It’s a delicate subject. Speaking “ill” of Beyoncé (but we must remember that even the “gods” are capable of frailty). Jay-Z, not so much. You can say pretty much whatever you want about him ‘cause he ugo and he cheated. But Beyoncé—sweet, “angelic” Beyoncé—is another story (and, as an ultimate fangirl/Beyhive member named Adele will tell you, “I don’t take any fucking shit when it comes to anyone not liking Beyoncé. You can’t be in my life, you know?”). Yet hers is very much intertwined with the branded package of being tied to Jay-Z (ergo her frequent nickname, “Mrs. Carter”). A “love” that has, yes, been distinctly wielded as a brand long before Tiffany’s came along to ask if they wanted to further monetize it. Love itself being an abstraction that can’t actually be commodified—but try telling that to capitalism.
Never has their commitment to this “brand” been clearer than their obnoxious ad campaign for Tiffany & Co. (or Tiffany’s, if you’re the Audrey Hepburn-loving type) called “About Love.” Of course, it’s not really about love at all, so much as selling the false ideal of what American capitalism has thrived off of. And that is to make certain that people—especially couples—pursue items as though they are “goals.” Things that must be acquired in order to display “status.” Not just wealth-level status, but the extent of their so-called love by the measure of an overpriced bauble. A little trinket that someone somewhere at a certain point in the process likely suffered a great deal to put out there. But just as it was in H. G. Wells’ The Time Machine, the “happy clams” on top of the world care not what happens to the workers down below.
In addition to the first campaign that was released by Jay and Bey for Tiffany’s, another new ad called “Date Night” has been proffered to keep the momentum going and peddle those wares meant to signify “love.” Or, more specifically, how it can be quantified on capitalism’s terms. In the backseat of a car meant to be driving along Central Park’s Fifth Avenue, Bey sits alone in the backseat briefly before Jay-Z pops in and, for whatever reason, once again shows us that he does not know how to say the word “pizza” (also notable during his feature on Rihanna’s “Talk That Talk”). Bey, meanwhile, picks vacantly at a flower and recites, “He loves me, he loves me not.” At the end of the “vignette” (complete with a Blue Ivy cameo), Jay confirms to her that he does and she gushes, “He loves me?!” in that same tone used on “Pretty Hurts” when she asks, “My aspiration in life?” It’s certainly not to live on love, therefore “to be happy,” as we’re indoctrinated to believe with movies like Breakfast at Tiffany’s (which, luckily for Jay and Bey, only features a horrible Asian stereotype instead of a Black one) and songs like “I Got You Babe.” Those are just the occasional “let’s throw the broke asses a bone” lies required by mass media to assure that it isn’t all materialistic propaganda iterating the idea within people that if they can’t “contribute” to society with money, then they have no purpose (see: Squid Game).
As for the original campaign commercial (or “short film,” if that’s what one needs to tell themselves), it finds Beyoncé working with director Emmanuel Adjei (who also directed Madonna’s “Dark Ballet” and “Batuka” videos) once more after Black Is King. The “About Love” video presents Jay-Z and Beyoncé at their cheesiest, which no one might have thought possible after the video for “Sandcastles” yet here we are. The director’s cut (which runs at two minutes and forty-one seconds) opens with Bey cooing on her phone, “Hey baby, I’m on the plane. I can’t wait to go home.” The plane, of course, is private. Why wouldn’t it be? There’s nothing “romantic” about flying with other plebes in coach behind you, and Tiffany’s is all about promoting an ideal. One that is unattainable for most, especially the “average” folk from the Marcy Projects where Jay-Z grew up.
Meanwhile, Jay-Z types slowly—like an old man would—on a typewriter (who he think he is? Madame X?) with the camera focusing on arbitrary words like “mailbox.” Um… alright, is that supposed to be like “rosebud”? In any case, Bey keeps looking wistfully out the plane window during the times when we haven’t cut forward to the point where she’s reunited with Jay in her Audrey look, sitting at the piano and singing “Moon River.” And here we thought Carrie Bradshaw and Big had already ruined this song as much as possible with the “I Heart NY” episode of Sex and the City (a favorite show of Beyoncé’s, per “03 Bonnie and Clyde”).
