Chromatic Chronciles

 23BE033067   Power in Pixels: A Formal Analysis of Peter Obi’s Presidential Campaign Poster Campaign posters are more than just graphics they are silent speeches. They tell you who a candidate is, what they stand for, and how they want to be seen. In the 2023 Nigerian general elections, Peter Obi’s campaign poster stood out. It was clean, minimal, and emotionally powerful. But what made it so effective wasn’t just the face or the party it was how the image was designed. Using formal media analysis, this essay breaks down the poster’s visual elements color, typography, composition, and symbols to show how they worked together to create a message of hope, change, and national unity. When I first saw Peter Obi’s campaign poster, what struck me was the simplicity. In a political environment where posters are often filled with text and loud visuals, Obi’s was different. It used a white background a bold choice that immediately conveyed cleanliness, honesty, and transparency. I...

  23BE033067 Title: Class on Display: A Marxist Critique of Chief Daddy   EbonyLife’s Chief Daddy is a film that’s hard to ignore. It’s flashy, chaotic, and filled with stars. On the surface, it looks like just another Nollywood comedy family drama, inheritance drama, plenty of laughs. But underneath the laughter is a clear message ,wealth ,rules and everything. When I watched it through a Marxist lens, I began to see that Chief Daddy is more than just a family feud. It’s a celebration of capitalist values and elite privilege, wrapped in humor and glamour. This essay argues that instead of challenging class inequality, Chief Daddy actually reinforces it by glorifying the rich, ignoring the poor, and turning class struggle into a show. Marxist theory, at its core, is about power. It focuses on the relationship between the bourgeoisie (those who own the means of production) and the proletariat (the working class). Karl Marx argued that all of history is shaped by class confl...

  23BE033067 A Stuart Hall Reading of CNN’s EndSARS Coverage On October 20, 2020, the world watched as Nigerian youth took to the streets in protest, demanding an end to police brutality and the notorious SARS unit. But even more powerful than the protest was the media coverage that followed particularly CNN’s investigative report “How a Bloody Night of Bullets Quashed a Young Protest Movement.” While many Nigerians already knew the truth of what happened at the Lekki Toll Gate that night, CNN’s report introduced the tragedy to an international audience, using visuals, witness accounts,   to build a case. But how this message was received depended heavily on the viewer. Using Stuart Hall’s Encoding/Decoding theory, I want to explore how CNN’s report was encoded with a particular message, but decoded differently by various audiences some accepting, others rejecting, and some somewhere in-between. Stuart Hall’s model argues that media texts are not just passively received th...

    Through the A Critical Look at Tiwa Savage’s Koroba Male Gaze and Oppositional Gaze   Tiwa Savage’s Koroba is flashy, bold, and unapologetically feminine. But beneath the catchy beat and glamorous visuals lies a deeper struggle one between control and objectification, between performance and perception. As I watched the video, I couldn’t stop thinking who really owns the image of Tiwa Savage in this piece? Is it her, or is it the camera, the audience, or even the industry itself? Using Laura Mulvey’s theory of the Male Gaze and bell hooks’ Oppositional Gaze, I want to explore how Koroba plays with the politics of looking especially when it comes to Nigerian Black womanhood. Mulvey’s “Visual Pleasure and Narrative Cinema” argues that in most mainstream visual culture, women are positioned to be looked at framed for male pleasure. She calls this the male gaze, where the camera often mirrors the heterosexual male’s perspective. When I applied this to Koroba, I noti...

  23BE033067 Title: Bell hooks, Representation, and the Cultural Framing of Joy in Glo’s ‘Feliz Navidad Nigeria!’   Introduction The late bell hooks, a prolific Black feminist scholar and cultural critic, challenged the ways race, gender, and class intersect to shape how people especially Black women are seen and treated in society. Her work placed strong emphasis on the politics of representation, calling out how media and advertising often reflect and reinforce systems of oppression. hooks argued that popular culture is not separate from politics, but rather one of its most powerful vehicles. “Representation is the ‘hot issue’ in terms of the connection between race and the body in our contemporary culture,” she once noted in her book Black Looks: Race and Representation. Using hooks’ perspective, this critique examines Glo Nigeria’s festive commercial, Feliz Navidad Nigeria!, a colorful holiday ad that celebrates unity and joy across the country. Although the ad appea...

 23BE033067 Feliz Navidad Nigeria! by Glo — A Critical Look Through Laura Mulvey   Introduction Glo’s Feliz Navidad Nigeria! ad is a vibrant, emotional celebration of the holiday season in Nigeria. At first glance, it seems like a harmless, heartwarming message of unity, joy, and cultural pride. But when looked at through the lenses of feminist and cultural theory especially those of Laura Mulvey and bell hooks it becomes clear that even joyful media content carries deeper meanings. Ads don’t just sell products; they also shape how we see gender, identity, and culture. In this piece, I’ll use Mulvey’s concept of the “male gaze”   to explore how the Glo ad sends messages beyond what’s on the surface. Laura Mulvey’s theory of the “male gaze,” introduced in her well-known 1975 essay Visual Pleasure and Narrative Cinema, is a powerful tool for understanding how women are portrayed in media. She argues that women are often positioned as visual objects for the pleasure ...

 23BE033067 In Stuart Hall’s encoding/decoding model, communication is seen as a process that involves not only the creator of a message (the encoder) but also the receiver (the decoder). According to Hall, audiences do not simply absorb the intended meaning of a media message; instead, they actively interpret it based on their own cultural background, experiences, and understanding of the world. Hall breaks this interpretation down into three possible readings: dominant, oppositional, and negotiated. A negotiated reading occurs when a viewer understands the dominant message being communicated and accepts parts of it but also resists or questions other elements. The Gucci × Dapper Dan collaboration is a strong example of how this theory works in practice. On the surface, the campaign is clearly meant to promote themes like cultural inclusion, Black excellence, and historical recognition. Gucci partners with legendary Harlem designer Dapper Dan who was once excluded from mainstream ...

  23BE033067   MIXING LUXURY WITH LOCAL CULTURE The Gucci × Dapper Dan collaboration is framed in the promo as a celebration of Harlem’s iconic style and craftsmanship. But through a Marxist lens, this isn’t just about appreciation—it’s about how capitalist brands capitalize on subculture. Filming in Dapper Dan’s old neighborhood vibes with authenticity, but ultimately Gucci controls the profits and intellectual property. This setup shows how valuable local culture gets turned into products, reinforcing corporate power even while appearing to celebrate creative communities. Honestly, while watching the video, I was impressed at first. It looked like a positive collaboration Gucci embracing Harlem culture. But when I started thinking about it through what we learned in class about Marxism, it became clear there’s more going on under the surface. Throughout the video, Gucci’s luxury branding is front and center high-end fabrics, polished logos, and a sleek studio feel. Mea...