Object Details
- Exhibition Label
- Afrika Bambaataa is a founding master DJ of hip-hop and the music’s philosophical proponent around the world. A gang member raised in a Bronx housing project, Bambaataa was transformed by a trip to Africa. He returned with a vision to transmute gang violence into cultural battles based in music, dance, and the arts. He founded the Zulu Nation as a new kind of consciousness-raising gang. An influential DJ in New York City’s club scene, "Bam" crafted a global electrobeat with the Soul Sonic Force: he mixed disco and funk with the rhythms of DJ Kool Herc (Jamaica), Kraftwerk (Germany), and the Yellow Magic Orchestra (Japan). An intimidating figure with a tight scowl who often wears a floor-length leather coat, Bambaataa still gives this simple advice to DJs and rappers: "you must seek knowledge." His club hit "Looking for the Perfect Beat" distilled into five words the elusive musical quest of the African diaspora in its American form.
- Data Source
- National Portrait Gallery
- Artist
- Laura Levine, born 1 May 1958
- Sitter
- Afrika Bambaataa, born 1957
- Date
- 1983
- Credit Line
- National Portrait Gallery, Smithsonian Institution
- Medium
- Gelatin silver print
- Dimensions
- Image: 20.4 x 13.5 cm (8 1/16 x 5 5/16")
- Sheet: 25.3 x 20.2 cm (9 15/16 x 7 15/16")
- Mat: 45.7 x 35.6 cm (18 x 14")
- Type
- Photograph
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