Fashioning the Afropolis: Histories, Materialities and Aesthetic Practices 9781350179523, 9781350179554, 9781350179530

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FASHIONING THE AFROPOLIS

Series Editors: Reina Lewis & Elizabeth Wilson Advisory Board: Christopher Breward, Hazel Clark, Joanne Entwistle, Caroline Evans, Susan Kaiser, Angela McRobbie, Hiroshi Narumi, Peter McNeil, Ozlem Sandikci, Simona Segre Reinach, Arti Sandhu Dress Cultures aims to foster innovative theoretical and methodological frameworks to understand how and why we dress, exploring the connections between clothing, commerce and creativity in global contexts. Published: Delft Blue to Denim Blue: Contemporary Dutch Fashion edited by Anneke Smelik

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Experimental Fashion: Performance Art, Carnival and the Grotesque Body by Francesca Granata

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Reading Marie al-Khazen’s Photographs: Gender, Photography, Mandate Lebanon by Yasmine Nachabe Taan

Fashion in Multiple Chinas: Chinese Styles in the Transglobal Landscape edited by Wessie Ling and Simona Segre Reinach

Wearing the Niqab: Muslim Women in the UK and the US by Anna Piela

Modest Fashion: Styling Bodies, Mediating Faith edited by Reina Lewis Niche Fashion Magazines: Changing the Shape of Fashion by Ane Lynge-Jorlen Styling South Asian Youth Cultures: Fashion, Media and Society edited by Lipi Begum, Rohit K. Dasgupta, and Reina Lewis Thinking Through Fashion: A Guide to Key Theorists edited by Agnes Rocamora and Anneke Smelik Veiling in Fashion: Space and the Hijab in Minority Communities by Anna-Mari Almila Reina Lewis: reina​.lewis​@fashion​.arts​.​ac​.uk

Fashioning the Modern Middle East: Gender, Body, and Nation edited by Reina Lewis and Yasmine Nachabe Taan Fashion, Performance & Performativity: The Complex Spaces of Fashion edited by Andrea Kollnitz and Marco Pecorari Silhouettes of the Soul: Meditations on Fashion, Religion and Subjectivity edited by Otto von Busch and Jeanine Viau Fashion in Altermodern China by Feng Jie Fashioning the Afropolis: Histories, Materialities, and Aesthetic Practices edited by Kerstin Pinther, Kristin Kastner and Basile Ndjio

Elizabeth Wilson: elizabethwilson​.auth​@gmail​​.com

FASHIONING THE AFROPOLIS HISTORIES, MATERIALITIES AND AESTHETIC PRACTICES

edited by Kerstin Pinther, Kristin Kastner and Basile Ndjio

BLOOMSBURY VISUAL ARTS Bloomsbury Publishing Plc 50 Bedford Square, London, WC1B 3DP, UK 1385 Broadway, New York, NY 10018, USA 29 Earlsfort Terrace, Dublin 2, Ireland BLOOMSBURY, BLOOMSBURY VISUAL ARTS and the Diana logo are trademarks of Bloomsbury Publishing Plc First published in Great Britain 2022 Selection, editorial matter, Introductions © Kerstin Pinther, Kristin Kastner and Basile Ndjio, 2022 Individual chapters © their Authors, 2022 Kerstin Pinther, Kristin Kastner and Basile Ndjio have asserted their right under the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act, 1988, to be identified as Editors of this work. Series design by BRILL Cover image © Isabel Okoro All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or any information storage or retrieval system, without prior permission in writing from the publishers. Bloomsbury Publishing Plc does not have any control over, or responsibility for, any third-party websites referred to or in this book. All internet addresses given in this book were correct at the time of going to press. The author and publisher regret any inconvenience caused if addresses have changed or sites have ceased to exist, but can accept no responsibility for any such changes. A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library. A catalog record for this book is available from the Library of Congress. ISBN: HB: 978-1-3501-7952-3   ePDF: 978-1-3501-7953-0 eBook: 978-1-3501-7954-7 Typeset by Deanta Global Publishing Services, Chennai, India To find out more about our authors and books visit www​.bloomsbury​.com and sign up for our newsletters.

CONTENTS

List of illustrations List of contributors 1

vii x

Introduction. Fashioning the Afropolis: Histories, materialities and aesthetic practices  Kerstin Pinther and Kristin Kastner 1

Part I:  Histories and archives

27

2

Woman in a white tobe: Activism, nostalgia and a viral image in Sudan  Marie Grace Brown 29

3

Afro-Brazilian dress modes in family photo archives in Lagos  Frank A. O. Ugiomoh 46

4

Tracing threads of time and space in conceptual fashion design in Lagos  Alexandra Weigand 60



Visual essay: The transformation of ndop fabric from its production in (pre)colonial artisan centres to contemporary urban fashion design  Michaela Oberhofer 80

Part II:  Materialities and aesthetic practices

89

5

Born to shine: Fashionable practices of refining and wearing textiles in Dakar  Kristin Kastner 91

6

Looking East: Bobaraba Vogue and the sinonization of fashion and beauty in Douala  Basile Ndjio 107

7

Between presence and evocation: Fashion design, photography and place-making in Lagos  Kerstin Pinther 121 Visual essay: Cairo ascending  Rana ElNemr with Alaa Abo El Goud 139

