GET KRUMPED
I’m sure you saw the pictures or the title and thought: What is David LaChapelle up to these days? I’m sure you know his photography (Sky vodka campaign), his books (Lachapelle Land and Hotel LaChapelle), his magazine covers (American Photo, The Face) and his music videos (No Doubt’s It’s My Life and that famed Elton John video with Justin Timberlake). So it comes as no surprise that the next step in this jack of all trades career is film. Rize, his first feature, chronicles a unique dance phenomenon called krumping.
Krumping is a combination of multiple moves that read like a recipe. Take one part stripper gyrations, mix with one part African tribal movements, add hip-hop beats and speed up to an impossible degree. But make it look sharp— vehement. After seeing it you probably want to try it – try to shake it fast and watch yourself. But it’s not simply the movement, the shake and the speed of the bodies that sets this dancing apart. It’s the origin of the dance movement that makes it unique – the clowning movement. The dancers vividly painted faces may look straight up carnival, but clowning is more fight club than Barnum & Bailey. It can look a lot like fighting, it’s fierce and threatening, but it’s more an outlet for aggression than a forum. These performers are forces but authentic youth in South Central los Angeles. Their brilliance isn’t just the bright colors of their makeup, it’s the expression of their art dancing fast and frenetic with the intent of rising. Rising above opposition. Dancing amid the intensity that is every day a part of their lives – their struggles. Dancing to release the negative energy using their body as the tool for their art their bodies move like fervent birds Beating their wings to lift off and up to a higher plane, away from where they are grounded, striving against whatever keeps them down.
Krumping is already off the ground and with David Lachapelle putting his lens to it, it’s bound to take off. His short film Crompton picked up awards from Aspen, Telluride, and Sundance Film Festival’s and the full length Rise has been acquired by Lionsgate which will be released in June.
Krumping is a combination of multiple moves that read like a recipe. Take one part stripper gyrations, mix with one part African tribal movements, add hip-hop beats and speed up to an impossible degree. But make it look sharp— vehement. After seeing it you probably want to try it – try to shake it fast and watch yourself. But it’s not simply the movement, the shake and the speed of the bodies that sets this dancing apart. It’s the origin of the dance movement that makes it unique – the clowning movement. The dancers vividly painted faces may look straight up carnival, but clowning is more fight club than Barnum & Bailey. It can look a lot like fighting, it’s fierce and threatening, but it’s more an outlet for aggression than a forum. These performers are forces but authentic youth in South Central los Angeles. Their brilliance isn’t just the bright colors of their makeup, it’s the expression of their art dancing fast and frenetic with the intent of rising. Rising above opposition. Dancing amid the intensity that is every day a part of their lives – their struggles. Dancing to release the negative energy using their body as the tool for their art their bodies move like fervent birds Beating their wings to lift off and up to a higher plane, away from where they are grounded, striving against whatever keeps them down.
Krumping is already off the ground and with David Lachapelle putting his lens to it, it’s bound to take off. His short film Crompton picked up awards from Aspen, Telluride, and Sundance Film Festival’s and the full length Rise has been acquired by Lionsgate which will be released in June.