G-Dragon's Camp Says K-Pop Star Wasn't Wearing Blackface

[benihime99.livejournal.com]

Says Trayvon Martin-like Instagram photo was both "HUGE misunderstanding" and reference to cover art from Big Bang mastermind's next solo effort



An Instagram photo of South Korean pop idol G-Dragon wearing what appears to be a hoodie and dark coloring over his skin was not meant as a comment on race or politics, according to a rep for the Big Bang leader.

"GD was simply wearing different facepaint colors and this is a HUGE misunderstanding," the spokesperson said in an email to SPIN. "The facepaint is only a color variation for his album cover which includes black, white, and red. It is in no way meant to be a political or racial statement."

The rep further clarified, "It’s being derived by a simple photo shoot where GD was using different facepaint colors for his upcoming album."

G-Dragon's spokesperson also said SPIN's article reporting on the image "is completely wrong and taken out of context."

The response comes after we reported on the photo, noting its resemblance to an iconic image of slain Florida youth Trayvon Martin and pointing out that it had drawn criticism online. Though the singer's Instagram account made no mention of Martin, the image bears an eerie similiarity to a meme that had Frank Ocean, Diddy, the-Dream, and others posting photos of themselves in a hoodie last year. (Rap-Up has a good collection of these Martin-inspired images.) Online forums Oh No They Didn't! and One Asian World previously pointed out an alleged connection to the Martin tributes.

G-Dragon is set to appear at KCON 2013, a K-pop convention in Los Angeles on August 24 and 25, and he is readying a new solo album. G-Dragon's 2012 "Crayon" was SPIN's No. 1 K-pop song of the year. His group Big Bang's "Bad Boy" was one of SPIN's 21 Greatest K-Pop Songs of All Time. Check out our coverage of a Big Bang concert in New Jersey here.

The original Instagram photo is below:

That's some Justin Bieber level of PR...

EDIT:
the official omona twitter has shared our open letter with authors from spin and the la times who wrote articles about GD.

Spin

Comments

[opd-top.livejournal.com]

Pretty sure that applies everywhere else too.

[shineebambi.livejournal.com]

for sure the only place ive even seen even a tiny hint of an arguement that whites dont have this overwhelming amount of prividge is in south africa where people are supposedly targeting white farmers to murder them to take their lands but i dont know enough about the situation to really comment on it but she lives in the US like no you have never experienced anything at all like racism in your life

[opd-top.livejournal.com]

Yeah Charlize Theron, the famous actress, always talked about how it was opposite i.e blacks hating on the whites. Discrimination is everywhere but that doesn't mean people should start excusing things like these really.

[itskimbitches.livejournal.com]

That is bullshit south Africa is the prime evidence of white oppression rn. The white ppl don't belong there with the way they came. U can not have a civil society when ur ppl forced their way into a country made themselves supreme and when that bullshit apartheid ends u want to stay and reap the benefits? Africa as a whole has been through so much thanks to the white race and they have the audacity to complain about being "targeted". Get the Fuck out you're not wanted. They still call the black Africans colored down there and the treatment is still racist. White Africans need to get the Fuck out or deal with the "targeting" because no African needs to treat them with kindness because the white race represents so much hatred and abuse its not even debatable