Contents

Part III:  Bodies and media

147

  8 Trans-worlding: Fela Kuti’s sartorial rebellion and pan-African influence  Nomusa Makhubu 149  9 Our Tribe: The Sartists’ portrayal of post-subculture in Johannesburg  Cher Potter 167 10 Africanfuturist Dakar in Selly Raby Kane’s designs  Enrica Picarelli 182 Visual essay: From second hand in Lomé to second life in Paris  Andrew Esiebo 200 11 Epilogue: African fashion, cities and the modernity of tradition  Victoria L. Rovine 208 Index 215

vi

ILLUSTRATIONS

1.1 2.1 2.2 2.3 2.4 3.1 3.2 3.3 3.4 3.5 4.1 4.2

4.3 4.4 4.5 4.6 4.7

Isabel Okoro for Lagos Space Programme, Lagos 2020 2 Image of Alaa Salah, 8 April 2019 30 A tobe merchant displays his stock in an Omdurman market, 2010 31 Female students standing in the main quadrangle of Khartoum University College, c. 1951–6 34 Women protesting at Ahfad University, Khartoum, 2 March 2019 36 Roberto Norberto Francisco de Souza (1879–1956). Photograph by Pierre Verger, c. 1936 47 Portrait of Louisa Angelica Nogueira da Rocha posing with her son Candido, c. 1870 50 Portrait of Adeola Holloway, alias Mammy Adeola. Unknown studio photographer52 Samuel Herbert Pearse with children. Unknown studio photographer 53 Two sisters of the Irmandade Boa Morte, Salvador, Bahia, c. 190054 Lagos Space Programme, Show finale Spring/Summer 2019 collection ‘Project 3.1 Awo-Workwear’ presented at Heineken Lagos Fashion Week 2018 63 Lagos Space Programme, lab coat with Ifá odù print, Spring/Summer 2019 collection ‘Project 3.1 Awo-Workwear’ presented at Heineken Lagos Fashion Week 2018 65 IAMISIGO, outfit lookbook Spring/Summer 2019 collection ‘Gods of the Wilderness’, Lagos 2018 67 IAMISIGO, outfit lookbook Spring/Summer 2019 collection ‘Gods of the Wilderness’, Lagos 2018 68 Maxivive, outfit Spring/Summer 2019 collection ‘How to marry a billionaire’ presented at Heineken Lagos Fashion Week 2018 71 Maxivive, Show finale Spring/Summer 2019 collection ‘How to marry a billionaire’ presented at Heineken Lagos Fashion Week 2018 73 Textile experiments ‘post-adire’ for the Lagos Space Programme’s collection ‘Project 4 Guerilla’, Osogbo, February 2019 74

Visual essay by Michaela Oberhofer 80   a. Ndop in the Wukari style with crocodiles in the corner, before 1955 81   b. Presentation of embroidery samples from King Njoya’s textile workshops, postcard81   c. Presentation of a ndop fabric with serpent motif from the workshops at the palace, Fumban, around 1930 82

Illustrations

  d. King Ibrahim Njoya presenting his royal costume made of ndop (ntieya) fabric, Fumban, 1908 82   e. Ngutane, King Njoya’s eldest daughter, in her wedding dress made of ndop (ntieya) fabric, Fumban, 1916 83   f. Display of Bamum masks and ndop (ntieya) fabrics in the background in the palace museum, Fumban, 1937 83   g. Ibrahim Njoya, drawing of Bamum kings with ndop (ntieya) fabrics and pattern, around 1930 84   h. Young chief in front of a mural painting with ndop pattern, Bafoussam, 1930 85   i. New mural painting in ndop (ntieya) style by Idrissou Njoya at the entrance of the palace, Fumban, 2019 86   j. Ndop in public space, newly painted monument of King Njoya in the centre of Fumban, 2019 86   k. Transforming the ndop technique and pattern in contemporary fashion, Spring/Summer collection ‘Asseulenn’ by Imane Ayissi, 2017 87 5.1 Seru rabal, Dakar 2018 94 5.2 Cuup palman, dye workshop, Dakar 2017 95 5.3 Marriage ceremony, Dakar 2016 97 5.4 ALGUEYE, Collection ‘boubou en itinerance’, Dakar 2019 99 5.5 NIAWAL, Collection ‘nawett’, jacket with seru rabal, Dakar 2020 101 5.6 BU KEN LAB, prototype ‘boubou bkl’, denim, Dakar 2020 102 6.1 Coco Argentée with Chinese look; video still from ‘Mouiller Maillot’, Yaoundé 2018113 6.2 Coco Argentée in Chinese style; video still from ‘Mouiller Maillot’, Yaoundé 2018 114 7.1 Andrew Esiebo, Highlife (2013–16) 122 7.2 Images from the archive of Shade Thomas-Fahm, Lagos 2018 124 7.3 From Maki Oh’s Autumn/Winter 2016 collection 127 7.4 Shem Paronelli Artisanal, Nkwo Distressed Pumps, Lagos 2016131 7.5 Kadara Enyeasi, Another, 2015 132 7.6 Gozel Green, Summer Collection 2021 133 8.1 Still from Fela in Versace, AKA ft Kiddominant, Dir. Nate Thomas, Vevo 150 8.2 Alexander-Julian Gibbson, Lenge Lenge 155 8.3 Bernard Matussiere, Fela surrounded by the Kalakuta queens, around 1982 156 8.4 Lemi Ghariokwu, Beast of No Nation, 1989 160 8.5 Still from Fela in Versace, AKA ft Kiddominant, Dir. Nate Thomas, Vevo 163 9.1 Our Tribe title image, 2017 168 9.2 Studio photography, c. 1945 170 9.3 Our Tribe campaign images, 2017 176 9.4 Our Tribe campaign images, 2017 177 9.5 Our Tribe campaign images, 2017 177

