'The Art of Resistance.'
Fashioning Black femininity, why the tignon matters, Rendering Revolution and the opening of 'RESIST!'
Hello everyone,
I will be very brief this week, but we have some lovely pieces to share with you. In this week’s letter, Kai has put together a reading list that explores Black femininity and we also revisit the brilliant profile that they wrote on the tignon. Daniela calls our attention to an academic passion project, Rendering Revolution, and, in the spirit of revolution, a new exhibition opened last week: ‘RESIST! The Art of Resistance.’
Thank you for your support – our readership is growing, and it wouldn’t be possible without you.
From The Library: Fashioning Black Femininity
This week FRD Research Assistant Kai Marcel uncovers a few ways that Black femininity is fashioned, presented and shaped:
While gender and fashion are distinct from one another, their abilities to signify, reflect, and shape each other are significant and often important sites of cultural meaning and definition. Similarly, the intersectionality of both racialization and gendering as sociocultural practices inform one another so that the knowledges associated with either subjectivity overlap, like a palimpsest, with layers of new and nuanced meaning being created all the time. This list of sources explores the intersection of Blackness, fashion, and femininity. Through their research and analysis, the authors featured in this list contextualize Black femininity as a discursive entity and investigate the ways it has been shaped and dominated by hegemonic institutions, but also the ways Black women and femmes have used the radical practice of self-fashioning to define themselves in spite of systems that have been built on their exclusion.
Ladies’ Pages: African American Women’s Magazines and the Culture That Made Them by Noliwe M. Rooks (Book)
The Stereotypes of Black and White Women in Fashion Magazine Photographs: The Pose of the Model and the Impression She Creates by Jennifer E. Millard & Peter R. Grant (Article)
Vintage Black Glamour by Nichelle Gainer (Book)
Fear of the Dark: ‘Race’, Gender, and Sexuality in the Cinema by Lola Young (Book)
Dressed in Dreams: A Black Girl’s Love Letter to the Power of Fashion by Tanisha C. Ford (Book)
‘The Library’ and the ‘Reading List’ is where we collect and organize countless educational sources all in one place. Referenced by educators, students, fashion enthusiasts and curious minds, this multi-faceted repository provides an expanding selection of tools for learning about all matters connected to fashion, appearance, power and the impact of ‘race.’
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Objects That Matter: The Tignon
The tignon (ˈtēyôN) is an 18th century headdress with origins in Louisiana, the Spanish Colonial Gulf, the Caribbean, and West Africa. It is a kerchief that both free and enslaved women of African descent were mandated to wear in the colonies of the so-called 'New World.'[...]The tignon consisted of a cloth scarf twisted, folded, and tied around the head in a turban-like fashion to cover the hair. The corners were tied in knots at the side of the head and the excess fabric could also be knotted and styled to resemble a rosette or flower.
[...]
"In the first part of Beyoncé’s visual album Lemonade, during “Pray You Catch Me,” she appears in a bath with a knotted scarf around her head. In a Harper’s Bazaar interview, her stylist Marni Senofonte shared that she included the head wrap at Beyoncé’s specific request to pay homage to the historical tignon and her Creole heritage. In her expansive 600-page book, How to Make Lemonade, Beyoncé dedicated a small section to explaining the “Tignon Laws” of 1786.
Read Kai Marcel’s profile about a headdress that transformed oppression into a gesture of power.
'Objects That Matter' gathers numerous fashion objects outside of the Western lens and provides a brief history, showing why they matter, as many of these items have been widely appropriated or referenced.
The Directory: Rendering Revolution
This week’s Directory spotlight, Rendering Revolution, was selected by FRD Media Editor, Daniela Hernandez. This project was co-founded by our friend and advisory board member, Dr. Jonathan M. Square and features contributions by our very own Kai Marcel.
Translating the Revolution: The History of Haiti Dress is a digital humanities project and at the same time a tool to document the importance of fashion and clothing in the construction of the notion of freedom during and after the Haitian Revolution. This project links the colonial perception with the texts found in the archives. The project also compiled contemporary artistic and fictional paintings to present the clothing culture of the era through 18th and early 19th century photographs expressing European and African fashion symbols in Haiti.
Visit the dedicated page for Rendering Revolution in our Directory.
The discourse on fashion and race threads through a vast network of like-minded endeavors. ‘The Directory’ catalogues other sources of information and inspiration.
The Calendar: ‘RESIST! The Art of Resistance’
The exhibition, RESIST! The Art of Resistance, opened April 1st and runs until September 5th:
The special exhibition “RESIST! The Art of Resistance” explores different forms, moments and histories of resistance against colonialism and its current continuities.
To this end, the RJM invites curators and activists Peju Layiwola from Nigeria, Esther Utjiua Muinjangue & Ida Hoffmann from Namibia, Tímea Junghaus from Hungary and Elizaveta Khan & Mona Leitmeier from Cologne to curate their own spaces. These are complemented by objects from the RJM’s collection, historical materials, personal testimonies, and works of contemporary art. The exhibition offers places for gathering, reflection and action through workshops in the exhibition space with an extensive program of events and mediation.
Learn more about this exhibition on our dedicated Calendar page.
A global network of events, conversations and opportunities will continue to evolve the discourse on fashion and race. ‘The Calendar’ and ‘Opportunities’ remains on the pulse and keeps you looped in.
That’s it for now. Please stay safe and we’ll see you next week.
Yours in service and solidarity,
Kim Jenkins
The Fashion and Race Database Team: Rachel Kinnard, Daniela Hernandez, Kai Marcel, Laura Beltrán-Rubio and Anthony Palliparambil, Jr.