strip of exposed white linen across the centre. The dried China clay paste is stained with washes of bronze and gold acrylic pigment. Halftone lines painted in deep cadmium red acrylic pigment at various levels of water dilution translate a cropped image capture of a 1997 freestyle cypher in Leimert Park Village, Los Angeles from the documentary film titled, Freestyle: The Art of the Rhyme. Halftone lines of very pale lavender translate an image capture of an MC rhyming at a 2014 Grime performance showcase in London.