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Illustrations

10.1 Surrealist collage posted 21 June 2017 184 10.2 SRK, ‘Young Fresh’ lookbook Spring/Summer 2018 collection, ‘Pichkari’, Dakar 2018186 10.3 SRK, detail of quilted coat Fall/Winter 2017 collection, ‘17 Rue Jules Ferry’, Dakar 2017 188 10.4 ‘Alien Cartoon’ prototype 190 11.1 Necklace (Odigba Ifa), late nineteenth/early twentieth century, 1994 211

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CONTRIBUTORS

Marie Grace Brown (PhD, University of Pennsylvania) is an associate professor at the University of Kansas who specializes  in  questions of gender, empire, and alternative historical texts. Her award-winning first book,  Khartoum at Night: Fashion and Body Politics in Imperial Sudan (2017), argues that Sudanese women used fashion and their bodies to mark and make meaning of the shifting sociopolitical systems of imperial rule. Continuing her interest in sensory experience, Brown’s second project, A World of Color: Adventures in Romance in Imperial Sudan, claims that romance and play were dynamic means through which individuals understood and moved across the British Empire. Her work has also appeared in Gender & History, the International Journal of Middle East Studies, al Hadatha al Sudania, and the Journal of Imperial and Commonwealth History. Her research has been supported by the American Association of University Women, the Social Science Research Council, and the Institute for Citizens & Scholars. Rana ElNemr is a visual artist based in and working with Cairo’s  art scene and larger urban environment. Her artistic practice moves from formalist explorations of photography as a medium to genre-bending visual essays of her surroundings in Egypt. Her practice is anchored in questioning what  it means to live and experience place and time through recording,  describing, and reflecting via photography, film, texts, and conversations. Andrew Esiebo was born in Lagos. He is an award-winning visual storyteller exploring themes such as urbanism, sexuality, gender politics, football, popular culture, migration, religion, and spirituality. His works have been widely exhibited and published across the globe; they are in several private and public art collections around the world. He is a founding member of Nigeria’s photographic collective, Black Box, Nigeria. Esiebo was part of the exhibition project Progress of Love, a collaboration between the Menil Collection, Houston, the Center for Contemporary Art, Lagos, and the Pulitzer Arts Foundation, St. Louis. He has contributed to the style magazine Arise and Le Monde’s M Le magazine, among others. Kristin Kastner is an assistant professor at the Ludwig Maximilian University in Munich. She holds a PhD in anthropology from Bayreuth International School of African Studies (BIGSAS) and works mainly in West Africa and the Mediterranean on fashion and styling, the body and body manipulation, mobility, and migration. Between 2018 and 2020, she was part of the DFG research project ‘Fashion and styles in African cities.’ Her publications include Making Fashion, Forming Bodies and Persons in Urban Senegal (2018) and Fashioning Dakar’s Urban Society: Sartorial Code Mixing in

Contributors

Senegal (2019). She is currently preparing a book on fashion practices in Dakar and the Parisian diaspora. Nomusa Makhubu is an associate professor in Art History and deputy dean of Transformation in Humanities at the University of Cape Town. She was the recipient of the ABSA L’Atelier Gerard Sekoto Award in 2006 and the Prix du Studio National des Arts Contemporains, Le Fresnoy, in 2014. She received the American Council of Learned Societies (ACLS) African Humanities Program fellowship award and was an African Studies Association (ASA) Presidential fellow in 2016. In 2017, she was also a UCT-Harvard Mandela fellow at the Hutchins Center for African and African American Research, Harvard University. Recognizing the need for mentorship and collaborative practice in socially responsive arts, she founded the Creative Knowledge Resources project. She co-edited a Third Text Special Issue: ‘The Art of Change’ (2013) and, with Nkule Mabaso, co-curated the international exhibition Fantastic in 2015 and The Stronger We Become in 2019 at the fifty-eighth Venice Biennale in Italy. Basile Ndjio is a professor of anthropology at the University of Douala and is currently a senior research fellow at the Freiburg Institute for Advanced Studies at the University of Freiburg. He has held teaching and research positions in several academic institutions in the United States and Western Europe. His most recent publications include Death Without Mourning: Homosexuality, Homo Sacer, and Bearable Loss in Cameroon (Africa/Journal of International African Institute, 2020, 90, 5: 152–69). Ndjio is currently writing a book on transnational Chinese sex labor migration to Central and West Africa. Michaela Oberhofer (PhD) is curator for Africa and Oceania at Museum Rietberg in Zurich. Her academic and curatorial work is dedicated to the entangled histories of African Art. As an art anthropologist, she focuses on the life and work of female and male artists, past and present (e.g., Bead Art), and the reception of African art in the avant-garde (e.g., Dada Africa). Connected to this is a critical examination of the colonial history of museum collections. In the exhibition Congo as Fiction, contemporary artists from Congo and the diaspora were invited to engage with the museum’s archives. Another of Oberhofer’s research areas is textile practices and contemporary fashion (see her text Fashioning African Cities 2012). A regional focus of her work is Cameroon. Her research on the Bamum collection at the Ethnological Museum in Berlin was the basis for various exhibitions and publications. Since 2015, she has been leading a museum collaboration with Fumban for the conservation of cultural heritage. Enrica Picarelli (PhD) is an independent researcher and blogger writing about African fashion digitalities from an anthropological perspective. Her research has appeared in international publications and anthologies, including Fashion Studies and the Companion to Fashion Studies by Routledge. She was Michael Ballhaus Fellow at the Center for Digital Cultures, Leuphana University, and a research fellow at Bologna xi

