Hip Hop Honeys

Book excerpt: They've been essential parts of decades-worth of rap videos yet rarely get the spotlight. That all changes with this book, where the women move to the foreground to be celebrated and showered with attention all their own. It's time to flip it and make the male rappers the window-dressing! What do you call the women in hip-hop videos? The often nameless ones who are featured dancing or posing, whose presence signals baller status for the usually male rapper they are there to support-are they hip-hop honeys, video vixens, video girls, models, dancers? Are they revered, over-sexualized, demeaned, or empowered? Are they stars or set pieces? Who are the women you see in videos?Photographer Brian Finkespent three years hanging out at backstage music-video shoots, getting to know these "hip-hop honeys,". Finke brings his style of robustportraiture and documentary photography to the women who appear in countless videos for artists like Busta' Rhymes, Kanye West, and many other B and C level video artists.