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Larice Schuurbiers
27 January, 2021

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Amazingly Simple Graphic Design Software - Canva

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Amazingly Simple Graphic Design Software - Canva

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GUN INTREE, 2021

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Online campaign poster

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Online campaign poster

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Online campaign poster

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Online poster campaign experiment

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Video/GIF experiment

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Adobe Spark experiment

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On redefining masculinity // INTERSECTIONALITY

Like femininity, masculinity and gender is very much intertwined and present on the intersections of race, class, sexuality et cetera. When talking about masculine identities, one should understand the framework of aspects of a person's social/cultural and political identities combined which results to a better understanding to different modes of privilege. Masculinity has many different definitions in many communities and cultures around the globe. Focusing on the West (Europe), masculinity for black boys and men is mostly defined by historical tropes of poor (Jim Crow), physically strong/dominant, angry black men.
Taking into account that their skin color is very much politicised in our society, black men already stand out - sometimes for the wrong reasons. Redefining masculine fashion seems like a privilege, as the freedom to express yourself through fashion is in a way easier when you know you can take the clothing items off. You can switch from invisible to standing out with fashion, but this is not the case for black young men in some cultures or parts of society. The color of their skin is not invisible - even though many try to argue that they don't see their color - and some black boys therefore don't feel free to redefine their masculine identities as they don't have the privilege to start from a blank page.

SOURCE
Lemelle, A. (1995). The Political Sociology of Black Masculinity and Tropes of Domination. Journal of African American Men, 1(2), 87-101. Retrieved January 20, 2021, from http://www.jstor.org/stable/41819284

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Masculinity is defined differently within all communities. One’s notion of masculinity can have different applications in another’s culture. Masculinity for black men for example, generally shapes and progresses differently than white men. This is caused by differences in experiences such as racism and discrimination, which influences the identities of men and masculinity across ethnic backgrounds.

For black young men growing up in the south side of Rotterdam, this also applies. A lot of black boys growing up in Rotterdam-Zuid, feel the weight of their environment. Most of these young men, like anyone else, learn the value of appearance, and like to wear clothes of luxurious brands. However, it is noticeable that a lot of these black boys are wearing basic t-shirts, often with a logo on their chest appearing to be from known brands like Nike and Northface, blending in with their unadorned surroundings. While it is worth mentioning that their peers are often wearing similar black or white ensembles, it is the intention that might differ from each experience with fashion.

Black young men like Timo, would sometimes rather be unnoticed, more than standing out for any wrong reason. Growing up on the outskirts of Rotterdam-Zuid, The Netherlands, his black skin is not always welcomed in every space he enters. Timo is 18 years old and often hangs out with his friends in the neighbourhood he lives with his parents. Fashion for him is often a means of necessity, and feels like a restricted form of expression. Like most young men his age, Timo likes to wear his tracksuits and comfortable joggers, preferably with a signature Adidas logo to reflect a certain exclusivity that his parents could afford such clothes. He is aware that because of the color of his skin, his outfit can incite preconceived ideas about him. A black boy in a tracksuit chilling on a bench might create the image of lazy boys looking to cause trouble. Fashion can be sensitive rather than liberating for some. Young black boys like Timo are aware of their appearance. In a society in which black boys need to be careful in which way they present themselves, it is conceivable that they feel restricted to express masculinity. There is a lot of pressure on them to not fall into  stereotypes society continuously compares them with. For a boy like Timo, a basic white shirt can feel like an armour, which he can hide behind.

Basic clothing intersects on vulnerability and strength, as it is about fitting in with their masculine peers and also about a certain invisibility black boys crave in society. Fashion is not always about pushing the boundaries and yearning for exclusivity. Important circumstances such as class and race can strongly influence men's experience with expressing masculinity through fashion, especially amongst men from minority groups. Exploring masculinity can feel like a privilege rather than a liberate act.

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Musings on Masculinity: Ludovic de Saint Sernin

by Henry Wolff
The most refined form of sexual attractiveness ... consists in going against the grain of one's sex.
- Susan Sontag (1)

Fashion is intimately bound to our representation of self. It is the external nonverbal conduit for communicating identity; a haven for the manifestations of gender performativity and an arena for challenging these constructs. Fashion's collisions of masculinity, femininity, sexuality and taste generate more than aesthetic beauty, but can reveal shifts in cultural attitudes and upend gender constructs.

Within the history of fashion, womenswear has had iconic ventures into masculinity, but until recently menswear has largely remained untouched, committed to promoting and upholding masculine misnomers. This is especially prevalent within the field of men's ready-to-wear fashion. Whilst in recent years there have been significant investments by larger brands, such as Zara and H&M, into gender neutral design: these profit driven forays into gender malleability have proven unable to comprehend gender expression and the diversity of gender identity, often defaulting to outdated tropes. As J. Arico reveals, within fashion there is a strange conformity that "defaults to a culturally male articulation of style".(2) He notes that:

"Most of the time when clothes are marketed as "gender neutral," they are still predominantly designed with our overwhelming understanding of masculine, since it is socially acceptable for women to wear men's clothes in our society, but not the reverse".(3)

Held hostage by these rigid social constructs, menswear has resisted evolving to become more recognisably feminine. However, amongst a set of contemporary menswear brands, who are currently redefining our image of masculinity, there is one particularly evocative designer - Ludovic de Saint Sernin.