Contributors

University, where she focused on cultural sustainability. She regularly contributes to Griot Magazine and blogs at afrosartorialism​.ne​t. Kerstin Pinther, a scholar of African art history, is currently a curator for modern and global art at the Staatliche Museen Berlin. Prior to this she held professorships at Ludwig Maximilian University in Munich and at the Freie Universität Berlin, where she co-founded the first department for African art history within German-speaking universities. Her research activities focus on twentieth- and twenty-first-century art, global design issues, and fashion practices. She is also a curator, and her most recent exhibition and book was Flow of Forms/Forms of Flow: Design Histories between Africa and Europe (with Alexandra Weigand, 2018). Together with Tobias Wendl, she is the author of a short film about the Malian designer Cheick Diallo: Cheick Diallo—ou la quête de rendre les chooses légères. Her publications include New Spaces for Negotiating Art (and) Histories in Africa (with Ugochukwu-Smooth C. Nzewi), 2015, and Design Dispersed: Form of Migration and Flight (with Burcu Dogramaci), 2019. Cher Potter is a South African design researcher and curator.  She is the Curatorial Director of Future Observatory at the Design Museum, London. She is also co-founder of the Leverhulme-funded AfriDesignX network (www​.afridesignx​.com) with Mugendi M’Rithaa and Ayorkor Korsah. The network brings together designers, tech innovators, and scholars from Johannesburg, Nairobi, Dakar, Accra, and London to investigate emerging design typologies in response to large-scale social and environmental change. In her previous role as Senior Research Fellow at the Victoria and Albert Museum, London (2013–2021), she convened the Global Africa Group. She studied history of design (MSc Distinction) at the University of Oxford, UK; Arts of Africa (selected module) at SOAS, UK; and fine arts (BA) at Rhodes University, South Africa. She is coauthor of the book Design and Futures (2019). Victoria L. Rovine is a professor of art history at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. Her research focuses on clothing and textiles in Africa, with particular attention to innovations in forms and meanings across cultures. Her first book, Bogolan: Shaping Culture through Cloth in Contemporary Mali (2001 and 2008), examined the recent transformations of a richly symbolic textile. Her second book, African Fashion, Global Style: Histories, Innovations, and Ideas You Can Wear (2015), explores the innovations of designers from Africa, past and present, as well as Africa’s presence in the western fashion imaginary. Her current research focuses on the important and understudied roles of cotton textiles and weaving in the colonial-era interactions between France and French West Africa.  Frank A. O. Ugiomoh is a sculptor and printmaker, a professor of history of art and theory, and the Omooba Yemisi Adedoyin Shyllon professor of fine art and design at the University of Port Harcourt, Nigeria. He is also the director of the Jonathan Adagogo Green School of Photography. His research focuses on the historiography and methods xii

Contributors

in art history and critical theory in art and photography. He has published widely in Nigeria as well as internationally, and his contributions have appeared in Third Text, Camera Austria, Nka: Journal of Contemporary African Art, and Critical Interventions: Journal of African Art History and Visual Culture. As an artist, his interests are in wood and bronze casting, and serigraphy in printmaking. He has held solo and group exhibitions in Nigeria. Ugiomoh is a fellow of the Society of Nigerian Artists and a recipient of many research and travel grants. Alexandra Weigand is a Munich- and Lagos-based designer, art historian, and interdisciplinary curator. Her work includes exhibitions such as Hit the Future—Design beyond the Borders (2014) and Hit the Future—Metropolitan Design (2015) for Munich’s Design Week, and Flow of Forms/Forms of Flow: Design Histories between Africa and Europe with the eponymous publication (with K. Pinther, Munich and Hamburg, 2017/2018, publication in 2018). Between 2017 and 2020, she was part of the DFG research group ‘Fashion and Styles in African Cities’ at Ludwig Maximilian University, Munich. Currently she is preparing her PhD thesis, building upon extensive research on fashion and urbanism in Lagos. For the art exhibition Look At This, developed in dialog with the Nigerian curator Folakunle Oshun at Pinakothek der Moderne in Munich (2021), she is part of the curatorial team as an academic advisor. Since autumn 2020, she has been co-directing the international design research project New Parameters of Making with partners in Germany, Ethiopia, and Nigeria (funded by the German Federal Foreign Office).

