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Dallas is Dallas Event

“By Way of Dallas” was a collaboration between LAB ART Texas, Dallas is Dallas, and City Bicycle Co. to celebrate LAB ART’s one year expansion into Dallas, TX.

LAB ART is the largest gallery in the nation devoted to street art and was founded in 2011 by Iskander Lemseffer, an influencer and pioneer in the art world. Dallas is Dallas celebrates the city through imagery, limited edition apparel, and by highlighting the creative that live and breathe the culture; the group operates as a passion project based off a crazy experiment to re-brand the city of Dallas.

7 City Bicycle Co Bikes and 7 Artists

“By Way of Dallas” featured seven Type001 bicycles painted by some of Dallas’ most notable artists to reflect their unique vision of the city. There was not much direction or restriction given to the artists aside from time; we at City Bicycle Co. sent each artist one of our famous matte black Los Angeles Type001s one month prior to the event. The capsule collection of limited edition Type001s will be sold by LAB ART with proceeds going to benefit Booker T. Washington HSP&ARTS, DISD’s arts magnet school. The featured artists include The Sour Grapes Crew, Blue the Great, DJ Sober, Jeremy Biggers, Hindue, Joonbug and Erykah Badu. Check out our other blogs which feature each artist and their unique City Type001.

The analog girl in the digital world

aka medulla oblongata

aka sara bellum

aka annie

aka maria mexico

aka @fatbellybella

…

Erykah Badu has as many names as occupations. Whether it’s singing, songwriting, acting, teaching, social work or just being a performance artist, there are a lot of titles she can claim.

Originally from Dallas, Badu has had a lot of influence in the local art scene and appreciates how it has developed. Even before her first album Baduizm dropped, she was dancing at the local Dallas Theatre Center. Eventually people began following the hip hop scene she and other Dallas legends like Mr.Lucci and the D.O.C helped start (like it or not Vanilla Ice played a role too). The hip hop scene was much more than music; it was “painting, graffiti, dancing, break dancing, backpacks headphones and DJing, all of those things are part of the culture”.

Like much of Badu’s work, her take on our Type001 provoked conversation. The battered and destroyed bicycle was lynched in front of a video screening the details of the ordeal.

“All over the globe we are going through a crisis…for many years we have been at war with other humans because of what color we are. Since you gave us black bikes, I figured it would be great way to demonstrate something being tortured just because of what color it is.”

She also accompanied her piece with a Black Bikes Matter shirt to emulate a Black Lives Matter (BLM) shirt and tie in the two campaigns.

All we want to do is create conversation

As a performance artist, Badu has created work that makes people feel uncomfortable, which is intentional. “Usually an uncomfortable position causes you to move.” Whether the viewer moves one way or another is not of concern, just the act in itself. “The purpose of art is to create dialogue. It doesn’t matter what kind. If it inspires someone to do a piece, if it makes someone angry, if it creates some kind of movement. You know it doesn’t matter to me, people can feel however they want to feel but no one has the right to censor art or what someone deems art and I just hope that it creates some type of dialogue”.

In regards to her piece, Badu strives to continue the dialogue that has been created by the BLM movement. Where that dialogue goes is up to those who have it.  “I’m an observer and what I observe is there’s a balance to everything and at some point the wobble has to be balanced…I don’t know if it will happen any time soon [but] I like for things to happen as they should, however they pan out”

Regardless of where conversations goes, you can be sure that “uncomfortable” work of Badu will keep it going.

Watch our exclusive interview of Erykah Badu!