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# J Dilla Gets Reanimated in a Video Collage
- URL: https://hyperallergic.com/j-dilla-gets-reanimated-in-a-video-collage/
- Published: 2016-05-13T20:29:58.000Z
- Updated: 2025-11-24T16:29:24.000Z
- Description: After a decade of anticipation, The Diary, a long-lost solo album by late hip-hop legend J Dilla, was released last month.
- Author: Carey Dunne
- Tags: Art, Music Videos, Review, #wp, #wp-post, #image-position-hidden, #Import 2025-11-24 07:17 (2016, 2017, part 1)

![2baU8b2 - Imgur](https://storage.ghost.io/c/51/f8/51f871d8-b6be-4a73-b958-0ca4fff0110a/content/images/hyperallergic-newspack-s3-amazonaws-com/uploads/2016/05/2bau8b2-imgur.gif)

Clip from official music video for J Dilla, “The Sickness,” directed by Ruffmercy (2016) (all GIFs by the author for Hyperallergic)

After a decade of anticipation, *The Diary*, a long-lost solo album by late hip-hop legend J Dilla, was [released last month](http://pitchfork.com/reviews/albums/21709-j-dilla-the-diary/?ref=hyperallergic.com). It’s his sixth posthumous album, made from the last batch of unreleased material the rapper was working on before his death in 2006\. In a new video for “The Sickness,” a [bonus track](http://www.rappcats.com/j-dilla-the-sickness/?ref=hyperallergic.com) produced by his frequent [collaborator](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Champion%5FSound?ref=hyperallergic.com) Madlib and featuring Nas, Basquiat crowns float over heads and tiny Dillas bloom into mandalas.

Bristol-based artist [Ruffmercy](http://www.ruffmercy.com/?ref=hyperallergic.com) created a dense, dazzling video collage from grainy archival footage of Dilla. There’s not much footage of the late rapper-producer around, so this is a rare reanimation — most of the footage here is previously unseen and dates from 2003 and 2004\. Best known for his likewise Basquiat-inspired music video for the Young Thug, Freddie Gibbs, and A$AP Ferg song “[Old English](http://www.dezeen.com/2015/01/24/ruffmercy-music-video-old-english-single-young-thug-freddie-gibbs-asap-ferg-basquiat/?ref=hyperallergic.com),” Ruffmercy visualizes “The Sickness” with kaleidoscopic colors and hand-drawn animation: Keith Haring–style squiggles burst off Dilla’s body; neon words (“disease,” “nuts,” “uh”) crack into the frame like lightning bolts; aerial black-and-white shots of New York City provide a glitchy backdrop. The best music videos look like what they sound like, and the animation here is a kind of [visual onomatopoeia](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bouba/kiki%5Feffect?ref=hyperallergic.com), translating language and sound into quivering abstract shapes.

![yTrzu80 - Imgur](https://storage.ghost.io/c/51/f8/51f871d8-b6be-4a73-b958-0ca4fff0110a/content/images/hyperallergic-newspack-s3-amazonaws-com/uploads/2016/05/ytrzu80-imgur.gif)

Clip from official music video for J Dilla, “The Sickness,” directed by Ruffmercy (2016)

![2gBDbQV - Imgur](https://storage.ghost.io/c/51/f8/51f871d8-b6be-4a73-b958-0ca4fff0110a/content/images/hyperallergic-newspack-s3-amazonaws-com/uploads/2016/05/2gbdbqv-imgur.gif)

Clip from official music video for J Dilla, “The Sickness,” directed by Ruffmercy (2016)