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Born from Culture
James Fenwick's global film series showcases traditional cultural clothing, dances, and other practices set against quick cuts and modern Trap music: Siva Samoa, Georgia, Aotearoa - Māori, Armenia. People from other countries/regions have independently made their own (below the cut), reusing the staging and "Mask Off" song from the Georgia video.
Kazakhstan, Uzbekistan, Estonia, Buryatia, Thailand, Azerbaijan, Bashkortostan, Chuvash Rebublic, India, Kalmykia, Kyrgyzstan, Lombok, Republic of Sakha, Tatarstan...
A counterargument delivered by Autre Magazine
posted by one for the books on Oct 22, 2026 at 12:39 PM
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It's great having the counterargument, it helps with the unease you feel even when you like the videos. And Fenwick did really nice work with the original.
posted by mayoarchitect at 11:54 PM
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Wow, this is really interesting. I hate the lyrics of that song, but I bet a lot of the people from other countries who've used it don't even understand the lyrics.
The song does have a vaguely catchy beat and sorta Balkan melody going on. I can see why various creative people from different places might try to jump on the bandwagon, and I like the videos... so I'm not quite sure why the unease or the counterargument?
mayoarchitect, can you talk more about that unease you're feeling?
posted by acridrabbit at 5:45 AM
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I initially thought this was marvelous until I saw the India one and realized that it was obviously all AI--that is to say the exact opposite process (disembodied, trope-repeating, individual, extractive) than that of living in a small peasant village community, moving your body with your extended kinship world and via moves and clothes your parents and grandparents had probably also known. This was not a good feeling to have, but I was glad to have learned about this phenomenon from this post!
posted by johnasdf at 6:37 AM
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I didn't care for all the quick cuts. If I'm watching a terrific dance, I want to see the dance, not little independent snips of assorted dances. I didn't watch enough to think about whether it was AI.
posted by Well I never at 9:05 AM
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Eh. Personally I did not think that juxtaposing the music worked as a fusion, it just felt tacked-on and kinda cheap. Like something from an TV ad campaign. Aside from the images starting off kinda interesting but ending up looking fake.
posted by ovvl at 9:52 AM
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until I saw the India one and realized that it was obviously all AI
I did skip a Turkey video because people seemed confident it was AI. Several of the other videos credited specific directors, dance troupes, etc., so I left them alone, but you're right, I missed India.
posted by one for the books at 10:27 AM
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