The fashion and art world lost a legend on Sunday. Virgil Abloh, the artistic director of Louis Vuitton and a prolific designer, died at 41 of a rare cardiac cancer. Abloh is credited with merging street style and high fashion with his massively popular brand Off-White. His gallery exhibit at Boston's ICA wrapped up in September, where he worked with local artist OJ Slaughter. OJ Slaughter joined GBH’s All Things Considered to speak with host Arun Rath about Abloh’s legacy. What follows is a lightly edited transcript.
Arun Rath: Let me say, condolences for your loss and for the loss for everybody of this hugely important figure.
OJ Slaughter: Yeah, thank you. It's absolutely terrible to have him go so, so young, but if anything, I'm really learning that legacy is everything and you can build so much in such a short period of time if you really put your mind to it.
Rath: Let's dive right in and talk about that legacy because you know, as you mentioned, it's so awful to die so young. But Virgil Abloh accomplished a lot in that time.
Slaughter: He did. Virgil Abloh was a brilliant man who changed the way that we look at art and culture, both from the small scale of Boston perspective, but a global perspective. Without him, we wouldn't have Pyrex, which then turned into him creative directing many, many of Kanye West’s projects. His work with Pyrex, his work with Off-White, changed the way that we look at graphic design and streetwear, and it changed the way that I presented myself as an artist, especially as a Black artist, especially a femme artist who kind of lives between gender binaries.
His work made me feel seen and heard, and it allowed me to create work that lets other people be seen and heard. I have been watching his career shine since I was in high school, so to be 10 years out of high school and finally have my work align with his felt like such an honor. And to lose him so soon, it feels unfair, I think, to myself, but also to the rest of the art world.
Rath: Yeah, it sounds unfair to hear you lay out all those gifts. And maybe if you can talk a bit about more about what it meant to you and people like you, because there's an awful lot you laid out there: both being a person of color, and again having to transcend the gender binary, which I'm sure is pretty pervasive in the design world. Put it in a historical context for us — in terms of where Virgil was in terms of being a breakthrough artist.
Slaughter: In America in particular, there is such a fascination with Black art and music and culture. But typically only once it's been handed down a couple of cycles to people that are not Black, through the gaze of appropriation or appreciation, whatever way you would like to format that.
For me, seeing Virgil Abloh, as I saw his career grow, I realized that we were finally getting to put faces to names the people who were creating the art that was creating pop culture. He really took things that were staples, I think, in everyday culture and blew them up to the point where Black people could maintain cultural hold of them versus giving them away to give them power.
And then to see him as the face of Louis Vuitton really made me understand that I was dreaming too small. That I was going by other people's rules until Virgil told me that there were none. And that's something that I think will always stick with me. The visibility of Black culture, of my own culture, not looked at through somebody else's eyes, but through somebody's eyes who looked like me.
Rath: That's amazing, and just kind of incredible to think about how, obviously, I guess the world of design has taken from Africa, from Asia, from all over the world, and then to to see it actually, you know, in one's own hands, in one's own voice, is something else entirely. Could you tell us a bit about the photography exhibit with the ICA? You mentioned what this meant as a young person, and this project involved teens as well, right?
Slaughter: Absolutely. So the ICA project that was worked with Virgil Abloh for "Figures of Speech," those with Virgil Abloh's project, "Church & State," is part of his pop-up retail experience that goes with any of Virgil Abloh museum installations — as far as "Figures of Speech" goes. The museum initially reached out to me to shoot just product photography, and then they had this idea where they wanted to create images of the teens wearing the clothes as a look book.
I pushed back a little bit on that and said I would do it, but I think the teens deserve to see their faces in the museum if they're going to be a part of this. I didn't want this to just be a flash in the pan project. Kris Wilton and Betsy Gibbons, two brilliant individuals from the museum, agreed with me, and they worked really hard to make sure that we made this happen.
As a teenager, I really found a home in museums when I didn't have stability in my own home, and I was so lucky to have access to museums because I look so close to them in New Jersey growing up. When I began to create this project, the idea was, "How do we break rules?" Because that was a prompt that Virgil had given us through this exhibit, was, how do we break the rules?
Myself, Crystal and the team from the ICA Teens sent out a prompt to the teens and said, "Tell us how you break the rules." There was an anonymous application process, and from there I picked six people blindly with my photo team. Me and the teens worked together for months to create work that felt personal to them, but also allowed them to tell their own history through photo. Mr. Abloh allowed the kids to have as many pieces as they would like from his selection with the ICA. They then cut them apart and styled them however they want. There was somebody who took pants and used it as a jacket. They took tote bags and used them as shirts. But through these images, we were allowed to create narratives with the approval of Mr. Abloh.
And it was a beautiful experience for me, and it meant a lot to me to be able to see, you know, Black, brown, queer young people see themselves with art on museum walls for the first time. It was especially important to me to be able to do this work just it because I have young siblings. And it was the first time many of my young siblings were going to be at an art museum. And that was a huge deal to me to be able to bring my siblings to the museum for the first time, and it be their older sibling's work.
This opening for the museum felt especially important because most of the artists who were at the opening were Black artists or artists of the African Diaspora. And right before the public opening, this was after I spoke to Mr. Abloh and we did a walkthrough together, I was able to bring my youngest siblings — they're twin sisters, they're both 13 — through the exhibit. And they at first didn't understand the impact of Mr. Abloh's work. They were really excited to see the Hadid sisters as giant cutouts. They were excited to see other models — the Jenners — that were familiar faces to them.
And my best friend — one of my best friends, his name is Eddy, we call him Fat. Fat turned to me and was like, "I can't believe there are so many Black people on the walls of the museum right now." And my sister Emma looked at me and she's like, "Why is that weird?" And I paused, and for the first time since I created this work, I understood the impact that Virgil Abloh's work was having on our area and across the world. Where young people, who are seeing his work for the first time at this museum, will never, ever have to know a world where Black artists are not the standard for museum work. And not work that is stolen from across seas, that was brought here by pillaging villages — art that was created for Back people, by Black people with intentional Black gaze kept in mind.
Rath: OJ, it's been really good speaking to you, and just appreciate how you help us understand the scale of the loss here. It's massive. Thank you.
Slaughter: Yeah, thank you for speaking with me. And I want to recognize that, you know, I wouldn't be able to do this interview without Mr. Abloh, and I'm doing it in the hopes that I'm honoring his legacy as well. One of the things that he said to me was, you're going to be good, and I'm really striving to be good. May his memory be a blessing to us all.
Rath: Indee. That's local artist OJ Slaughter. We've been talking about Virgil Abloh, the legendary designer artistic director of Louis Vuitton, who died at the age of 41. This is GBH's All Things Considered.
