Striking a Delicate Balance
By Millée Spears of
Khismet Wearable Art
from the Feb-Apr 2005 Print Issue
Many admire flowing traditional African robes like agbadas and bu-bus when worn by others. However, many find it difficult to imagine wearing these garments themselves.
Skeptics often wonder how they will gracefully handle a garment’s oversized sleeves getting caught on a doorknob or entangled in a steering wheel. Some dread that their garment’s long hemline will get caught in the gas pedal of their car or get in their way while they are navigating a staircase.
With these apprehensions, many don’t bother including traditional African wear in their daily attire. Instead, many put traditional African clothing in the category of “ceremonial” or “special occasion” clothing. Such dressers pull from their closets their African clothing only when attending weddings or other special ceremonies.
However, each traditional or even contemporary styled garment made from traditional textiles is a cultural masterpiece. Traditional hand woven textiles such as kente, kuba, ashoke, and adinkra have a wealth of history, and weavers depict spiritual and moral lessons into each design. Naturally, the cultural pride of wearing the masterpiece often spills over into all aspects of the wearer’s life.
The acceptance of traditional textiles has more than an aesthetic value. It has an economic one. As long as there is a market for traditional fabrics, weavers will remain employed as weavers of traditional fabrics and pass the ancient traditions to our youth. The youth will then carry the art form forward and apply modern technology and inspiration to the tradition.
My challenge as a contemporary wearable art designer is to strike a delicate balance between the use of traditional textiles, culture and art, with contemporary fashion, function and fit. For instance, the simple crop jacket that Amari Young of Jacksonville, Florida is wearing on the right supports the beauty of manufactured mud-cloth (traditional mud-cloth is hand-woven). A young Malian designed the cloth. His work is an example how our young are learning our traditions and moving them into the 21st century. |
