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By Verónica Bayetti Flores • @veroconplatanos • 10 years ago

Feministing Jamz: Artist you need to know – Ibeyi

Ibeyi are French-Cubana twins Naomi and Lisa-Kaindé Díaz. The daughters of accomplished Afro-Cuban percussionist Anga Díaz (of Buena Vista Social Club fame), they put out their Oya EP a few weeks ago, and I’ve had their gorgeous melodies and sparse beats in my head nonstop.

Two brownskinned women, one with an afro, the other with long and curly hair, wearing gold accessories.

The Oya EP just has two distinct tracks, but their voices keep me coming back to them. The video for River – sung in English and Yoruba, and dedicated to river goddess Oshun – is an intense, simple, yet visually stunning single-shot video of a baptism, where the submerged women emerge only to sing their parts.

You can find the Oya EP on Spotify.

1bfea3e7449eff65a94e2e55a8b7acda-bpfullVerónica loves that creepy video.

New York, NY

Verónica Bayetti Flores has spent the last years of her life living and breathing reproductive justice. She has led national policy and movement building work on the intersections of immigrants' rights, health care access, young parenthood, and LGBTQ liberation, and has worked to increase access to contraception and abortion, fought for paid sick leave, and demanded access to safe public space for queer youth of color. In 2008 Verónica obtained her Master’s degree in the Sexuality and Health program at Columbia University’s Mailman School of Public Health. She loves cooking, making art, listening to music, and thinking about the ways art forms traditionally seen as feminine are valued and devalued. In addition to writing for Feministing, she is currently spending most of her time doing policy work to reduce the harms of LGBTQ youth of color's interactions with the police and making sure abortion care is accessible to all regardless of their income.

Verónica is a queer immigrant writer, activist, and rabble-rouser.

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