Young bodies adorned with suggestive allusions to gender's malleability: boys in cowled and beaded tops, strapless streamlined bodices and clothes with annotations to stereotypically feminine silhouettes. De Saint Sernin's minimalistic ready-to-wear designs display a coalescence of masculinity, femininity, sensuality, youth, kink and desire. This crucible generates a more fluid image of gender, questioning what authority fashion has in defining sex and constructing divisions. De Saint Sernin's image of menswear could be read as an evocative articulation of Susan Sontag's belief that "what is most beautiful in virile men is something feminine";(4) prompting us to recognise not only fashion's relationship to gender expression, but also what generative potentials are lost in the denial of gender fluidity. Whilst it would be remiss not to recognise that the De Saint Sernin world can be perceived as much a gender fluid utopia as it can a queer wet dream, by walking the tender line between voyeurism and a celebration of the mutability of gender, these collections prompt viewers to contemplate the constructs that we readily partake in and perform.

The diversity of gender identities insists that brands comprehend gender expression and continue to confront fashion's default position surrounding masculinity. We need more brands like Ludovic de Saint Sernin, who corrupt these masculine hang-ups and invite us into a gender malleable dream - asking us whether these musings on masculinity and gender fluidity can exist within our general social consciousness.

1. S. Sontag, 'Notes on Camp', in S. Sontag, Against Interpretation, and other essays, New York, Farrar, Strauss & Giroux,1966. p. 4.

2. S. Sontag, 'Notes on Camp', in S. Sontag, Against Interpretation, and other essays, New York, Farrar, Strauss & Giroux,1966. p. 4.

Bibliography

Sontag, S., 'Notes on Camp', in S. Sontag, Against Interpretation, and other essays, New York, Farrar, Strauss & Giroux, 1966.

Henry Wolff is an arts administrator and emerging writer in Adelaide, South Australia with experience across fashion design, textile print design, styling and graphic design for local, national and international brands.

Issue 18: GENDER, March 2019.

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Musings on Masculinity by Henry Wolff - fine print

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The most refined form of sexual attractiveness ... consists in going against the grain of one's sex. - Susan Sontag (1) Fashion is intimately bound to our representation of self. It is the external nonverbal conduit for communicating identity; a haven for the manifestations of gender performativity and an arena for challenging these constructs.

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GUN INTREE (2021)
Redefining Masculinity

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GUN INTREE, 2021

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GUN INTREE, 2021

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GUN INTREE, 2021

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Inspiratie Campaign Gender, Interrupted

Source: Pinterest

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Larice Schuurbiers

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Larice Schuurbiers

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Moodboard december 2020 (Shoots canceled due to lockdowns)

Source single images: Pinterest

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Larice Schuurbiers, 2019

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Essay on The Female Gaze and the Construction of Masculinity. Kevin Goddard, 2000

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Source single images: Google

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Suitsupply came with a new controversial ad in 2018, one with two men kissing in suits. These posters were put up everywhere, mainly at bus stops. Many men became outraged by this image and vandalised the advertisement screens all over The Netherlands. I think this speaks volumes on how masculinity is presented in media, particularly in fashion, and how this image of homosexuality being put in ordinary spaces such as bus stops reveals how the general public reacts to masculinity being challenged in this way.

23/12/2020

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08/12/2020

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Quil Lemons, Glitter Boy

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Source image: Getty Images

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Male Gaze > still limiting new mxn/masculine identities?

02/12/2020

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theory by Stuart Hall

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Article mentions Edward Said's Orientalism theory which makes you think about the westernised view on fashion (and culture) and the white male gaze

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Photography Sebastian Kim. Image courtesy of the Fine Arts Museums of San Francisco

On the 22nd of September, San Francisco's de Young Museum of Fine Art will unveil its latest large-scale fashion exhibition, Contemporary Muslim Fashions. From turbans to burqas, from the Nike Hijab to an Oscar de la Renta caftan special collection, it maps out diasporic and local religious wear. In doing so it also treads a thin line, tapping into the current growth of the modest wear market, as well as the west's enduring fascination with Arabic cultures.

Max Hollein, the museum's director, says that "there are those who believe that there is no fashion at all among Muslim women, but the opposite is true, with modern, vibrant and extraordinary fashion scenes, particularly in many Muslim-majority countries." And while he may be right, Muslim fashion still suffers from much discrimination and dangerous assumptions in many countries in the west. In France and Belgium the veil is not allowed in public. Numerous other countries have partial bans in place.

Regardless of Max and the museum's intentions, we have to ask if this an honorable attempt at much needed diversification of fashion narratives, or another example of the west mistakenly imposing its own narrative on the "Other"?

In his seminal text Orientalism Edward Saïd describes Europe and North America's obsession with the east as fundamentally imperialist: "From the beginning of western speculation about the Orient, the one thing the Orient could not do was to represent itself. Evidence of the Orient was credible only after it had passed through and been made firm by the refining fire of the Orientalist's work... we will give you your history, we will write it for you, we will re-order the past."

His work is one of the bases for post-colonial theory today. It critically looks at science, history and art to understand how colonization has imposed its power by dictating its own norms and values around subjective notions -- heroism, gender interaction. How can this framework be applied to fashion, preconceptions of chic, beauty, provocation, escapism that dominate the industry to this day?

"From the beginning of Western speculation about the Orient, the one thing the Orient could not do was to represent itself." Edward Saïd

Historically, the eastern fashion industry descends from a European, aristocratic culture and its heteronormative, dominant views of social progress. Consequently, it followed evolutions such as sexual liberation and modernity from a very white, Christian point of view. Its citations of other continents were often a process of exotification and fetishization rather than fluid, horizontal multiculturalism. "Fashion has always provided a commentary on the rest of the world -- or how it was fantasized, as most designers hadn't been to the countries referenced," says Alice Litscher, a professor at Paris' Institut Français de la Mode. "Fashion is a political tool to set a norm, suggesting that the west elevates, civilizes, ennobles and enhances the rest of the world -- the continuation and justification of a long colonial mentality."