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CHAPTER 1 INTRODUCTION. FASHIONING THE AFROPOLIS HISTORIES, MATERIALITIES AND AESTHETIC PRACTICES Kerstin Pinther and Kristin Kastner

Figure 1.1 is the work of Adeju Thompson of Lagos Space Programme. Since its foundation in 2018, the label has steadily challenged the notion of fashion design made in Nigeria as well as of Lagos, the city where it is produced. Through a collective process between the designer, craftspeople from various regions in Nigeria, artists and photographers alike, explorations into past textile and sartorial practices not only led to the creation of new shapes but also helped to unveil hidden or sidelined societal beliefs and epistemologies. In particular, the brand’s research into the blue-and-whitepatterned adire fabric and, more recently, into the material qualities of brass, underlines its approach to adapting long-established fabrics and dress forms to the present. The results are handmade pieces, sewn from indigo-dyed silk in cuts that are usually wide and multilayered, often reminiscent of ‘traditional’ garments – a wrapped skirt or, as in Thompson’s first collection, a modernized version of an Ifá priest’s babalawo ‘workwear’. His latest collection, as always gender-neutral, takes as a starting point the Yoruba proverb ‘Aso là ńkí, kí a tó ki ènìyàn/We greet dress before we greet its wearer’ and thus emphasizes the importance of cloth and person inextricably linked to and mutually reinforcing each other (Renne 1995) – fashion and dress as techniques of the self are equally evoked as are the sensual and communicative aspects of clothing. The fashion photographs by Isabel Okoro and others accompanying his collections defy stereotypical images of a(n) (over)crowded and somehow ‘chaotic’ Lagos. Instead, the city’s modernist architectures or ‘simple’ courtyard settings serve as backdrops, conveying a sense of Lagos as an ‘ordinary city’ (Robinson 2006). With our intertwined focus on fashion and styles in the Afropolis, we aim to contribute to the ongoing discussion on the globalization of fashion and fashion theory within the interdisciplinary field of art history, anthropology, design studies and material culture research. Historically ‘fashion and city’ have been regarded as marginal phenomena within the African context, and fashion research was, and still is, not one of the core subjects within the field of African studies. Here, fashion’s negative reputation as allegedly ‘superficial’ together with anti-fashion discourses seems to have left its mark. Barbara Vinken (2019) repeatedly pointed out how fashion has been stigmatized in western thinking as effeminate and idolatrous, and Ted Polhemus (2011) continues to criticize anthropology’s unease with fashion as an important field of research even thirty-five years after the publication of his seminal Fashion & Anti-Fashion. Daniel Miller (2005) likewise argued against the assumption of fashion and clothing being ‘superficial’ – on the

Fashioning the Afropolis

Figure 1.1  Isabel Okoro for Lagos Space Programme, Lagos 2020. © Isabel Okoro. contrary, he stressed the constitutive role they play in the production and re-production of society. However, whereas the earliest western sociological theories addressed fashion in the mode of critique alone (Veblen [1899] 1986; Simmel [1905] 1995), this negative attitude towards fashion and its assumed superficialities probably was, and is, not shared among many intellectuals and artists in Africa. Films by the Senegalese directors Sembène Ousmane or Djibril Diop Mambéty confirm this impression as works like Xala (1974), Faat Kiné (2000), Touki Bouki (1973), or Hyènes (1992) express a pronounced sensitivity to the language and meaning of fashion and dress as well as to their sitespecific and place-making qualities. This volume aims to contribute towards an understanding of fashion and sartorial practices as being a relevant and an important part of ‘African’ expressive cultures and contemporary life (Rovine 2015: 7). For too long, a western-centric gaze has dominated scholarship which perceived Africa as homogenous and provincial and its visual arts and textile cultures as static and folkloristic (Rovine 2009). For too long, fashion and city were discussed only within a western framework which, thereby, continued to perpetuate the deep-rooted opposition between an ‘ethnographic presence’ and a ‘perpetual future’ in discussions about non-western dress practices and western fashion (Rovine 2009: 134). This perspective is astonishing for several reasons: on the one hand, with regard to Africa’s rich and entangled textile and sartorial past; on the other hand, in light of more recent developments that are turning many cities in Africa into eminent hotspots for a steadily growing and connected scene of fashion designers. More and 2

