PARIS –
Based on a news report, the Balenciaga fashion house has severed ties with Ye, the rapper previously known as Kanye West.
Ye was suspended from Instagram and Twitter after making numerous offensive comments, including anti-Semitic posts.
“Balenciaga has ceased to have any relationship with this artist, nor any plans for forthcoming projects involving this artist,” holding company Kering said in response to a query Friday, without elaborating.
Ye had worked with Balenciaga as well as its artistic director, Demna Gvasalia, on several projects.
The label has also maintained an active association with Ye’s ex-wife, Kim Kardashian, who has popped up in their ad campaigns & credits her ex husband with connecting her to the brand.
Ye was recently barred from posting on both Twitter and Instagram due to anti-Semitic posts that breached the social networks’ policies.
He has also implied that slavery was an option and referred to the COVID-19 vaccine as the “mark of the beast.”
Following his exclusion from social media platforms, he has offered to purchase the right-wing-friendly social platform Parler.
All through Paris Fashion Week, the rap star walked as a model in Balenciaga’s ready-to-wear show, which designer Demna Gvasalia called a “iconic moment” at the time.
He was then seen clad in a Balenciaga-branded black dental brace at Givenchy’s collection.
Ye was also chastised for wearing a “White Lives Matter” T-shirt to his Yeezy collection show in Paris that week, and the shirt even showed up on the runway.
White Lives Matter is a neo-Nazi organization, as stated by the Southern Poverty Law Center, that also tracks hate groups.
In recent times, Ye has severed Yeezy’s ties with Gap as well as told Bloomberg that he intends to cut ties with his corporate suppliers.
Adidas has put its sneaker deal with Ye on hold, and JPMorganChase and Ye have called it quits despite the banking breakup being in the works even before his antisemitic remarks.