As early at the 17th century we started seeing visions of faraway countries as trends in fashion: the Chinoiseries in the royal European courts popularized anything vaguely "Asian". The same can be said of Turquerie and Indiennerie - visual elements and stylizations imported from the Ottoman Empire and India. Today, one look at fashion history reveals a long tradition of ill-fitting, approximate citations and appropriations that say more about how the west wanted to see itself than about the cultures they were appropriated from. Jeanne Lanvin's kimonos; Elsa Schiaparelli's fascination for "the exotic body" and of course Paul Poiret's harem pants and turbans. Often these new shapes introduced new 'fashionable' norms. "Harem pants were a subtle way of bringing trousers into women's wardrobes, kimonos an excuse to question the corset" Alice Litscher says, "but these often failed to take the people cited into account."

"In more general terms, fashion - both right now, and by reevaluating its history - needs to be rethought and deconstructed. We need to decolonise the fashion imagination."

This continued throughout the 20th century. Yves Saint Laurent's frequent trips to Morocco led him to design Sahariennes, loose, pocketed, sand-colored outfits imagined for trips in the Sahara; John Galliano recreated Geisha makeup on models, and Jean Paul Gaultier presented an African Collection in 2005 that Vogue described at the time as "having more to do with rumba than Rwanda ". The examples are countless. A seemingly never-ending stream of cultural "inspirations", from the Native American headdresses used by Victoria's Secret, to the recurring blackface in fashion magazines, or Mango's "slave earrings".

But we are, slowly but steadily, becoming increasingly aware of cultural appropriation, and unwilling to stand for it, and fashion houses targeting a worldwide youth are following suit. In more general terms, fashion -- both right now, and by reevaluating its history -- needs to be rethought and deconstructed. We need to decolonize the fashion imagination.

The theorist Walter Mignolo has written extensively on what he calls "decolonial aesthetics" and recommends thinking critically of the borders between, say, high art and low art, the academic and the decorative. The same can be done with fashion, believes Mélody Thomas, a Paris-based fashion and culture writer and co-founder of inclusive newsletter What's Good. "A classic example of western domination on fashion is that "foreign" clothes are considered "costume", or at best "clothing". It only becomes "fashion" once it has been re-appropriated and validated by a white gaze", she said quoting, amongst other things, Kylie Jenner's cornrows being labelled as an "edgy new look" by some. "When citing anything, one must keep in mind if the people referenced are given the means to speak back and decide of their own representation, can participate in the process; one must always quote one's sources, otherwise it's not design... it's pillaging."

Another decolonial fashion project is Mille, an avant-garde online magazine aimed at Arab youth. Co-directed by Tunis-based Sofia Guellaty, a former editor at Style.com Arabia, and Samira Larouci, a London-based writer of Moroccan descent. It aims to provide an Arab outlook on fashion, beauty and underground culture. "Arabs see that they are being aggressively and opportunistically targeted by western luxury brands, who don't even take the time to understand the different needs, all whilst imposing their idea of beauty, their norms," Sofia explains, adding that notions such as emancipation, feminism, self-expression and rebellion all needed to be rethought locally, with religious and cultural expectations in mind, "rather than copy and paste a very white idea of rebellion and freedom".

"In On Beauty Zadie Smith writes, 'Art is the western myth with which we both console ourselves and make ourselves.'"

The aim, for the trilingual French, Arab and English publication, is to create a new media and fashion language that is rethought. Take the French case of "cheveux normaux" (normal hair) which usually means straight hair. Darker makeup is referred to as "peaux ethniques" (ethnic skin), and nude means beige.

As for Moroccan designer Amine Bendriouich, he designed a collection named Touaregs du Futur, which mixed a North African futurism with traditional dress and high-tech textiles. "This is a dream vision of what North Africa could have been had it not suffered from centuries of colonization. It is a way of unifying but also celebrating the differences of the "Other". I am Berber, I am African, there are millions of variations of Arab-ness", he says. On his website, it states, "Thank you for your stereotypes, I am building my own aesthetics."

And then there is French brand Aswad ("black" in Arabic), founded by French-Moroccan designer Sonia Ahmimou, producing haute maroquinerie -- A mix of brutalist and Islamic art and architecture, as a way to question high and low, aristocratic and functional.

All this needs to be applied to the way fashion is taught, Alice Litscher believes. "It is a matter of rethinking how discourse and power is produced and transmitted, developing local industries, and mostly, looking at yourself critically: who are you, what are your privileges, in order to put into place a respectful design process."

In On Beauty Zadie Smith writes, "Art is the western myth with which we both console ourselves and make ourselves" -- let's hope these projects allow for new, non-western mythologies to inspire generations to come.
This article originally appeared on i-D UK.

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Photography Sebastian Kim. Image courtesy of the Fine Arts Museums of San Francisco On the 22nd of September, San Francisco's de Young Museum of Fine Art will unveil its latest large-scale fashion exhibition, Contemporary Muslim Fashions. From turbans to burqas, from the Nike Hijab to an Oscar de la Renta caftan special collection, it maps out diasporic and local religious wear.

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The problem of Colorism in fashion (and society)

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The problem of Colorism in fashion (and society)

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Colorism in social, cultural and political context of fashion (interesting because it is relevant to many representations of color - not just black)

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First and foremost, the term colorism means discrimination towards an individual based on skin color usually within the same race. The fashion world is a great example of colorism, it still showcases dark skin as taboo which results in discrimination within the community and from the fashion industry.

The fashion industry reinforces the stereotypes of black dark-skinned people; not giving them a chance to move past them because they are not getting the exposure. The divide between light and dark skin grows more and more as colorism is reinforced; going as far as whitening products becoming a popular purchase for those lightening their skin.

