Star Image Analysis: Kelis Rogers

The artist I am analysing is Kelis Rogers. Kelis was born august the 21st 1979 in New York. She began recording her first album kaleidoscope in the summer of 1998 and it was finished within a year. Her album was produced by other well known artists such as Pharrell Williams and Chad Hugo. Her main genres are R&B, hip-hop.

Kelis’s early image was portrayed through an R&B/ dancehall track called ’Milkshake’. This gave her audience an insight on how she controls and manipulates men. She uses her flirtatious nature and body language to overpower men. In the lyrics of this song it states ‘my milkshake brings all the boys to the yard’. She uses the word milkshake as a metaphor to describe herself and say that the boys love her. Kelis constantly uses sexual suggestion in her music video to help them sell. Being a R&B track, it is normally dominated by male artists and women are normally used as pretty objects and for selling tracks. In one of the scenes from her video we see a couple that are sitting down and the man becomes entranced by kelis. We can clearly see that from this one video that Kelis is a sexual and persuasive character. Kelis has had a strong image since the beginning of her career.

However, in her later career she seems more vulnerable and less independent. In her music video ‘4th of july’ she seems very dependant on the man she is talking about. In her lyrics she says ‘ didn’t think I needed you, never seemed to but I'm living proof ….. nothing will be as good as loving you’. This is a big change in her personality from her earlier career. This is because she has now started to have feelings for this person compared to her earlier career where she seemed very promiscuous and flirtatious. It is like she is care free and wild so that she can sell herself better to fans at the beginning of her career but now she has settled into the business she is starting to show her true feelings.

She doesn’t often act in her videos however in her video ‘caught out there’ she plays the character of a lady who has been cheated on by her boyfriend. She is shown performing when she goes crazy and starts throwing things across the room. It also shows her in a stray jacket suggesting that she is restricted in what she really wants to do. This relates to the majority of women who feel they cannot do anything about it. But in this case she has hurt her cheating boyfriend. This video has a very strong but general message and was made so that women worldwide wouldn’t feel alone and it shows how certain people would react to the situation.

This is an image of her leaning against a window and looking into the camera. this suggests that she is trapped and is searching for help.

One of the main motifs in kelis’s videos is that there are close-ups of her face. She uses this to express her emotions and to gain sympathy or love from the audience depending on what she is singing. The record company attempts to sell kelis by using close-up shots because this shows her expressions and grabs the audience's attention especially if she has lots of make-up on. For instance in her video ‘caught out there’ her hair is a blonde afro with pink tips showing the situation is natural but the pink (which is an unnatural hair colour) also shows she gone mad about what has happened. The colour also signifies girl power. The record company attempts to sell kelis to her female and male audience several ways. In videos such as ‘4th of july’ or ‘milkshake’ they both have very different messages such as vulnerability and promiscuity yet they will both attract her male audience because the majority of males appeal to these things. Whereas in her video ‘bossy’ it will attract her female audience and she is shown to be a strong and powerful. This will appeal to her female fans because it will give them inspiration being that males are normally dominant.

The camerawork and editing reinforces her roles and positions in her videos. For example the video ‘bossy’ shows loads of close-ups of her face to show that she is the boss of the video. The video also cuts to the beat and shows different clips of her being bossy.

For example in one clip she is standing on a mans back wearing high heels. This gesture definitely shows her dominance while showing the mans submission. This is also her album cover so even before we hear the music we can see that she holds the power.


Overall I think that kelis has gone through different phases and experiences in her life which in effect has changed her style and genre. But when summarising all the meanings of her together it makes a lot of sense. In the beginning she was cheated on by her boyfriend. Then a little while after she was on the rebound and became very flirtatious and seductive. Then finally, after overcoming this bad experience she was able to trust again and starts talking about her love and romance in her songs. To me she is a very good example of how women can defeat their troubles and bad experiences and because she went through different stages and the outcome was positive. It shows that time is a healer.