By: Hermekay Dehaney
Separating art from the artist has become a controversial and recurrent topic over the past decade; its main belief is focusing on the work itself of that artist rather than the artist’s reputation and controversies at hand. Usually, when this topic gets brought up, it surrounds a celebrity getting “canceled” over various allegations and actions, which sometimes include severe repercussions such as criminal offenses.
These fallouts usually lead to a moral dilemma of people asking, “When should we separate, or is it okay to separate art from the artist?”
I believe that when the topic around a celebrity is about separating them from their art, then you know what they did was bad. Consider R. Kelly, a famous R&B singer whose crimes landed him in jail for 30 years, with the help of the documentary ‘Surviving R. Kelly’. Despite his sentencing, his music was still played on social media, at parties, and even sometimes at weddings. I would say nowadays people are starting to distance themselves from him, but there are a few outliers.
On the other hand, Kanye West is more of a complex case. He is considered one of the top artists of this generation with multiple platinum albums including, ‘The College Dropout’. and ‘Graduation’. In recent years, his crazy erratic behavior in public and online, especially his antisemitic views, have landed him in this topic.
Although people online do blame his mental health issues which potentially contributing to his sometimes outlandish behavior, there are others that don’t see his mental health as being the sole reason for his behavior. As someone once put it, “That’s an explanation, not an excuse“. So, even though I do believe it’s a factor, that doesn’t fully explain his weird behavior.
People have tried to draw a line on what is acceptable and unacceptable, but it’s not that easy. When someone as influential as Kanye uses their platform to spew hate and misinformation, especially to his impressionable younger fan base, that becomes dangerous.
The art that the artist puts out is sometimes a reflection of themselves. Their beliefs and values are sometimes mentioned in the lyrics, making it impossible to separate the two. Continuing to support such artists, even if you don’t agree with their actions, is still indirectly supporting them. They’re still making money from streams and maintaining cultural relevance despite their actions.
This topic is very subjective of when the line is crossed which leaves a gray area. Obviously, humans are not perfect, so when the opinion of canceling every artist who missteps comes about, that’s unreasonable. Some artists have committed serious and harmful acts that impact others while some have made non serious controversies. What one person sees as totally “cancellable” others may not.
I saw a comment which stated, “Art is based on context. I don’t think the artist needs to be a moral example to appreciate their work. But as always, we have to remain conscious and educated. We can pretend art lives separate from reality,” and to add onto that, this topic is not very limited, it’s not a one-size-fits-all discussion, but the truth is that It gets to a point where if you’re asking the question, the answer is most likely no.
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