It wasn't black people who created the colorism strain, it was brought onto them by years and years of European influences, thus creating the belief the lighter the better. It was only 400 years ago black people were owned by caucasians and enslaved to work and sadly white supremacy still takes over and sneaks its way toward the fashion world. Even in now we are seeing instances of racism, Gucci and Prada were victim of blackface creating "fashion pieces" that were racist to the black community. Instances like this need to be brought to light so more people could see that blackface is wrong and learn the reason why.

The only way for the black community to move on from colorism is to go against the white supremacy system. For everybody to realize european features and lighter skin isn't the only face of beauty.

Vogue has been in the industry for over a century but they have only recently started to incorporate darker models. Before 2012 models such as Rihanna and Halle Berry were on the cover of Vogue but are both light skin. In 2012 Serena Williams was the first black dark skin model to be on the cover of Vogue; following her was Lupita Nyong'o and Michelle Obama. Although Vogue's journey to include more dark skin models has imporved they must realize that they have 24.4 million readers globally, their small attempt of representation must grow. People from all over the world need to see the normality of dark skin models and fashion magazines, brands, blogs, etc need to be aware of colorism, start uplifting and including black dark skin models.

Society is becoming more aware of the problems dark skins face and there is a slow incline of representation, let us hope Vogue and many other fashion magazines keep up this momentum.

As the fashion world evolves we are seeing more exposure to black models however, a lot still believe tokenism is completely fine. Tokenism is the practice of only including a few people of a minority, using that small group to represent every single person of that minority. This is seen everywhere in fashion, once they find one black dark skin model they keep them and don't search for more. Lupita Nyong'o is an example, she's been on the cover of Vogue 4 times, there are a few other dark skins but she is the darkest of them all.

What vogue should do is make an effort to discover new black models of darker skin. By doing this they'll show a diverse range of skin tones by different models, different origins, and experiences; allowing as much exposure for the black models in the world.

Tokenism doesn't improve a companies image by including one minority, it portrays the bare minimum a company went through to be inclusive. It doesn't improve the problem with diversity and colorism, it masks the real issue of diversity. It makes it even worse because no real progress or growth has been made.

Skin Bleaching Product

Colorism has led dark skins to purchase bleaching products to lighten their skin. They have always been criticized for their features like large lips, big nose, and stereotypical large/curvy men and women. Socially we've learned that black people should embrace their beauty and forget about stereotypes.

The one thing that can't seem to be forgotten is the idea that dark skin is unattractive.

Famous model Blac Chyna partnered with Whitenicious to launch her "X Blac Chyna Diamond Illuminating and Lightening Cream " on November 25, 2018, in Lagos, Nigeria, the cream is a luxury product on sale for $250. Many are criticizing the product because Chyna is taking advantage of the people in Nigeria. Chyna specifically chose to launch the product in Nigeria because she knew there was a demand for it. Nigerians are at a state of vulnerability because its been pushed inside their heads that dark skin is unattractive since they were young.

"77 percent of Nigerian women use skin-lightening products." according to a 2011 report by the World Health Organization.

The product promotes lighter skin to a demographic of dark black people, this launch will only make the situation worse and add another product to the lightening creams.

Once many people in the fashion industry encourage and bring up the issue of skin lightening in Nigeria, black dark-skinned people will recognize their beauty.

The fashion industries effort to incorporate dark models is unappreciated and will only be thankful once colorism and tokenism is nowhere to be seen. Black people need representation of dark skin, its the only way they can learn to love their skin. As for the fashion industry a bigger effort for representation would be appreciated. The non-inclusive fashion brands will receive praise for taking diversity seriously and dark skinned people will enjoy the representation of beautiful dark skin.

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Why is colorism still a problem in the Fashion Industry?

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First and foremost, the term colorism means discrimination towards an individual based on skin color usually within the same race. The fashion world is a great example of colorism, it still showcases dark skin as taboo which results in discrimination within the community and from the fashion industry.

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Nadine Eijewere

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On the evening of April 15 2019, a fire started in Paris's Notre-Dame Cathedral. Three people were injured. No one died. Images of the cathedral spread around social media as quickly as the flames ripped through the historic church's roof, and within a day, the donations flooded in. Hundreds of thousands of euros, millions of euros, hundreds of millions of euros. Kering (Gucci, Saint Laurent, Balenciaga) CEO François-Henri Pinault promised €100m, and LVMH (Louis Vuitton, Dior, Fendi) CEO Bernard Arnault pledged €200m. The total amount of donations pledged was so large, that within 10 days, the BBC was asking: "Has too much money been given to rebuild it?"

13 months after that day, across the Atlantic, America is burning as protests unfold across all 50 states. There is not just one fire. There are not just three injuries. And sadly, awfully, and yet, unsurprisingly, there are also deaths. We know their names: George Floyd, Ahmaud Arbery, Breonna Taylor, Tony McDade, David McAtee. These are just the latest: every day seems to bring another victim of police violence or white vigilantism. 1 in 1,000 Black men can expect to be killed by police in the USA. Black Americans are 2.5 times more likely to be killed by the police than white Americans.

So what does a French cathedral, an icon of European architecture and history, have to do with police brutality in the United States? Put simply: companies and CEOs were a lot faster to donate money towards the church's repair than they have been towards Black Lives Matter.

"Notre-Dame is much more than a cathedral. It is a symbol of the Western world's cultural hegemony, and a symbol of white greatness by extension," says Paris-based fashion critic Pierre A. M'Pelé, aka Pam Boy, noting that the building serves as a reminder of the "exclusionary" heritage that has shaped our societies. "Fashion brands being so responsive to the Notre-Dame fire is ideologically driven, whether they know it or not and whether they admit it or not." Such a church, he argues, is a symbol - and symbols "are used to prevent change (from happening). They remind everyone that the world in its current state is the only option."

