On Friday, July 19, Kool DJ Red Alert is being honored with a statue in Harlem to commemorate his 40 years in radio. The statue, which will live in Montefiore Square, was designed by artist Sherwin Banfield, who has also crafted commemorative pieces for the late Christopher “The Notorious B.I.G” Wallace, LL Cool J, and more.
Banfield, a native of Trinidad who immigrated to the United States in the 1980s, has lived in Queens, NY for the past 13 years.
“When I moved to this country, Hip Hop was the gravity that helped to assimilate me into this culture,” Banfield tells WBLS.com. “And it also provided information that wasn’t broadcast on the news. Hip hop gave me the real story of what was happening at the ground level in this country. And Red Alert was instrumental in providing the sounds.”
Banfield, who holds a BFA with honors from Parsons School of Design, spent three weeks creating the statue and feels that building installations like DJ Red Alert’s is a calling.
“[Hip Hop] is just an incredible story and I feel like it wasn’t being preserved in a way. So, I’m like, I got to get these legends to at least live in a public space where the community would not normally go to a museum that’s just like a field trip or something. If it’s in their space, then they could at least see themselves reflected through these sculptures.”
Art Official Intelligence
One of Banfield’s first public sculptures is 2018’s “A Cipher In Queens,” which features the late Malik “Phife Dawg” Taylor of A Tribe Called Quest, Jam Master Jay, and Prodigy of Mobb Deep. This was followed by LL Cool J’s “The Goat” in 2021 and a “Sky’s The Limit” portrait of The Notorious BIG in 2023. The process for creating each piece is as unique as the final product, which includes a custom playlist that adds a musical element to the physical tribute.
“It’s the life that happens after doing one statue that helps to create or motivate the next one,” he explains. “The ideas from each project fold into the other [and] I have themes that reoccur throughout all the projects. I have a symbol, the content of Africa that symbolizes the source of the frequency of the sounds that come out of us. That’s in our DNA. And then the LL was the first bronze because that had a bigger budget. The LL was also the first one that had solar panels because it was a solution to a problem.
‘The Cipher in Queens’ was in Socrates Park and they had power, so I was able to run power from that source to power the music. By the time we got to LL, there wasn’t any power. So I’m like, all right, let’s try solar panels. And that worked out. Then the solar panels became a thing ongoing through the rest of the sculptures. Red’s sculpture, he’s actually scratching on a type of turntable, but that turntable is a solar panel.”
“Red’s sculpture, he’s actually scratching on a type of turntable, but that turntable is a solar panel.”
SHERWIN BANFIELD, ARTIST
Thanks to support from The Harlem Sculpture Garden and the West Harlem Art Fund, plans were put in motion for a DJ Red Alert sculpture.
“I met with Red just to tap his mind, learn about his story and to get ideas and inspiration. So, Red was the first sculpture where I sat down with the legend and was able to build and ask questions and get feedback, understand his story, and put those ideas into sculpture.”
While DJ Red Alert is a spry sexagenarian rocking the WBLS airwaves every Saturday night from 6pm to 8pm, his sculpture features a younger Red cutting up on one of his custom crimson turntables.
“I chose a younger version of Red because I believe that the story of Hip Hop needs to be preserved from its inception. Hip Hop was started by young people trying to find a method of escaping their reality and creating an environment where they could have fun and express themselves,” he says before sharing details on the design.
“I decided to paint it gold because it’s a metal that’s associated with kings from Africa, and that’s what our lineage is. And we also have the Golden Era, which [Red Alert] helped to develop and grow. He’s been on the radio for 40 years, so I included an ‘on-air’ radio sign. His Afro is there, that symbol of our hair and our power, our growth. So, there’s some things happening there that I think are noteworthy.”
In addition to Red Alert’s installation, Banfield will be unveiling a tribute to another Hip Hop legend, VJ Ralph McDaniels, who is also celebrating his 40th year in the culture.
“On Thursday next week at Jamaica Performing Arts Center, I’m the curator of Jamaica Flux, so we have six amazing artists that I’ll be unveiling for this program, but I’m also going to be unveiling my Ralph McDaniels statue. And then Friday, the day after, that’s the Red statue unveiling. So it is back-to-back statue unveiling with two legends that have helped craft the culture and have helped create many, many, many careers.”
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