Rihanna Releases New Art Work Featuring New Album Cover

Rihanna Releases New Art Work Featuring New Album Cover  

New Album "ANTI"

BHR Hollywood Reports..........When Rihanna's Kanye West and Paul McCartney team-up "FourFiveSeconds" dropped in January, fans and industry insiders presumed a new Rihanna album was coming soon. After all, her last LP was in 2012 -- even 10 months ago, it had already been the longest gap between Rihanna albums ever.

 The Bajan-pop princess unveiled both the cover art and title of the record, ANTI, at a magazine party they hosted for her in L.A.

The 27-year-old seemed to confirm the album’s title, previously known as #R8, by posting a snap of the term’s definition via Instagram.

This year, she has released three songs (each accompanied with a music video): “FourFiveSeconds” (a collaboration with Kanye West and Paul McCartney) in January, “Bi*ch Better Have My Money” in March, and “American Oxygen” in April.

 

Rihanna 

 But, this flurry of singles was not followed by a surprise album release or any sort of announcement—eventually, at some point over the summer, rumors abounded that Rihanna had scrapped the entire album and was starting over.

The promise of #R8 seemed less and less certain with each passing carefree Instagram Rihanna posted.

But yesterday, October 7, marks the great turning point: the day #R8 transformed from hazy prospect into palpable reality.

 Rihanna hosted an event at Los Angeles’s Mama gallery, where she debuted the art for the album, all of which was created by artist Roy Nachum (in total, seven original oil paintings by Nachum were featured).

Rihanna had her guests don red eye masks as they perused the exhibit, and asked them to touch large-scale Braille poems which were embedded on top of the images.

Rihanna With At Mama Gallery 

 The cover art, which was not unveiled until Rihanna herself arrived, features the singer as a child, wearing a gold crown and holding a balloon, sheathed in red paint.

(There is something very Kanye-esque about this aesthetic, no?) “I fell in love with [Nachum] because I felt like there was another spirit, there was another layer to the art.

After we met, we talked about what I wanted visually, what would make me the happiest girl in the world," Rihanna said.

The album is called Anti, which Rihanna confirmed on her Instagram account, posting a shot from the exhibit.

 “By continuing to follow her own instincts,” the explanation reads, “her work strives to make an impact by doing the very antithesis of what the public expects.”

Not every R8 mystery has been solved, however—no release date for Anti has been revealed.