As escalating protests spread across the USA over the weekend and at the start of this week, many brand accounts remained noticeably silent, even as their stores were vandalised and looted.

While some companies - such as Nike, which has built a large part of its reputation and profits on its Air Jordan line - were quick to take a stand, other brands only posted after followers demanded they speak up in the comments. When they did, in many cases the responses were vague: white on black text statements focussed on diversity and inclusion rather than police brutality or Blackness. They were immediately followed by calls in the comments for brands to open their purses and donate. It was only Tuesday - over a week after the protests began on May 26 - that major luxury players began to announce donations.

To Antoine Gregory, a New York-based fashion consultant who has worked with labels like Telfar and Pyer Moss, the posts brands did make were clearly in response to the lobbying of Black followers. "What I've noticed in this industry is that until Black consumers make a loud enough effort to be heard, brands will absolutely remain silent," he says.

"What I've noticed in this industry is that until Black consumers make a loud enough effort to be heard, brands will absolutely remain silent" - Antoine Gregory

Another reason for the delay? Some brands may not see anti-Blackness as in-keeping with the luxury aesthetic or image they strive to uphold. "Fashion houses were slow to donate to the Black Lives Matter Movement because a social revolt isn't glamorous enough," reasons Pam Boy. "It stains the pristine image that fashion and luxury houses thrive on. It's a lot less sexy to say that Black Lives Matter than to contribute to saving a building that's going to stand the test of time." Two other high profile recent causes: Australia's bushfires (for which Kering gave $1m AUD, and Balenciaga made a t-shirt) and Covid-19 relief efforts (which saw the entire industry rally remarkably and brilliantly to build hospital wings, manufacture hand sanitiser and PPE, and donate) did not seem to warrant the same hesitancy.

Although many brands began to pledge support at the start of this week, often their vague statements offered little insight into any action they might be taking either internally or externally. In many cases (including Prada, Versace, and Fendi) posts did not mention a donation. To many, this wasn't enough: as Gregory puts it, "It is not enough to stand in solidarity without any deliverables." When brands - such has Kering and Burberry - did note that a donation had been made, the monetary amount was almost exclusively unspecified.

"Fashion houses were slow to donate to the Black Lives Matter Movement because a social revolt isn't glamorous enough... It stains the pristine image that fashion and luxury houses thrive on" - Pam Boy

Tuesday's controversial viral #BlackOutTuesday trend also gave some major brands the opportunity to post a row of plain black squares to their Instagram feeds, rather than meaningful messages of solidarity, pledges for money or promises of action. There have been other misses: according to GQ, the designer Jonathan Anderson posted a caption saying "there is only one race", later replacing it with an image of James Baldwin and apologising after criticism. Celine, the fashion house led by Hedi Slimane and owned by LVMH, posted a statement to Instagram saying that the brand "stands against all forms of discrimination, oppression and racism" - but had not posted an image of a Black model since June 2019.

The last few years have seen various brands struggle in light of high profile racism scandals; from Prada's Blackface keyring, to Gucci's imitation of a Dapper Dan design on the runway and Blackface balaclava, and Comme des Garçons' cornrows fiasco. These moments have resulted in the establishment of diversity councils in the case of Gucci and Prada, and apologies in all. But in many instances, it's taken internet pressure - often spearheaded by Black Twitter or fashion watchdogs Diet Prada - to galvanise change. "Fashion has a history of changing reactively and not proactively," says fashion historian and Dazed 100-er Shelby Ivey Christie, whose Twitter is a vital resource of Black fashion history. "Brands aren't truly vested in combating issues like racial profiling, police brutality and police abolitionism... The priority seems to be (the) optics of change and not actually change."

"Brands aren't truly vested in combating issues like racial profiling, police brutality and police abolitionism... The priority seems to be optics of change and not actually change" - Shelby Ivey Christie

"If Black Twitter did not call-out Gucci for knocking off Dapper Dan then there would be no Atelier in Harlem," says Gregory. "If the Gucci store was not looted in Atlanta we would not have read a poem the following day asking for peace and love. If your solidarity with the Black communities that buy and support your brand only comes after backlash, that is not solidarity."

they made their way to rodeo drive i love this pic.twitter.com/cPtKpVCk72
- sarah 🍬 (@innerlaIisa) May 31, 2020

Whether images of Rodeo Drive graffitied with phrases such as "eat the rich", or the internet roasting of Virgil Abloh, the Black designer of Off-White and Louis Vuitton menswear who was perceived to have donated just $50 to a cause (on Tuesday, he revealed he had donated over $20,000 and would continue to donate), fashion has found itself as a talking point during these protests.

Often, the conversation centres around looting, as videos of store break-ins circulate on social media (Abloh also apologised for comments criticising looters, in a statement that discussed his own experiences as a dark-skinned Black man in America). "Luxury fashion brands have been targets for looting because they are arbitrators and benefactors of racism themselves," says Christie. "They appropriate Black culture, they gatekeep Black people out of the industry and they have put images and messaging out that is rested upon racism. I think people are more aware of this now more than ever, in the wake of last year's Blackface items and the conversation."

"If your solidarity with the Black communities that buy and support your brand only comes after backlash, that is not solidarity" - Antoine Gregory

If any of those scandals proved anything, it's that brands need to commit to upholding diversity long-term - not just in external communications, like how many models feature in campaigns, on runways, and on Instagram, but internally behind the scenes and in other ways, such as lobbying for law changes.