Introduction

more fashion labels operate successfully on an international scope as well as within Africa, where locally produced fashion, ranging from haute couture to prêt-à-porter and street style, is on the rise, not to lose sight of fashion networks and collaborations along a South-South axis (Odu 2019). Since the mid-1990s, fashion weeks have been popping up everywhere: in Johannesburg, the South Africa Fashion Week took place for the first time in 1997; in 1998, Alphady launched the Festival International de la Mode Africaine (FIMA) in Niger, and Lagos Fashion Week was founded by Omoyemi Akerele in 2011, to name but a few, and not to mention earlier events dating back to the 1960s.1 In addition to more established fashion centres like Dakar, Abidjan, Accra, Lagos and Johannesburg, many other cities on the continent such as Douala, Kampala and Nairobi entered the scene – with The Nest Collective being among those initiatives that link creative scenes on a transregional level. Founded in Nairobi, Kenya, in 2012, the collective around Sunny Dolat under the title Not African Enough (2017) opposes stereotypical ideas about design from Africa and has thus shaped cultural production in Kenya in its very own way. These developments represent an enduring change in the cartography of fashion and question the dominance of western fashion centres hitherto (Breward 2011; Segre Reinach 2006).2 All this calls for an updated empirical and theoretical foundation. Inspired by designers and labels such as the aforementioned Adeju Thompson (Lagos Space Programme), Amaka Osakwe (Maki Oh), Bubu Ogisi (IAMISIGO), Gozi Ochonogor (U.Mi-1), Papa Oyeyemi (Maxivive), Adama Paris, Selly Raby Kane, Stoned Cherrie, Sun Goddess, The Nest Collective, MaXhosa by Laduma, we depart from an understanding of fashion design and sartorial styles as genuine urban yet entangled phenomena that by far transcend the cities’ physical boundaries and also encompass the multiple imaginary localizations. In addition to our focus on the interplay between fashion and its respective city, our empirical approach drew our attention to other current tendencies. In line with research on the political roles of textiles and sartorial styles, frequently connected to times of crisis and transition (Allmann 2004; Nuttall 2008), fashion design plays an ever-growing part in (cultural) activist performances (de Greef 2018). Fashion is thus approached as a highly relevant area of contemporary culture and is considered a seismograph of societal issues and conditions. Analogous to ‘global trends’ (Teunissen 2005: 9–10) and despite the fact that handicraft has never completely lost its central meaning in many parts of Africa, there has recently been a growing preoccupation among (fashion) designers and artists alike with crafts, materiality, tactile processes, skilled labour and technologies of the ‘past’ – with the latter underscoring fashion’s archival potential. Such reinterpretations and re-appropriations of craft techniques like dyeing and weaving locate the work of memory within the tactility of fabric. Textiles and fashion design in this regard are considered repositories of technical and body knowledge.3 Fashioning the Afropolis proposes the city and more precisely each individual urban centre as a common starting point for all the contributions.4 According to Sarah Nuttal and Achille Mbembe (2008), the concept of the Afropolitan and accordingly the Afropolis was introduced to provoke a re-reading of African metropolises beyond normative urbanist and development approaches and to discuss them within the field 3

Fashioning the Afropolis

of cultural theory. The term ‘Afropolis’ emphasizes the cosmopolitan nature as well as the transnational networking of cities in Africa and, at the same time, affirms the search for each city’s specific situatedness. Hence, the Afropolis is anything but a monolithic and fixed setting, but, instead, it encourages the idea of each city being the product of, among others, its own history and stories, religious and cultural contexts, practices, politics and economy. Accordingly, fashion and sartorial styles are likewise shaped by the respective city as they contribute to the making and remaking of its spatial and imaginary production. By building on the concept of the Appaduraian ‘scapes’ (1990) which Calefato (2019: 33–4) recently adopted for fashion, the essays in this volume follow an understanding of culture and place that is no longer marked by unity (if it ever existed), but by flows. The notion of the fashionscape, first coined by Vicki Karamina (Calefato 2019), allows for departing from the ‘classical’ western models to describe changes in styles such as imitation and distinction or the assumed flow from the streets into high fashion (Calefato 2019). Hence, Fashioning the Afropolis also looks at the interstices, connectivities and flows of fashion within, between, and across cities, and the ways fashion makers and consumers, materials and ideas move, converge and affect each other.

Challenging definitions: Fashion and style The above-mentioned studies clearly reject the notion of homogenous and static textile and sartorial practices. They also challenge long-lasting assumptions of fashion theory whereby fashion has been understood as a purely western phenomenon, seemingly determined by its European history – from the Renaissance through the Industrial Revolution until today – and distinguished by the promise of endless novelty and the ephemerality considered typical of modern western society (Bieger and Reich 2012; Skov and Riegels Melchior 2010). At the same time, the existence of fashion phenomena in other parts of the world, such as Africa, the Arab World or Asia, was ignored or classified as costume that has perpetuated long-standing power relations (Niessen 2003). Victoria Rovine asks what ‘fashion’ means if it is not defined by the conventional proximity to western clothing innovations, and concludes, in line with other authors, that change is crucial when distinguishing fashion and other dress practices. This presupposes that ‘recognizing change requires an appreciation of the historical and cultural context within which dress innovations occur’ (Rovine 2015: 15), setting change as a constant in every culture. This also includes the existence of fashion worlds that do not necessarily participate in the global fashion system, but, instead, draw inspiration from ‘their own histories, economies, and precedents’ (Rovine 2015: 29). In line with this field of contemporary research, we emanate from a broad understanding of fashion. Additionally, we propose an approach that deliberately blurs the distinction between ‘low’ and ‘high’ fashion or ‘world/cosmopolitan fashion’ (Eicher and Sumberg 1995: 300; Calefato 2019: 33) as opposed to haute couture by underlining the existence of what could be called a ‘popular haute couture’. Bespoke and unique clothes are, for many regions on 4

