Fashion
Erykah Badu’s Fearless Evolution Has Made Her an Icon
A look at the singer and songwriter’s signature moments as she is set to receive one of fashion’s highest honors: the Council of Fashion Designers of America’s icon award.
It was nearly 15 years ago that Erykah Badu ignited an early version of an internet firestorm with the release of her risqué video for the song “Window Seat.” Shot in a single take, the video followed Ms. Badu, a Dallas-born singer, as she walked from her car through Dealey Plaza, roughly following the route taken by the motorcade carrying President John F. Kennedy when he was assassinated on Nov. 22, 1963.
As she sauntered, casual but determined, along streets filled with passers-by, Ms. Badu performed a slow-motion striptease, gradually shedding her hoodie, shirt, sneakers and then underclothes before collapsing to the ground naked, as if she had been shot. Drawn across Ms. Badu’s back was a single word: Evolution.
Few performing artists have been more committed to the concept of evolution than Ms. Badu, 53, who later explained to her numerous critics that the video was not a stunt, but a sincere act of protest against cultural conformity.
“I know I don’t always have the most popular positions,” Ms. Badu said by phone from Los Angeles. “And it can be offensive to be not conforming. But I’ve always been that kind of human; I’ve never been anything other than that.”
For that reason alone, the timing seems more apt than ever for Ms. Badu to receive the ultimate fashion recognition: On Monday night at the Museum of Natural History in New York, she will receive the fashion icon award by the Council of Fashion Designers of America.