Content area
Full Text
WEEKEND MAG
MTV's Internet audience has named Madonna the greatest music video star ever, according to a new special airing Saturday.
Madonna's "innovation, creativity, and contribution to the music video art form" puts her at the top of the list during "The Greatest Video Stars" special airing at 1 p.m. Saturday on MTV, the channel said.
The list of greatest video artists was determined through a recent poll conducted at www.mtv.com.
"The video has really become a marriage between the artist and our audience," says Michele Dix, senior vice president of music and talent programming at MTV and MTV2.
The list, she says, includes "the broad entertainer" as well as "artists who were just there to make a video all their own."
Madonna's lexicon of videos includes controversial works such as "Like A Prayer," in which she dances in front of a burning cross; "Justify My Love," involving sadomasochism; and "What It Feels Like to be a Girl," banned for its violent content.
"Her ability to always intrigue the audience captives [viewers]," Dix says. "Her last video reinvented her in a cowgirl image. She is someone who is truly a sex symbol and she was [seen] in this cowboy attire with a hip-hop beat."
The MTV online honor comes at a time when Madonna is having yet more video woes. She pulled her original video cut of "American Life," her current single, because of its political imagery.
In the original video, Madonna dances in...