"Brands have to earn the right to say Black Lives Matter," says Gregory. "The industry needs to commit to action. Commit to hiring more Black people in positions that give us visibility because diversity is not your campaign featuring a Black model. Commit to using their resources to help reform laws that cost us Black lives." It is not simply a matter of making a post on Instagram expressing solidarity and considering it job done, especially if you've already promised to do better. "We don't need any more performative activism," he says. "We need action."
Editor's note: After the publication of this article, a representative from Gucci reached out with further information on the work they have been doing "as part of a comprehensive and concerted DE&I action plan" launched in 2019 with the announcement of the advisory council already mentioned. * Launch of $5 million North America Changemakers Impact Funds, which has donated $1.5 million to 19 NGOs working at grassroots level to support disadvantaged Black and Brown communities across North America
* $1.5 million Changemakers Scholarship Fund to help minority students enter the industry
* The Gucci Design Fellowship giving fashion colleges from 10 cities around the world the chance to have a student participate in a one-year internship in Gucci's Rome design office

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'We need action': how fashion is failing Black Lives Matter

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On the evening of April 15 2019, a fire started in Paris's Notre-Dame Cathedral. Three people were injured. No one died. Images of the cathedral spread around social media as quickly as the flames ripped through the historic church's roof, and within a day, the donations flooded in.

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Antwaun Sargent

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FOAM Magazine

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presentation form idea: Online (interactive) multimedia exhibition

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presentation form idea: Online (interactive) multimedia exhibition

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so with video, photography, text (for the writers here, this is maybe interesting to try out different media to present your work/publications) photo below is from a past exhibition in Tropisch Museum in Amsterdam, an interactive work where people could comment on certain parts of the visual article

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She has graced countless magazine covers, posters, merchandise and even face masks. Her smile was always accompanied by short face-framing curls or deep polished waves. Headlines across the world ran images of the 26-year old African-American woman. Her name was Breonna Taylor.

In early summer 2020, our Instagram newsfeeds were flooded with black squares, captioned with statements such as "we stand with you" or "we love diversity". Some companies embarrassingly posted nothing at all. The murder of George Floyd reached the fashion industry in the most complex of ways. It seemed trivial for us to post our new haircuts, DIY at-home spa treatments or sponsored content. I cringed at so many tone-deaf companies and even unfollowed their accounts.

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Performative activism contributes to the problem, and what I mean by that is sharing an Instagram post about the importance of racial equality without diversifying staff, castings and content. It means nothing to talk the talk unless you are prepared to do the work, to act and do better. For two weeks straight I scrolled past black squares. After a while, I didn't even care about them anymore. I wanted to know what was going to happen within you, the industry, afterwards, how you would go beyond Instagram statements and implement meaningful change.

Performative activism contributes to the problem

In 2015, I started the #BlackModelsMatter movement. The hashtag is currently trending at 83,000 on Instagram. At the time, New York Fashion Week catwalks featured less than 10 per cent models of colour. In 2019, there was at least one model of colour in every single runway show and diversity now stands at 43 per cent. Beyond the hashtag, I worked vigorously for the phrase not to become trendy - the fight for better Black representation in fashion is not a trend. I've spoken for The New York Times, Columbia University, The Indianapolis Museum of Art, magazine panels and even at an event in Lagos, Nigeria. I served on The Model Alliance Advisory Board and have sat in with The Humans Of Fashion Foundation. I have poked microphones directly in designers' faces backstage at Fashion Week asking what more can be done.

Performative activism does not go to these lengths. Performative activism posts a graphic online, and then carries on with Zoom meetings while their African-American colleagues are on the receiving end, heartbroken. Performative activism says, "we value diversity", yet allows racism to manifest itself within meetings, editing, casting rooms, and on set. Allyship is not confined to a black square on social media. Allyship requires honesty, responsibility and accountability.

As a working African-American model and visual artist, I have been well-equipped to deal with racism; I have a choice about who I choose to champion. During New York Fashion Week, I don't attend shows that do not cast Black models. On social media, I do not follow brands that don't reflect society. Your attention is your highest currency. Brands like Telfar, Fenty, Aerie, Pacifica, Christian Siriano, and Pyer Moss have my full support. These brands undoubtedly have shown diversity in race, age, gender and body positivity long before Covid-19 and the Black Lives Matter movement. If every company took similar initiatives, some rooms in the industry wouldn't be so unbearable, unwelcoming, and uncomfortable.

What good is using Black culture if Black people aren't allowed in the room?

I still have hope for the future of fashion, but there must be accountability. As a society we are so pressured into making the next thing, being the next big thing or simply buying more things. It is essential for us to care about the people that contribute to those exact things. "Never let them convince you that broken glass or property is violence," said Marc Jacobs in response to the damage done to his Soho location in the midst of the Black Lives Matter protests. "Property can be replaced, human lives cannot."

I am relieved that activism is not taboo anymore. Activism can happen at any time, anywhere by anyone. Five years ago, I was a liability. People in this industry were afraid to exercise their freedom of speech in fear of being blacklisted or even fired. But what you, the fashion world, needs to know is this: caring about people shouldn't be a liability. What good is using Black culture if Black people aren't allowed in the room? There is no one better to tell Black stories than Black people. Black editors matter, Black designers matter, Black directors matter, Black models matter, Black creatives matter, Black lives matter.
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A letter to the fashion industry: what you need to do to go beyond performative allyship

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She has graced countless magazine covers, posters, merchandise and even face masks. Her smile was always accompanied by short face-framing curls or deep polished waves. Headlines across the world ran images of the 26-year old African-American woman. Her name was Breonna Taylor.

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Source: DietPrada (instagram)

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Source: DietPrada (instagram)

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intersections of  race, class, sustainability in fashion

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intersections of  race, class, sustainability in fashion

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Recent protests around the world speak to the ways white privilege is deeply ingrained in policy, institutions, and economic systems. As many white people seek to educate themselves on how they might have unwittingly perpetuated oppressive systems, so too must the fashion industry pause to re-consider how white privilege has shaped its approach to sustainable fashion.

