Creatives Ye (formerly known as Kanye West) and Denim Tears designer and Supreme creative director Tremaine Emory had a meeting of minds with the pair exchanging a series of texts, some of which Ye posted on his Instagram account. The duo had a massive blow up last week when Emory took issue with Ye describing Virgil Abloh as his best friend. While Emory met Ye through his friendship Abloh, he also worked as a creative consultant and brand director for Ye from 2016-2018.
Ye responded to Emory’s admonition with a series of Instagram posts blasting Emory as “the struggle version of Virgil.” Ye went on to claim that Emory only landed his role as creative director at Supreme because he’s Black, adding that “Tremaine doesn’t even skate.”
The revealing exchange, which was only posted in part, began with Emory noting that Ye “rode on [Abloh] when you knew he was sick.” He added, “That’s the ether. That’s the shit that [you] can’t address. The shit you can’t live with. All the hate you spewed on your brother.”
Responding to Emory’s insistence Ye knew Abloh had cancer, he countered by noting Alboh never personally told him he had cancer. He added that stylist Christine Centenera told him Alboh didn’t have cancer and that he believed her. In the same DM he noted that he only hired Emory because “LVMH took Virgil.” Pushing back on his version of events, Emory wrote, “No you fired Virgil. Virgil worked himself for years before the Louie job.”
Reversing his many public critiques of Abloh, in a touching moment Ye added, “I made mistakes. I [screamed] at Virgil. I was jealous of Virgil. I felt betrayed and lied to by Virgil. I felt he gave Drake the [custom Patek Philippe] green diamond watch just to fuck with me. But I love Virgil to and I miss him and my family.”
In his initial post, Emory noted Ye was only invited to Abloh’s public memorial and not Abloh’s private funeral with family and close friends. Emory added that Ye wanted to speak at the public funeral but he wasn’t allowed we can assume because of the many negative comments he had made about Abloh leading up to his death.
Reflecting on the funeral, Ye wrote that he wanted to speak to the fact A$AP Rocky and A$AP Bari were sitting on opposite side of the room. He wrote, “I just wanted to grab the mic and say, Don’t let these people split your gang up like they did mine.”
Ye then posted DMs in which he wrote as he had in the past about LVMH CEO Bernard Arnault‘s acumen as a business person. He went on to lament as he has in the past that Black people are overly focused on owning pieces of the culture like “braids. The word n*gga. And drip.” Likely weighing in on the next Louis Vuitton creative director of men’s, he wrote, “We need Martine Rose though no cap. She the oracle.”
Weighing in on why Ye hired him, Emory wrote, “You hired me because I worked for frank [Ocean] on blonde/[visual album] endless and [Ocean’s] boys don’t cry magazine.
Ye then apologized to Alboh’s wife, Shannon Abloh, for “taking most of her husbands time from her and they kids.” Addressing Emory, he added, “And thank you for letting me be around this amazing human being for so long. My life is forever changed by Virgil just as his was forever changed by mine.”
In the same text he apologized to Emory for judging him for being an atheist. Emory noted in his response that he’s agnostic, adding “big difference.”
Ye finished out on a conciliatory note, writing, “Talk later?’ emphasizing as he has in the past the importance of Black ownership: “We need more from these companies than to be a black face.”
