Kanye’s persona deliberately fused street rap and art-school fashion codes

Evidence

Roc-A-Fella Records reluctantly signed Kanye in 2002, hoping he’d make an album that showcased other rappers over his acclaimed beats. When the label refused to prioritize his solo debut, Kayne self-financed a video for “Through the Wire,” a song he recorded while recovering from a near-fatal automobile accident. The video helped Roc-A-Fella finally see what Kanye was aiming for: He wasn’t a conventional rapper but a hip-hop auteur who could “bridge the gap” between the street-oriented beats of mainstream rap and the artistic edge of backpack rap. West embodied this mission in his personal style, wearing diamond-encrusted pieces from Jacob the Jeweler on his front and a Louis Vuitton backpack. Like Pharrell, he loved Ralph Lauren and created a mascot called Dropout Bear, modeled on the Polo Bear. — W. David Marx, Blank Space, 107

Categorization

• XREF: The front/back split — diamonds in front, backpack behind — is a physical embodiment of the omnivore mixing that the book’s thesis tracks.