What implicit racial biases do sustainable fashion advocates have?

I'm a white, female, millennial with Dutch and American parents. About five years ago, I went from a bleeding-heart liberal with a degree in human rights to a garment factory manager in Cambodia. I thought if I wanted to be effective in sustainable fashion spaces, I needed to better understand production.

Initially, I struggled with the label "Garment Factory Manager." I felt the need to qualify it - both to myself, and to friends (mostly white, left-leaning liberals) back home.

For example, I would say to people that I was the manager of a "sustainability" minded factory. It was somehow important to point out and defend my positioning as a "good guy".

The more I inhabited the role of factory manager, the more I realized that the sustainability challenges factory managers face are part of a larger system of asymmetrical power relations. I realized that I'd internalized certain racially rooted stereotypes about who a factory manager is, and their role as "bad guy" in sustainability.

I had a blind spot. Mahzarin Banaji, Harvard psychologist and co-author of Blind Spot: hidden Biases of Good People, researches how when you pair two things together over and over, they come to be associated with one another. Bread goes with butter. Leaders are male. Nurses are female.

Repeatedly throughout my life, "factory manager" was paired with sweatshops. Banaji suggests that when people are asked to reverse these associations, they struggle. Experiencing this difficulty is what allows people to understand how deeply ingrained culture, and its implicit biases, really are.

Gradually, I stopped qualifying my title. When introducing myself to people at home, I was often met with a lot of follow up questions seeking to gauge whether I fell in the good guy camp or the bad guy camp. What did I think about unions? What kind of wages did my employees earn?

Our unconscious perception of the brown factory manager out to make a quick buck pervades the way we approach sustainability. And while there are certainly factory managers out there doing bad things, for which they must be held accountable, this implicit bias prevents us from reflecting critically on how we created this system. And it prevents us from seeing and trusting the factory managers out there who are sustainable fashion allies.

Where should the story of sustainable fashion begin?

As primarily white sustainability advocates, engaging critically with our role in creating a fundamentally unjust system that disproportionately disenfranchises people of color requires reconsidering where the story should start.

The fashion industry has a smattering of original sins from which we could choose to start our story. But for the purposes of this article, I'd like to select just one: the decision to outsource production.

Brands were the first to outsource production - to stop doing it themselves and/or move it to external companies in far-flung corners of the world throughout the eighties and nineties. The explanation usually focuses on cheaper wages elsewhere combined with improvements in logistics and communication technology.

But these narratives are incomplete. Another critical reason for moving production offshore had to do with unstable demand. Unstable demand is hard for production facilities to manage - no matter who is doing it. It's hard to give workers job security when you don't know if the shirt you've designed is going to be fashionable this season. It's risky to invest in fabrics and raw materials up front when you don't know yet how many pieces you'll sell. It's hard to pay workers living wages when consumer demand rewards cheaper and cheaper products.

The decision to outsource production was at least in part a way for brands to insulate themselves from the risk inherent to unstable demand, inherent to the fickle business of fashion. It was a way of coping with the catch-22 of having just the right amount of capacity to successfully deal with busy periods and slow periods, good seasons, and bad seasons. It was a way to shift inventory on to someone else's books. The risk wasn't eliminated, it was passed down to someone else. Usually, that someone was a person of color in a developing part of the world.

In other words, brands, comprised primarily of white employees from countries with relative economic might, leveraged their power to shift financial risk onto less privileged people of color. The impossible task of balancing safe working conditions, living wages, increasing consumer demand for cheaper goods, job security for workers, and the risks inherent to the fashion industry was passed down.

From implicit bias, to structural racism, in sustainable fashion

Meanwhile, sustainable fashion advocates often start the story of sustainable fashion in the nineties with the Nike sweatshop exposés. This was the critical moment that led to growing consumer awareness, a proliferation of social compliance initiatives, and the birth of sustainability departments within brands.

Nike initially responded to sweatshop accusations by denying them. In 2001, Nike director Todd McKean admitted that the initial attitude was 'Hey, we don't own the factories. We don't control what goes on there.' In other words, the problem was external to the brand itself. The problem was unwieldy supply chain partners. Or maybe even the complexity of poverty and bad political governance. Either way, he implied that it was not the result of Nike's decision to outsource production, or the leveraging of their power over more vulnerable people of color throughout the global economy.

By the late nineties, Nike began to change its tone. It adopted a code of conduct to govern its suppliers, doing more than 600 factory audits between 2000 and 2004 to assure that its code of conduct was being followed. But the conception of the problem as "external" remains integral to its communication around the issue.

For example, today their website says "We expect all our suppliers to share our commitment to respecting the rights of workers - with particular care for the unique vulnerabilities and needs of worker groups such as women, migrants and temporary workers - and to advancing the welfare of workers and communities." The problem to be solved, in their view, is one of respect. Factory managers, in other words, suppliers, must learn to respect the rights of workers.

Another example is the recent Boohoo scandal. Leicester, the site of non-compliant suppliers, is in the UK. But Leicester's textile workforce is dominated by its large South Asian immigrant population. In 2018, a Financial Times investigation described the poor working conditions that pervade Leicester's garment sector an "open secret," well known in both the industry and government.

When Boohoo gets away with saying things like "we've terminated the contracts with the non-compliant firms" or "we're going to do an independent review into our supply chain" or "we have nothing to hide" the subtext is the job of the brand is due diligence, to weed bad suppliers (of color) out. There's no need for self-reflection or inward-facing scrutiny.

