Kanye West, a 42-year-old designer and Founder of the apparel company Yeezy said he is considering self-identifying as Christian Genius Billionaire Kanye West.
West made a surprise appearance at the Fast Company Innovation
Festival in New York with Steven Smith, head of design at his footwear brand
Yeezy.
The outing was their first public appearance together. He
said he had thought of changing his name for a short while.
“When people say it’s crass to call yourself a billionaire, I might legally change my name to Christian Genius Billionaire Kanye West for a year until y’all understand exactly what it is,” he said.
The statement seems to be in response to Forbes’s recent ranking which listed Kanye as one of the richest hip-hop artists estimating his personal net worth at $250 million.
“Martin Luther King didn’t get killed because he had a dream;
he had something else he was going to talk about. He talked about black
empowerment, economic empowerment,” the 42-year-old musician-entrepreneur said.
“When I did Forbes, I showed them a $890 million receipt and they still didn’t say billionaire.”
Though, this wasn’t the first time, the Yeezy founder had
mauled the idea of changing his name. Back in 2009, while promoting a line of
sneakers, West said he’d change his name to Martin Louis the King Jr.
…He hinted at a 2024 Presidential run…
Still not done with his jaw-dropping comments, West said he
would run for the President of the United States in 2024.
“When I run for the President in 2024,” he began. This statement led to sparked laughter from the audience.
“What y’all laughing at? We would create so many jobs! I’m no going to run; I’m going to walk. When you see headlines saying Kanye’s crazy – one in three African Americans are in jail and all the celebrities are in Jail also because they can’t say nothing, they got no opinion, they’re so scared!”
… then, revealed how an LVMH-Yeezy deal fell through
West revealed he was eyeing a deal with the global fashion
brand LVMH; however, the deal fell through during one of the most difficult
times of his life.
It was around that time that his wife Kim Kardashian was robbed at a gunpoint in Paris and he was hospitalized for exhaustion.
But, in spite of all these, he was on hand to support his
friend Virgil Abloh as he was appointed the creative director of menswear at
Louis Vuitton which made him the first African American to hold that position
in the 14-year history of the brand.
“Bernard Arnault could have picked anyone he wanted to be the head of Louis Vuitton and who was it? And as I got on that flight, I knew I had to go. Because if I didn’t go and give Virgil that hug, who was I then?
No one knew that the deal had been pulled. Nobody Knew That was the beginning of my going to the hospital. No one knew how this game is.”
