Photo: Instagram/paintedbyesther
Black women have been here before, watching someone else profit off what they created.
Makeup artist Ngozi "Esther" Edeme, known professionally as Painted by Esther, broke her silence this week in a TikTok video that has the beauty world talking.
"I'm honestly very nervous to make this video," she said. "But I don't like being scared to say things because you know how easy it is for them to 'angry Black women' us."
Edeme, whose work has graced the faces of Naomi Campbell, Kelly Rowland, Viola Davis, and breakout star Olandria, built her signature around a bold, airbrushed "transition blush" technique — a dramatic gradient that extends blush into the under-eye area, specifically designed to pop on deeper skin tones.
Now, she's accusing celebrity makeup artist and beauty brand founder Patrick Ta of lifting that technique wholesale.
The receipts she laid out were specific. Edeme described at least two to three prior incidents with Ta, including a suspicious booking request from the brand's co-founder, Rima Minasyan, who — after scheduling a routine glam appointment — asked to film Edeme doing the makeup.
Edeme cancelled immediately. Then, Ta announced his new Transition Blurring Blush Duo.
Edeme pointed out that Ta's tutorial used the same powder puff tool she'd called her "holy grail" and even mirrored her specific phrasing — "back of your palm" instead of the standard "back of your hand" — almost word for word.
The controversy deepened when Ta allegedly trademarked the phrase "Transition Blush" — a move critics called the clearest sign yet of intentional appropriation, turning a technique directly tied to a Black independent creator into a commercial asset without formal collaboration or credit.
Ta responded by tagging Edeme and acknowledging she popularized the look, but the internet wasn't satisfied.
Even the estate of Kevyn Aucoin — the legendary makeup artist who defined the look of supermodels like Naomi Campbell and graced the covers of Vogue throughout the '80s and '90s, and whose 1997 book Making Faces first introduced the transition blush technique — weighed in, posting a video crediting Aucoin as the originator and naming Painted by Esther as one of the artists who later refined it.
This isn't the first time Ta has been accused of ripping from Black creators. In 2024, influencer Avonna Sunshine went viral, calling out Patrick Ta for unpaid invoices to Black creators. He apologized. Now, less than two years later, the same pattern is playing out again.
The broader conversation cuts deeper than one product launch. Black women's beauty innovations — from hairstyles to acrylic nails to skincare techniques — have long been adopted, repackaged, and profited from by others. Transition blush is just the latest example.
Edeme said it plainly: "What you will not do is belittle my influence. Google me. That's it."
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