I haven't posted anything in this blog for almost a year and I don't think I will be writing anything anytime soon... so I am posting my Colloquium Paper I wrote as a part of my final graduation collection in college last March.
Introduction
In a world which has around 6 billion human beings, what is IDENTITY and what is DIFFERENCE? How are we so different from each other, yet be the same? What is I, You, We, Us, They or Them?
Identity and Difference are words used so frequently. Identity means - how do we recognize or refer to something as the same. Identity can be on global, national, local and personal levels. Identity in the contemporary world derives from a multiplicity of sources- from nationality, ethnicity, social class, community, gender and sexuality- sources which may lead to conflict in the construction of identity positions and lead to contradictory fragmented identities. However, identity gives us a location in the world and presents a link between us and the society we live in. Identity marks the way in which we are same as others who share a position/view, and in ways which we are different from those who don’t. Often, identity is clearly defined by difference, i.e. by what it is not. Identities are marked by polarization, for example in the most extreme form of national/ethnic conflict, and by the marking of inclusion and exclusion- insiders and outsiders, “us” and “them”. Identities are frequently constructed in terms of opposition such as man/woman, black/white, gay/straight, healthy/unhealthy.
Each of us, at some point experience struggles between conflicting identities based on our different positions in the world, as a member of a particular community, ethnicity, religion, social class, as a parent, as a child, as a worker or as unemployed. Identity is fluid, contingent and ever evolving.
My concept is to explore identity crisis and the repercussions of taking an identity out of its context and placing it under a set of different parameters. What happens when the subtext of an identity is manipulated? Does it evolve to integrate or does it disintegrate and loose its meaning?
6 Billion Others: Identity and Difference
When I started the project, I was unclear about the direction I should be taking. Identity is a complex phenomenon; there are so many levels and paths through which Identity can be explored. I could take one particular identity and manipulate it to result in a crisis or I could treat identity as a neutral generic concept.
At the initial stage, I decided to select a particular identity and explore the contextual repercussions of identity loss. Choosing the south Ethiopian tribe of Surmas as the primary anchor of inspiration, I researched about their history, culture, customs and rituals, clothing, art and crafts etc. I choose a tribal identity because most of the tribes in the world are at a serious risk of identity loss as a result of the rapid globalization and modern development. I assumed that a tribal identity will give me a larger scope for studying, analyzing and interpreting identity loss and the resulting crisis.
The first approach to the design process was simple and straight forward. I decided to take the traditional motifs commonly found in the Surmas tradition of face painting and modify it to give a new identity. I primarily explored with colour manipulation and combining different elements/motifs to create a new one. This resulted in a series of prints which provided a new identity with barely any resemblance or association with the original tribe. I realised that this approach to the design process wasn’t heading in the right direction. Instead of exploring the crisis which results from the loss of an identity influenced by the external factors, I was creating a whole new identity which was completely devoid of any associations with the original one and hence lacked the depth of crisis or confusion.
My next approach to the design process was to take multiple identities and cross over their elements to result in a mismatch and hence express the loss of a composite identity. However, I was reminded of a conversation I had with a friend about the Arab Scarf- Keffiyeh.
The keffiyeh is a traditional headdress for Arab men made of a square piece of cloth (“scarf”), usually cotton, folded and wrapped in various styles around the head. The black and white keffiyeh is a symbol of the Palestinian heritage. Traditionally worn by Palestinian peasants, the keffiyeh became a symbol of Palestinian nationalism during the Arab Revolt of the 1930s. Its prominence increased in the 1960 with the beginning of the Palestinian resistance movement and its adoption by Yasser Arafat. Hence, outside of the Arab world wearing a keffiyeh is a symbol of solidarity towards the Palestinian cause.
However, in the last few years wearing the keffiyeh has become more of a fashion statement than symbolism. I realised that this is exactly what identity loss is, especially in terms of clothing. A keffiyeh, which is a symbolic piece of clothing with a long history and strong beliefs, has turned into an object of fad and thereby losing its identity.
I finally reached clarity on the direction I should be taking with this project. I should not create new identities; neither should I manipulate specific set identities to explore on a contextual level. Instead I should explore identity loss as a generic phenomenon. I should treat identity as a neutral element completely devoid of any specific association or subtext.
With this direction, I started exploring identity loss/crisis on a psychological level. What kind of emotions does one go through when faced with a loss of identity? After a bit of psycho analysis, self introspection and research, I narrowed down on certain aspects of the human psychology and emotional temperament that I felt best represented an identity crisis. I decided that the exploration should deal in the direction of chaos, confusion, mistrust and prejudice, isolation, fear and struggle, lack of understanding and similar aspects of an emotional crisis arising out of an identity loss.
To interpret this set of key words in terms of clothing, the first decision I made was to develop a set of textile prints. I used the photographs I had collected during my research on the Surma tribe as the inspiration and represented the emotional attributes in a crisp, sharp and modern graphical manner. In terms of silhouette development and detailing, the initial approach was to keep it clean and simple in order to maximise the strength of the textile prints. However, I soon came to the conclusion that I should not solely depend on the prints to express my concept.
I started thinking in terms of detailing with respect to the use of style lines and embellishments. I found the inspiration for the style lines from a mirror. A mirror is the ultimate representation of what an identity stands for and a shattered mirror best represented the identity crisis.
After in-depth explorations, I shortlisted some sketches which I felt best represented my concept along with a strong commercial feasibility. As I started the pattern making and construction process of the toiles, I realised that there was an additional manner through which I could express identity loss. I decided to manipulate the traditional treatments and expectation in a piece of clothing. Why does the seam have to be at the sides? Why can’t the darts be shown on the right side? Why should the style lines match?
With this new direction, I reanalysed my sketches and incorporated the element of manipulating traditional treatments of clothing along with my prints and style lines to represent my theme is a sharp, crisp and concise manner.
Conclusion
The concept of Identity and its loss is such a vast and in-depth subject. There are plenty of alternative ways to approach the concept and its exploration. However, I was very clear from the beginning about the direction I shouldn’t be taking viz. the kitsch costume approach. Fashion, after all is also just another business. The challenge lies in doing justice to your concept and yet be very commercially sensitive and viable and I feel that I have achieved that goal with this project. After all, fashion like identity is fluid, contingent and ever evolving.
Bibliography
- Kathryn Woodward (1997). Identity and Difference: Culture, Media and Identities. Sage Publication
- Wikipedia. Keffiyeh - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Keffiyeh. Wikimedia Foundation Inc
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