Fahamu Pecou Regina Bradley
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OutKasted Conversations – Episode 10 – Fahamu Pecou Regina Bradley: Hey, what’s up, everybody! I'm Dr Regina Bradley, and this is OutKasted Conversations. Count ‘em. Ten, ten down. Episode ten. And we gon’ end this special run with the one, the only… fugitive Mister-Professor-Doctor- Fahamu Pecou: Hey! Regina: -the shit! Fahamu Pecou. Fahamu: Hootie hoo! Regina: What’s going on, good sir? Fahamu: Hootie hoo. Regina: How you? *laughs* Fahamu: I’m good. *both laugh* Regina: Well, thank you, thank you. ‘Cause, you know, you a busy, busy, busy man being the shit. Fahamu: Aye, man. But, you know. Regina: So, um… Fahamu: We- we here with you, so… Regina: But, you know, You gotta answer the question to get into the club. How did you become OutKasted? Fahamu: Aye, you know… I'm a tell you the truth. I’m a tell you a true story, right? Regina: That's all we do here. We want the facks (facts)! Fahamu: Yeah, yeah, it’s a true story. True story. Regina: C-K-S, not -T. Fahamu: So, I wasn't always OutKasted. Regina: *gasps* Get off my set. … *both laugh* Fahamu: Yeah, like, when I first, uh, moved to Atlanta in ’93, Regina: Mhm. Fahamu: OutKast, you know, was starting to get a little bit of a buZZ, but so was the Wu-Tang Clan. Regina: You was Wu all day. Fahamu: I was Wu all day- Regina: Who’s your favorite? Fahamu: -I had my Timbs- Ghostface, of course. Yeah. Regina: Respect. Fahamu: Yeah, so I- Regina: Sometimes, you gotta ask questions. You know. Fahamu: I was- I was real New York with my hip hop, and people kept trying to put me on to OutKast. but, you know, again, I had just moved here. Atlanta was a culture shock. Regina: Mhm. Fahamu: I couldn't understand what people were saying. Regina: *laughs* Fahamu: Like, I didn't- I couldn't understand the accent. Um, and- Regina: You tried to stomp ‘em out with the Timbs- Fahamu: *laughs* Regina: You, right, brought the Timbs out here like, “I can’t understand what you saying!” Fahamu: “You know, what are y’all talking about?!” Regina: *laughs* Fahamu: But, uhh, a friend of mine, uh, who lived off campus used to kind of, like, use my dorm room between classes. Regina: Mhm. Fahamu: And he was really, like, trying to beat this OutKast thing, you know, um, into my head. And I was like, “Nah, man, I’m cool off of that.” Anyway, he knew that whenever I would come in my room, I would just hit my stereo and, like, start drawing, you know? Regina: Mhm. Fahamu: So he queued up a OutKast tape to “Crumblin’ Erb.” And I came in the room, I hit the thing. Those drums came in, I'm drawing, and I was like, “What is this?” You know? And then I looked, and he was, like, “Got you.” *both laugh* Fahamu: And I was like, Oh, snap. Okay. So, after that, I really started, like, listening to- to OutKast and, you know, became a fan. But it really wasn't until Soul Food where I was like, Oh, this is the stuff. Regina: Okay, yeah. So, I mean, so you're a visual artist. You're a visual theorist, a thinker, all of the scholarly shit that they want us to say. You know, you do that- Fahamu: I try. Regina: *laughs*. You do a great job of it. So, one of things that I find most fascinating about your work is your ability to visualize connections between hip hop and ideas of gender, particularly masculinity. Fahamu: Mhm. Regina: So, you know, I'm just kind of curious to hear your thoughts about what that evolution was. I mean, like, were you specifically going out to be like, I’ma talk about Black men doing hip hop shit, or was it like a- like a organic thing, like somebody just kind of hit play, you were like, “Oh, maybe I should go from here.” Fahamu: Yeah, it was really organic. In fact, um, you know, I was still trying to discover my voice as an artist when I landed a job – or let me let me rephrase that – when I lied to get a job as a graphic designer. Regina: Okay. Fahamu: Um, I’d never taken a graphic design class in my life, but, you know, I needed a job. Regina: Mhm. Fahamu: Anyway, um, uh, I ended up, uh, getting a job in New York, uh, working at this, like, boutique agency that did a lot of, like, promotions for hip hop groups, and this is the late ‘90s in New