ENOUGH IS ENOUGH; return that piece stolen from Africa.
Tiffany and co was founded in New York in the year 1837 and their main product is luxury jewelry. They came up with ad phrases like “diamonds are a girls’ best friend” targeting women who wanted luxury jewelry as gifts. It is the place you go to get the exquisite, rare clean-cut diamond that glows from a mile away.
Their history however is not so clean; if you are familiar with any history books, you must have read that South Africa was the main source of diamonds. What these history books failed to mention was that the diamonds were stolen from South Africa, that black people were forced to work in the mines in terrible and inhumane working conditions just so that diamond retailers in North America could turn a profit.
In South Africa, diamonds were discovered in Kimberley. About 50,000 black workers were forced to hand dig a 215-meter-deep hole looking for diamonds. The deeper the hole the riskier it became; there were reports of land-slides and cave-ins which killed some workers and left others fatally injured. There were reports that most of the workers caught diseases and were sent to the local hospitals, some died, and others remained permanently disabled. The mines claimed the lives of about 1000 black workers in south Africa, but production never stopped, since they were black people, indispensable and worthless no one cared.
As a black person then, if you could not show papers stating that you were employed in the mines or as a slave you were punished by flogging. They paid the workers almost nothing, provided no health care and literally worked them to death.
The big hole produced 2750 kg of diamonds and helped Cecil Rhodes establish DeBeers; the major mining company and supplier for Tiffany and Co. Cecil Rhodes when confronted about the working conditions of the miners said, “I prefer land to niggers”, he was a racist capitalist and ensured that the black workers or niggers (as he so frequently called us) toiled day and night so he could have millions in his pocket.
In 2020, Beyonce released a visual album celebrating black excellence, celebrating royalty and beauty in Africa. She drew inspiration from different parts of the continent, featured different African artists, promoted several African traditions and produced a beautiful visual album. As a black woman, she has always expressed that black is beautiful and black lives matter.
However, in August 2021, she was featured in a Tiffany and Co’s ad with her husband, to promote the brand and take it to a new direction. In the ad, she is wearing the rare diamond piece which has been worn by just 3 people before her since it was acquired stolen. This diamond is said to be worth $130 million as at 2019. As the first black woman to wear it, it must have felt like an honor when she was approached for this campaign, but it is disappointing to see that she followed through.
In her album Black is King, she went on about how Africans are kings, and our continent is beautiful. That is obviously thrown out the window when a multi-million-dollar company with a history of enslaving black people in Africa hires her. Apparently, the black lives lost to the big hole do not matter. When approached by Tiffany and Co, she could have easily declined and let them know that she would not be a part of their racist company built on the backs of slaves, she could have told them to return that piece stolen from Africa. Instead, Tiffany and co made a lazy commitment to donate to HBCU’s but no, that does not liberate them from their past. Perhaps, Africa only matters to Beyonce when she wants to profit off the continent.
An irony of the campaign was the painting that was featured, a painting by Jean Michel Basquiat from 1982 called Equals Pi. Apparently, Tiffany and Co acquired this painting some years ago from a private collector and held onto it just for this campaign. Basquiat was a street artist whose works focused on bringing social issues and inequalities to light. He was an avid anti-capitalist and his work highlighted social dichotomy such as wealth versus poverty, integration versus segregation and inner versus outer experience. He used social commentary as a tool for introspection and for identifying with his experiences in the black community, as well as attacks on power structures and systems of racism. His art was political and criticized colonialism and social inequality.
Basquiat’s view is opposite of what was depicted in this campaign, Basquiat would never have stood for this disgusting display of wealth and it is sickening that his art was used here. Was using Basquiat’s art here supposed to show that black people have finally reached the top of the societal ladder and that we have won and are free? We are not free till we are all free. Basquiat’s politics is very different from the very capitalist, wealth hoarding politics of the Carters and it should not have been brought into this.
The Carters must do better. This wealth accumulation and power that so many black artists are struggling to attain is ridiculous and scary. Why is there a need to be this all-powerful, untouchable thing hoarding millions of dollars and feeling proud looking down at your people suffering in poverty then donating a pinch of that wealth occasionally and making a display of it just so the conscience is clear?
We are all striving for equality, there is no reason why a millionaire should exist while others can barely eat or find suitable housing. True equality cannot be achieved if we still have the top 1% hoarding their wealth. We must make a conscious decision to do better.
