VMA 2016: Alicia Keys clarifies she’s not anti-makeup after showing up makeup-free at the 2016 MTV Awards
Despite not winning any citation during 2016 MTV’s Video Music Awards, soul singer Alicia Keys made headlines after showing up makeup-free at the prestigious music event Sunday.
It was not the first time for the “If I Ain’t Got You” singer-songwriter to appear in public without wearing cosmetic makeup. But Keys’ decision to ditch makeup elicited praises among makeup-free advocates and fans.
Keys, who was born as Alicia Augello Cook, has also chosen to appear without makeup on “The Voice” season 11. The 35-year-old pianist-record producer joins Miley Cyrus, Adam Levine and Blake Shelton as judges of the top-rated talent show which starts airing on Sep. 19 on NBC. (Click here for a related story)
While embracing her makeup-free look, the “Girl on Fire” hitmaker, however, clarified that she is not anti-make up.
Before her aesthetic shift, the 15-time Grammy Award-winning artist wrote a column for lennyletter.com wherein she said choosing to be makeup-free is a result of meditation.
“In one song I wrote, called ‘When a Girl Can't Be Herself,’ it says,
In the morning from the minute that I wake up / What if I don't want to put on all that makeup / Who says I must conceal what I'm made of / Maybe all this Maybelline is covering my self-esteem
No disrespect to Maybelline, the word just worked after the maybe. But the truth is … I was really starting to feel like that — that, as I am, I was not good enough for the world to see.
This started manifesting on many levels, and it was not healthy.”
Key’s deciding moment to uncover came after she shot a makeup-free portrait for her recent album right after a gym session.
“It was just a plain white background, me and the photographer intimately relating, me and that baseball hat and scarf and a bunch of invisible magic circulating. And I swear it is the strongest, most empowered, most free, and most honestly beautiful that I have ever felt.
I felt powerful because my initial intentions realized themselves. My desire to listen to myself, to tear down the walls I built over all those years, to be full of purpose, and to be myself! The universe was listening to those things I'd promised myself, or maybe I was just finally listening to the universe, but however it goes, that's how this whole #nomakeup thing began. Once the photo I took with Paola came out as the artwork for my new song "In Common," it was that truth that resonated with others who posted #nomakeup selfies in response to this real and raw me.
I hope to God it's a revolution.
'Cause I don't want to cover up anymore. Not my face, not my mind, not my soul, not my thoughts, not my dreams, not my struggles, not my emotional growth. Nothing.”