York, like, everybody's getting this stuff done in this spot. And so, I got to, like, sit like this with, like, you know, a number of hip hop artists and I got a different side of the game. I got to meet the person instead of the person they played on TV. Regina: Person instead of the product. Fahamu: Right. Regina: Mhm. Fahamu: And, uh it- it put this question in the back of my head, like, what would happen if somebody marketed a visual artist the same way we do a hip hop artist? Regina: Mm. Fahamu: Would people, you know, respond the same way. Fast forward a couple years later, I'm back in Atlanta and I'm trying to, you know, get my work into galleries and, you know, get put on. Uh, and I got frustrated, you know, like, I wasn't getting the kind of response that I, you know, thought I would get. And I decided to create, uh, a marketing campaign based on that idea that I had. Like, I'm a market myself like a hip hop artist. I just want to see what would happen. And I came up with the whole Fahamu Pecou is The Shit! thing, you know? Uh, and it was, like, patterned after, like, the 50 Cent, you know, marketing campaign. And I just wanted to, like, see if people would respond. Regina: I remember when people had, like, the li’l- the little stickers you put on your- your computer, like Fahamu Pecou is The Shit! And I’m like, “Who da hell- “ *both laugh* Regina: Na mean? “Let me figure out who this is.” Okay, so you- so you decided to market yourself like a hip hop artist, in a way. Fahamu: Yeah. And I mean, but ultimately that led me to these questions about, uh, black masculinity and representation and marketing and media and visual culture and, you know, how all of these things impact not only, uh, how black men are perceived or read in society, but how ultimately black men shape their performance in the world, you know, based on these images. Um, and that's ultimately how it all kind of landed for me. Regina: So, I mean, it’s- it’s dope, I mean, I feel like I have to say this repeatedly, like, your artwork is just mind-blowing, especially the Do or Die exhibit that you have up at Emory right now. Fahamu: I thank you. Regina: The big ass one in the back. Fahamu: *laughs* Regina: The one that has, like, just all the different color blues in it and- Fahamu: And indigo. Regina: -and I’m just like, ahhh- Fahamu: Yeah. Regina: -it took me out. It’s gon be in somebody’s house on Cribs. Fahamu: *laughs* Regina: I’m like *laughs* If I could put- if I could put something on it, I’d be like, you know, we could set up, like, a art- a art share type thing. Fahamu: Yeah. Yeah, we got layaway plans. Regina: You know what I’m saying? I'm trying to make it work. You know. Fahamu: *laughs* Regina: Um, but, yeah, so, I mean, let's dig a little bit deeper in terms of, you know, your effect on Southern hip hop- Fahamu: Mhm. Regina: -particularly Atlanta artists. Fahamu: Mhm. Regina: So, um, we think about somebody like a OutKast, you know what I mean? Like, you can't separate the lyricism- Fahamu: Right. Regina: -from the- from the visuality- Fahamu: Mhm. Regina: -of what they do. Like, you have to be able to literally visualize- Fahamu: Mhm. Regina: -you know, what- what that means. I'm kind of curious to hear your thoughts about, you know, what is it about OutKast’s literal imagination that you think is so important to how we think about not only them but, like, this contemporary Southern black masculinity that they present time and time again? Fahamu: Well, yeah, I mean, I think one of the reasons that I- I really became attracted to, um, OutKast and the Dungeon Family more broadly was- Regina: Mhm? Fahamu: -they really did paint pictures with their words, you know, like, I wasn't from Atlanta, I didn't grow up in the woods, playing in the woods and doing all that kind of stuff like, you know, get- be talking about, but I could see it. You know, I could feel it was- it was visceral, you know, the way they described, uh, their world and the way they articulated their experience. And it was just- it was really beautiful and poetic, um, you know, wh- wh- in fact, there was an interview with- with Andre. I can't remember what magazine it was in, but he talked about how he kept this journal.