Prominently showcasing the notorious yellow Tiffany diamond, Bey seems to have nary a care regarding the irony of her, a Black woman, sporting a blood diamond. Originally “found” (read: pillaged) by De Beers in South Africa’s Kimberley diamond mines, Charles Lewis Tiffany obtained the rock in 1877, reportedly for $18,000. “Owned” (a.k.a. colonized by Britain) at the time, South Africa has long been “renowned” for its brutal blood diamond practices, with those working in the mines being subject to amputations if they didn’t meet quotas. Nonetheless, Tiffany’s assures all of their diamonds go through the “Kimberley Process,” a “resolution” made by the “civilized” diamond industry to help curb the distribution and sale of blood diamonds. Of course, Tiffany’s can make no such assurance about diamonds like the one Beyoncé is wearing, mined during the height of colonial rule in Africa, what with exploited (to use an understatement) Black labor building white wealth in that part of the world as well.
In this sense (the one that speaks to generational trauma), it’s interesting to note a specific lyric from “The Carters” on their album, Everything Is Love, itself a celebration of how having money makes it relatively easy to be in love, per the capitalist gambit. It’s a sentiment expressed on “Boss,” when Bey sings, “My great-great grandchildren already rich/That’s a lot of brown churrin on your Forbes list.” One would like to say, “Who has the heart to tell her the planet won’t be around by the time her great-great grandchildren exist?” but it won’t matter anyway. Her and her fellow rich ilk’s progeny will have either defected to another planet or their underground bunker in New Zealand. Probably with the Tiffany diamond. So yeah, maybe she’s right about her great-great grandchildren being just fine. But the point is, both this song and the Tiffany campaign serve as conduits for The Carters to take on the braggadocio that all rich people do when they’re proud of having built a “legacy” for future generations—one that perpetuates the rigged system of capitalism favoring anyone born into wealth already.
To add to the grotesquerie of it all, a painting by Basquiat is thrown into the mix apropos of nothing. Displayed in arguably the last place Basquiat would have wanted it—Tiffany’s—the company touts, “As part of a private collection from its creation until now, About Love marks a rare public appearance of Jean-Michel Basquiat’s ‘Equals Pi’ (1982), propelling Tiffany’s long-standing tradition of working with New York creatives forward. The piece will be on display in the newly renovated Fifth Avenue flagship store next year.” How lovely. From the streets to the elite walls of a place that never would have let him in while he was tagging Samo around the city.
A nonsensical quote from “The Carters” on the Tiffany website also boasts, “Love is the diamond that the jewelry and art decorate.” Sounds like advertising gobbledygook if ever there was such a prime example. Elsewhere, a statement from the company felt obliged to explain the presence of Jay-Z and Beyoncé as follows: “Ushering in a new brand identity, this campaign embodies the beauty of love through time and all its diverse facets, forging a new vision of love today.” That’s a whole lot of euphemistic language for: “Hey! We welcome and want to appeal to Black people now that our usual market has plateaued.”
With money being power, Black people have always strived to be “good capitalists” (often to their detriment when the white man sees they’re “getting too much clout”—does the Tulsa Race Massacre ring a bell?), seeming to turn as easily as white people do on their own kind once they ascend into a certain echelon. In short, capitalism turns everybody white (making it both the “great” equalizer and non-equalizer…mostly the latter). That is to say, prone to exploitation. Tiffany’s desire to appeal to a “different” audience speaks volumes about capitalism’s last gasp—being so “desperate” as to finally “let” Black people have access to an “aspirational” image they can relate to (that is, if Beyoncé doing Hepburn drag is somehow relatable to Black women who don’t idolize wispy white ladies, still held up as a benchmark).
As for Jay and Bey allowing themselves to be used as pawns in this scheme, well, what do they care when it’s only helping those aforementioned great-great grandchildren? The ones who will be told that their great-great grandparents “fucked shit up from the inside” when, in fact, all they did was perpetuate the same old song.