Another example is the Dutch Agreement on Sustainable Garments and Textiles. Their website states that "many businesses in the Netherlands have outsourced their production to countries outside the European Union. These are countries where human rights, worker health and safety, environmental protection and animal rights may be at risk." Again, the problem is externalized - the problem is poor governance in developing countries and the brands' responsibility is due diligence.

Primarily white sustainability advocates - myself included - have internalized our implicit biases about men of color, about the factory manager as the "bad guy". And then we built a sustainability industry around those biases. That's why sustainability initiatives today often look outward instead of inward, focused on control, on reigning in unwieldy and unethical supply chain partners, on due diligence.

This is white saviorism at its most perverse. Brands, comprised of mostly white employees, leveraged their power to shift financial risks to groups of people with less power, people of color. When that resulted in human rights abuses that primarily white customers couldn't cope with knowing about, the explanation weaponized stereotypes about those same people of color to shift the blame as well.

The intersection of implicit bias and power

We can't talk about implicit biases without also talking about power. As novelist Chimamanda Adiche articulates so well: "Power is the ability not just to tell the story of another person, but to make it the definitive story of that person."

I want to pivot back to my journey with the title of "Garment Factory Manager". After I stopped qualifying my title to friends and acquaintances back home, I usually dealt with their follow-up questions with textbook answers that satisfied the checkboxes their liberal assumptions were looking for me to fill. Yes, I thought labor unions were important. Yes, my staff earned living wages.

But once, an exchange with a particularly self-righteous dinner companion led me to take a different tack. I replied that although labor unions made sense in a country with strong rule of law, in countries with corrupt governments like Cambodia I wasn't sure whether they always represented workers' best interests. I watched the discomfort, outrage, and judgment pass over my dinner companion's face. This was enough to vilify me. She quickly changed the subject.

I possessed the language and vocabulary to defend myself. I was intimately familiar with the stereotypes I was up against. I had the power, privilege, and protection of not being reducible to a singular narrative. And still, all it took was one comment on labor unions to put me in the "bad guy" camp.

I've been reconsidering this anecdote recently because together with my formidable co-host Jessie Li, we've just launched a podcast about sustainability and the making of fashion. The podcast is focused on sharing underrepresented voices across the fashion supply chain - for example, factory managers, industrial engineers, third party inspection companies, freight forwarders.

I live in fear of inadvertently enabling listeners to fill in the blanks about our guests with this single story of factory managers, with their implicit biases. If one comment is all it took to vilify me, how can we do justice to our guests, who usually don't have the power and protection of many stories?

For example, during one conversation, a factory manager of color proudly told Jessie a story about opening a canteen in his factory because his workers were unable to afford nutritious meals. Later, over dinner with a radical left-leaning female friend from Europe, Jessie shared this anecdote. Her friend was quick to point out that instead of offering free lunch, the factory manager should have paid wages that allowed his workers to buy their own food. And that might be true, but it's also incomplete.

Perhaps the purchasing practices of the brand did not allow for paying higher wages to the employees? How much cost pressure was the factory under? What kind of lead times did it have? Did it benefit from committed sales forecasts? What were the payment terms? How was the risk and reward distributed between factory and brand? While factory managers should not be automatically absolved of responsibility, it's unfair to locate this responsibility without also considering these questions.

These issues are multi-layered; power is always relative. Factory Managers have power relative to workers. But brands have power relative to their suppliers. We must be willing to contend not only with how we, as sustainability advocates, might be perpetrators ourselves, but also, how the lines that delineate victims and perpetrators might not always be so clear cut. Sometimes, people might be both.

And that's why it's a problem that the only factory manager narrative to which consumers and sometimes even industry insiders have access is the sweatshop exposé. It's incomplete. It's a single story mediated and narrated to the public by brands, filtered through the racial biases that pervade the industry's approach to sustainability.

It obscures the very asymmetrical power relations between brands and suppliers, enabling brands to escape public scrutiny of their buying practices while the social responsibility spotlight is placed firmly on factories.

Where do we go from here?

As sustainability advocates, we must turn conventional knowledge about what sustainability requires on its head. We must radically re-imagine equal partnership. We must be proactive in dismantling implicit and racially rooted biases against factory managers - both for ourselves, and for consumers.

Precisely because of their power, brands have a duty to create space for supplier voices to be heard. As the gatekeepers to the fashion supply chain, brands have a responsibility to give supplier voices a seat at the table - whether internally, or facing consumers.

Brands have a moral obligation to ensure that their employees and customers do not rely on implicit biases to explain fashion's sustainability woes, and to talk openly about their own role in creating this system. They must examine their internal decision-making structures, their standard operating procedures, the rules that codify an unequal distribution of risk and reward.

Brands must also compensate suppliers fairly for their insight and expertise, and look inward at their own purchasing practices. They must stop treating suppliers like liabilities to be minimized instead of assets worth investing in.

Just as people of color in the United States don't bear the burden of educating white people or fixing a racist system they didn't create, neither should the factory manager have to bear the indignity of being labeled the problem. And yet, too often our approach to sustainability relies on this very assumption. As Dena Simmons, author of the upcoming book White Rules for Black People puts it: "Don't ask the wounded to do the work." Instead, we must start by looking inward.

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How Racism Shapes Fashion's Approach to Sustainability

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Recent protests around the world speak to the ways white privilege is deeply ingrained in policy, institutions, and economic systems. As many white people seek to educate themselves on how they might have unwittingly perpetuated oppressive systems, so too must the fashion industry pause to re-consider how white privilege has shaped its approach to sustainable fashion.

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"How can we challenge the value system of the fashion industry so that it is motivated by ideas of inclusion, diversity and social justice?"

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"How can we challenge the value system of the fashion industry so that it is motivated by ideas of inclusion, diversity and social justice?"