Introduction

the continent and especially in Western Africa, a common mode of fashioning the self. Indeed, the practices associated with haute couture fashion in the western context are often the defining and predominant fashion-making processes in many places in Western Africa. So-called street fashion and designer-made high-end fashion mutually influence each other, while street-corner tailors and craftspeople like dyers and embroiderers create and innovate on a daily basis. What is more, many conceptual fashion designers who ‘address contemporary anxieties and speculations about body and identity’ (Rovine 2015: 158) and who blur the boundaries of fashion and art often reflect and update these handmade capacities. Certainly, fashion unfolds its multi-sensory and communicative potential only when worn on the body, a long-neglected concept in fashion studies (Entwistle 2000: 4–5). Karen Tranberg Hansen introduces the terms ‘fashioning’ and ‘fashionability’ to ‘capture the performative qualities of dress practice’ and to stress the experiential dimension of dress, in terms of both wearing and viewing (Hansen 2013: 6). She refers to fashionability as ‘an aesthetic sensibility involving discerning skills from a variety of sources in creating an overall look that results in pride, pleasure, and experiences of feeling good’ (Hansen 2003: 303). Thus, there is more to fashion than the various garments a person might wear, which is reflected in the notion of style. While, following Daniel Miller, fashion implies the ‘dissolution of individual identity through appearance’, style ‘appears as a highly personalized and self-controlled expression of particular aesthetic ability’ (Miller 1994: 74) and ‘a personalized context for fashion items’ (Miller 1994: 75). The recent fashion video Looku (2021) directed by Sunny Dolat and Noel Kasyoka from The Nest Collective also engages in the matter of style which they intimately relate to their city Nairobi as the English subtitles to the comment in urban Swahili convey: Style. It means different things to different people. To some, it’s clothes. To others, it’s how you speak. Some use it to make a statement. To some it is how they walk . . . how they relax at the end of a long day. Just how you carry yourself. In our area . . . Style is all the above. We call it ‘Style’, ‘Stylé’, ‘Fashion’, ‘Looku’. It’s got many names. But it’s all the same thing. . . . And our . . . style is one of the few things we own in this city.5 Such self-definitions resonate with Carol Tulloch’s use of the term ‘style’ (in a diasporic context) as agency (2010: 276). They are crucial when reasoning about terms such as fashion and style that, alongside others, are ‘in need of reconsideration to progress critical thinking on dress’ (2010: 274).

Fashion and textile (research) in time and space Fashion in its spatial and temporal references has played only a marginal role in previous research on Africa’s art and visual cultures. Nonetheless, earlier art historical and art anthropological studies on the aesthetic and symbolic premises of textile production 5

Fashioning the Afropolis

exist – notably analyses of materiality, technique, form and iconography of specific tissues (Picton and Mack 1979; Sieber 1972). Research since the 1980s has attempted to identify aesthetic principles and specific visual qualities of selected textiles (Adams 1989; Renne 2010), and clothing has been examined as a marker of political, religious and ethnic identity in pre- and postcolonial contexts (Allman 2004; Eicher 1995; Masquelier 1996). Fashion design in its globally connected form has, however, been established as a research topic only in the last decade. In particular, Victoria Rovine’s seminal studies on Bamako’s fashion history (2008) and African Fashion, Global Style (2015) not only underscored the narrative qualities of fashion design but also made a strong point for the integration of local, ‘indigenous’ sartorial practices in the field of fashion studies. Besides her studies, other (survey) editions (Gott and Loughran 2010; Jennings 2011; Pivin and Fall 1997; van der Plas and Willemsen 1998) have addressed the dynamics of change within clothing and fashion practices and were important cornerstones for our research. Historical research has shown the crucial role of textiles as vehicles for transcultural and transregional transmissions of ideas and forms (Benjamin 2016; Kriger 2006; LaGamma and Giuntini 2009; Rabine 2002). Trans-Saharan trading in fabrics is one example, others refer to the cotton waxprints travelling across Asia, Europe and Africa (Gott, Loughran, and Quick 2017; Picton 1995) or to the trade in African Lace (Plankensteiner and Adediran 2010), the material worlds of the Indian Ocean (Machado, Fee and Campbell 2018), or the more recent circulation of patterns and cloth within Chinafrique fashionscapes (Sylvanus 2016). Rabine (2002) has also investigated the global circulation of African fashion in relation to three cities: Dakar, New York and Nairobi, showing that informal economies, eminent in many African cities, provide channels for the dispersal of fashion trends and practices of dress; she explains how the visual codes of the ‘African’ or ‘authentic’ transform depending on the context in question. Besides research on textile histories and the circulations of fabrics and sartorial styles, an important impulse for our project stems from debates on fashion cities and fashion’s world cities (Breward and Gilbert 2006). Since the ‘spatial turn’ in fashion studies (Breward and Gilbert 2006; Lehnert 2012; Potvin 2009), the interconnections between the fashion industries and genuine urban cultures have been examined predominantly within a Euro-American context (Steele 1998). Until very recently, fashion capitals in the west like Paris, London, and New York were perceived as the only major trendsetting sites for global fashion design.6 The recognition of polycentric fashion industries is gradually gaining ground – with the allegedly historic centres in Paris, London, Milan, New York and Tokyo being increasingly interlinked with or bypassed by fashion cities in the Global South and a planetary urbanism (Brand and Teunissen 2005; Breward and Gilbert 2006). Research has neglected the fact that, alongside these key urban centres, a number of fashion cities have emerged in Africa which contain both the networks and the necessary infrastructure required to produce, distribute and present fashion on the local and international market. Furthermore, research on western fashion centres often followed a ‘cultural economy approach’ (Gilbert and Casadei 2020: 26–7) that led to studies concentrating on fashion cities’ typologies of possible urban fashion formations. 6

