He is ‘an American contemporary visual artist working in the mediums of painting, drawing, sculpture and printmaking’, currently living and working in New York City. George Condo was born in 1957 in Concord, New Hampshire. This cover was designed by George Condo, and is one of the many designs made for the album, as shown below. The strong red is the only colour that really stands out on the cover, suggesting that Kanye has a strong heart, but has been hurt and emotionally damaged, causing everything else to turn sombre. I see the deflated heart itself being a clear metaphor for the emptiness and vulnerability Kanye was feeling, due to the events that had occurred.

The deflated heart is composed in the center of the cover, although not taking up a large portion of it, leaving the surrounding area empty. They go on to say ‘This stripped down look may not have been entirely new, but Kanye was the first artist to successfully pull off and popularize such an aesthetic’, after placing it #1 on the 50 best rap album covers of the past 5 years. Complex called the minimal approach ‘groundbreaking at the time’. The cover itself was also a departure from the usual ‘loud’ covers Kanye used in his previous albums. The original cover features nothing but a deflated balloon in the shape of a heart with a subdued strip of swatches, photographed by Kristen Yiengst, and designed by Virgil Abloh (creative director of the Off-White and Louis Vuitton brands) West said that he wished to classify the album in a genre called ‘pop art’, stating that it was the musical equivalent of the visual art movement. West described this album as ‘therapeutic’. These things occured whilst he was still adapting to his pop star status. Months later, his fiancee Alexis Phifer ended their relationship. In 2007, Kanye lost his mother after complications during cosmetic surgery. It is also said to influence a new wave of rappers and singers who adopted 808’s style. It was very different from his previous albums, using sparse electronic sounds and auto-tune instead of conventional hip-hop sounds.

The album was created in a difficult time in Kanye’s life, and featured lyrics exploring themes of loss, alienated fame and heartbreak. 808’s & Heartbreak was Kanye’s forth studio album, recorded between September and October of 2008 and released November 24th 2008.

Kaws 808s and heartbreak