Exile, Deportation, and Convergence, 2021

In this art piece, we see the last emperor of Ethiopia, Haile Selassie sitting on a bench, in conversation with the late rapper Daniel Dumile aka MF Doom.

Both men had taken up permanent or temporary residence in England, after being forcibly removed from their land of birth or the land they called "home".

Emperor Selassie was forced into exile when Italian Fascist Dictator Benito Mussolini acted on his colonial desire and invaded Ethiopia, resulting in a 5 year occupation which was dubbed as “Etiopia Italiana" in Italian ("The Italian Empire of Ethiopia").

MF Doom, born in London and relocated to New York City, was the child of immigrant parents from Trinidad and Zimbabwe respectively. A failure to secure permanent residency in the US for MF Doom as a child, led to a lengthy battle of navigating the complex US immigration system. In 2010, upon returning to the US from a world tour, MF Doom was denied entry to the place he called "home" and deported back to the United Kingdom.

In contrast to Emperor Haile Selassie who bore the title "The King of Kings", the hip hop community bestowed the title "The Rapper's Rapper" upon MF Doom. In his own right he was among hip hop royalty as his single-syllable rhymes infused with comic books and his obscure references, adding to his enigmatic persona which made him the Thelonius Monk of Hip Hop.

Overall this piece conveys the continued upheaval of people of African descent across the globe, regardless of economic, political or social status.