FKA Twigs, a Craftsman
While intimately navigating body aches, heartaches, and art aches, she had to accept the ugly parts of growth in order to extricate herself. As part of her fracturing and healing, she took on crafts.
I am convinced women only get more powerful after heartbreak.
Fka twigs is a robust example. I witnessed FKA twigs churn a crowd with her hypnotic voice akin to a siren in 2019, months after exiting an abusive relationship with Shia LaBeouf. Every step she took in her four-inch heels was intentional and firm. She dipped her body very low and very unafraid, but then rolled back up like reverted rainfall. The lights flickered approvingly in rhythm. Her eye makeup was just as bold as the Medieval costumes she wore. An alien ship could just have come from the sky and swallowed her while she perfectly landed an arabesque — all of this lived in the realm of possibilities because it was FKA twigs.
Twigs began her career dancing in music videos for Jessie J, Ed Sheeran, Taio Cruz, and many more. In spite of her dance career success, she hoped to steer away from the “video girl” identity. Since then, Twigs released three critically acclaimed albums and earned a Grammy nomination, earning a reputation as a notable British singer, songwriter, dancer, and actress. Yet, she is constantly redefining herself. On her Instagram page, she currently honors herself by simplistically identifying herself as a craftsman.
Twigs admitted to a reckoning during the creation of her latest album, Magdalene. While intimately navigating body aches, heartaches, and art aches, she had to accept the ugly parts of growth in order to extricate herself. As part of her fracturing and healing, she took on crafts.
Twigs demonstrated wushu sword fighting techniques in “Sad Day” and tap dancing in her Magdalene tour. FKA Twigs intensely trained in pole dancing for one year to prepare for the video for “Cellophane”. In the music video, she twirls on a pole wearing a golden two-piece set. Twigs confronts a dragon that shares her face and falls at the will of gravity into the mud until she is revived by tender feminine creatures. With her hauntingly beautiful lyrics ‘And didn't I do it for you? Why don't I do it for you?’, Twigs yearns to love and be loved in the most genuine ways — her self-preservation is rebirth itself.
New life always comes with vulnerability for Twigs. She wrestles with the hurt that comes from attachment in “Good to Love”, a single released in 2016. Then in 2022, she wrenchingly takes us through her push and pull of longing in “Killer”. Timeless emotional honesty is another craft she is constantly practicing and employing to tell her story. By sharing her truth, many women can find solidarity in her resilience, particularly heartbroken women.
“After a lifetime of never quite finding my place in company I now realise that my true home is in practice & the learning of new skills,” she writes in an Instagram caption. “If one day I completely disappear, I am not gone, I am just in a safe space somewhere, learning something new and touching the veil.”
She is endlessly reemerging and celebrating her multidimensionality. With Caprisongs, her mixtape released in 2022, came a reintroduction. ‘I'm not the rockstar's girlfriend, I am the rockstar girlfriend,’ she proclaims in “Which Way”. Caprisongs is a celebration of how far she has come and how far she will go. Twigs is the main character and every man that has been amiss to her weight has lost.
Drawing strength from being emotionally naked, she expresses self-doubt in “Meta angel”. She is tired of not being the Twigs she dreams of, but a friend reminds her that ‘The universe is so powerful. You're gonna be more free and you're gonna love more and you're gonna have more fun’. Over and over again, she is each of us.
Every craftsman knows that discipline comes with persistence. Every lover knows that heartbreak is not an endpoint; no beginning or ending in love stories, just continuation. Despite the pain from mourning past versions of herself, Twigs vows to never give up, to continue. In her grieving, she harnesses the potency of falling apart to create for the sake of learning, alignment, and liberation. Twigs shoots down a docile version of herself with a bow and arrow in the visual narrative of “Meta angel”. She chooses to use the friction to unlock herself, reimagining herself free and sexy. Just by witnessing her, we are invited to step into our craft because we all too can be crafts-people.
About Nancy Uddin
Nancy Uddin is a Muslim artist based in New York City. She often explores identity, culture, and wellness in her writing. Nancy has bylines in Dazed, Vogue, and HuffPost. She values change, impermanence, and infinite love.
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