Beyonce on Sunday dominated the MTV
Video Music Awards as she won a near-record award haul and awed the
audience with a fiery dance medley with an unstated political message.
The pop superstar won Video of the Year
for “Formation,” the most controversial work of her career, as she took
home eight of the 11 awards for which she was nominated.
“Formation,” the first single off her
intertwined film and album “Lemonade,” was shot in New Orleans and
inspired by the city’s Creole culture, its bounce hip-hop scene and the
aftermath of Hurricane Katrina.
“I dedicate this award to the people of
New Orleans. God bless you guys,” Beyonce told the gala at New York’s
Madison Square Garden.
Beyonce stole the spotlight by
performing for more than 16 minutes songs from “Lemonade,” managing even
to change outfits in a set that culminated in the stage erupting in
fire.
In one of the most striking moments, a
series of gun-shots rang out as her dancers, in angelic white dresses,
each dropped to the ground in a red fog.
The video for “Formation,” directed by
Melina Matsoukas, had offered solidarity with the Black Lives Matter
movement against police brutality with officers portrayed raising their
hands as if under arrest.
Beyonce invited to the show, broadcast
to more than 120 countries, the mothers of four young African American
men whose deaths have galvanized the United States — Michael Brown, Eric
Garner, Oscar Grant and Trayvon Martin.
Martin, 17, was killed in 2012 by a
white neighborhood guard, a catalyst moment for Black Lives Matter.
Brown, Garner and Grant were all killed by law enforcement.
Singer Alicia Keys offered another of
the night’s powerful moments as she recited a poem inspired by civil
rights hero Martin Luther King Jr. who delivered his landmark “I Have a
Dream” speech in Washington 53 years ago Sunday.
In a year marred by global conflict and a
bitter US presidential race, Keys, moving seamlessly from spoken word
to a cappella, said: “If war is holy and sex is obscene, then we got it
twisted in this lucid dream.”
“Maybe we can love somebody / instead of polishing the bombs of holy war.”
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