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Did Kris Jenner Just Confirm That Kanye West’s Behavior Is Performance Art?

Shannon Carlin
May 4, 2018, 4:30 PM
Photo: Victor Boyko/WireImage.
If you are one of the many, many people asking, "What is Kanye doing?" Don't worry, Kris Jenner seems to have an answer for you and it's one that might confirm a fan theory that Kanye West's behavior is a bit of performance art.
Jenner stopped by Ellen in an episode airing Friday where she was asked about West's antics, which included an appearance on TMZ where he said slavery was a choice, but luckily didn't include an appearance on conspiracy theorist Alex Jones' Infowars. (That was a lie.) “What’s going on and is he okay?” Ellen DeGeneres asked and Jenner had an answer. “You know, Kanye has a lot of love for all of you, all of his fans, and everybody who’s been there to support him forever,” Jenner said. "And, I know that he will explain himself in his own way.”
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She then added, “And, I think that anything he does – and I just think this is important to say is – he always does things with really good intentions. So, I’m going to let him explain himself when the time is ready and… I just keep rolling on. Trying to keep up."
The way Jenner carefully words her explanation for West's behavior, it's hard not to feel like she's setting up a plot twist. That perhaps everything West is doing is all for his art. That he could be pulling an Andy Kaufman — someone he appears to have tweeted about recently — or even a Joaquin Phoenix, whose 2010 mockumentary I'm Still Here, in which he pretended to quit acting to become a rapper, didn't win him many friends. Though, it did win over West, who reportedly used one of Phoenix's beats on Pusha T's 2013 My Name Is My Name.
Jenner's answer to the West saga also feels like it's another clue that a recent Twitter theory about West pulling a fast one on us could be true. Earlier this week, Twitter user @Snowcone965 wrote, "Get your tinfoil hats and red string, I’ve got a conspiracy theory: @kanyewest is in the middle of a performance art piece and the clues are right in front of us." In a thread, they point out that before West was losing friends over MAGA tweets, he was sharing photos from David Hammons, who's work, @Snowcone965 explained was "aimed to 'turn racist cliches (spade) on its head.'”
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Another sign that some of West's recent comments about slavery could be tied to performance art is that 'Ye also shared photos "from an art installation Beuys did in 1974 called I Like America and America Likes Me, where he locked himself into a room with a coyote for 3 days." The purpose was to see if these wild animals could be tamed through "Beuys’ desire to heal.”
Healing through love is something West has been talking a lot about on Twitter. On April 28, he tweeted, "I've got a new challenge for everyone today. Pick somebody that you had an argument with that you think you hate maybe even someone you haven't spoken to in years and contact that person and tell them I love you." And he's talked about forgiving the surgeon who performed his late mother, Donda West's plastic surgery shortly before her death. He's also been making the point that original ideas aren't always best, which could be a pre-explanation for this stunt.
All of this is why this Twitter user thinks West is giving his own take on Beuy's art experiment. "He’s embraced what might be considered the coyote of today. Gotten close to it. Trump, Candace Owens, Alt Right," @Snowcone965 wrote. "Maybe he sees this as a better chance to 'tame' the coyote than more traditional methods."
Jenner revealed to DeGeneres that the Keeping Up cameras have been rolling for West's public drama. But, maybe the filming is really just part of whatever project he is planning, which might be looking at fake news, a topic his buddy Donald Trump loves.
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West may even be thinking this is his magic trick to pull off, since one of his collaborators has been tweeting about The Prestige, a 2006 movie about two magicians looking to perform the ultimate magic trick. "In the movie (idk if it’s true or not) the prestige is the reveal to the illusion," @SnowCone965 wrote. "You take an ordinary thing (Kanye’s usual stance) make it something extraordinary (supporting Trump) and then the prestige turns it back into something ordinary. Is the album his prestige?"
It doesn't seem farfetched from West, a man who reappropriated the Confederate flag for his Yeezus tour merch and is now proudly wearing a red MAGA hat. The Kardashians' reality show might not be scripted (haha!), but that doesn't mean West isn't working on something that is. Fans will have to wait and see — that is, if they can stomach it.
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