Introduction

Although it is important to anchor fashion design in its respective economies and production conditions, our approach focuses more on the visual, sensual and aesthetic as well as on the social and cultural aspects that link cities and sartorial cultures in time and space. On the one hand, work begun on the interrelationship between the Afropolis and its artistic production and the urban imaginaries (Pinther, Förster and Hanussek 2012) is partly continued. On the other hand, our approach is informed by the work of Christopher Breward (2004, 2011) on the merging of fashion and cities. Resonant with Joanna Grabski’s theoretical paradigm of the ‘art world city’ which she developed for Dakar’s art world to ‘account for the imbrication of the creative economy and the urban environment as well as the interplay of local and global dynamics’ (Grabski 2017: 3), we ask not only how fashion and fashion makers are shaped by the city and the sensual and material experiences associated with the urban but also how they project and add new visions and images to the city and thus contribute to its ever-changing constitution. Each city thus provides the setting and stage for sartorial displays and, at the same time, is often referenced in the designs of tailors, stylists and designers – categories that are frequently blurred and transcended in contemporary fashion contexts on the African continent. Thus, the relation between fashion and city is a reciprocal one: fashionable styles are important devices to create and recreate the sense of urban spaces as well as each city’s distinctive atmospheres, and styles add important layers to fashion design.

Cities as crossroads of ideas, forms and fashionable styles In the African context, this area of inquiry has been limited to a few cities in North Africa (Jansen 2014; Pool 2016) as well as to Dakar (Grabski 2009; Mustafa 2006; Rabine 1997), and also partly to Accra (Richards 2016). Research that systematically relates the themes ‘fashion and city’ has come out of Johannesburg, in particular. Its fashion industry is one of the few on the continent that has been promoted through political and structural programmes such as the establishment of a genuine ‘Fashion District’ relying on a competitive city branding (Rogerson 2006). Fashion and sartorial styles, as Nuttal (2008), Farber (2010), Rovine (2015) and most recently de Greef (2019) among others have demonstrated, were and still are considered an eminent arena for social negotiation in times of resistance and transition and of political and social upheaval. South African fashion labels such as Stoned Cherrie and Sun Goddess have picked up styles from the past in order to overcome the former marginalization of certain groups and to create alternative points of references for the future (Nuttall 2008). As a literal material mode of accessing the past, Stoned Cherrie inserted images from the Drum Magazine in contemporary designs, remembering and celebrating Sophiatown’s counterculture of the 1950s. Likewise, Loxion Kulcha created a popular fashion icon for urban youth by reworking garments like the miners’ overalls associated with the townships during apartheid (and which were looked down on by the white mainstream culture). A permanent remix and a selective crossover finally led to an upgrade in value and a re-coding of hitherto 7

Fashioning the Afropolis

marginalized styles into a ‘high-urban experience’ (Nuttall 2008: 437). More recently, South African fashion activists the Sartists set out to uncover hitherto untold stories of ‘urban black sports culture, black identity, and forgotten heroes’ (Kungwane cited in de Greef 2019: 1). In Kinshasa, a rudimentary urban infrastructure continually generated new techniques of the body and fashionable styles. In this context, Filip de Boeck (2004) cites bodybuilding as the only available option to ‘build’ and thereby emphasize the potential of fashion for identity ‘construction’. The sapeurs, who move between Kinshasa, Brazzaville, Brussels and Paris, embody this potential to the extreme (Friedman 1990; Gondola 2010). These examples highlight that fashion and the cultures of dress in Africa are to a large extent urban phenomena and very much shaped by their often-cosmopolitan conditions. Cities like Kaduna, Kano, Kumasi or Foumban (Rovine 2015: 10–11) as well as SaintLouis in Senegal were historic fashion centres in their own right – with (female) fashion trendsetters such as the precolonial Senegalese signares (Jones 2013) or the Asante premanfoo (Gott 2009) and with a long history of adapting and integrating external cultural forms and practices into local sartorial practices. Urban centres in Africa, preand postcolonial alike, were and are shaped by transnationalism, transculturalism and hybridity (Förster 2017; Nuttall and Mbembe 2008; Simone 2004). They are veritable crossroads in the circulation of ideas, forms and fashionable styles. This is where fashion, from streetwear to haute couture, from ready-made clothes to bespoke garments, are being produced and consumed. They are the places of site-specific practices, relying on existing forms of body modifications, established yet updated textile techniques and materials or an understanding of clothes suitable for an individual person. ‘Apart from the social, aesthetic, and other implications of clothing’, John Picton writes, ‘there are the clothes of masked performers as well as, in given circumstances, of houses and shrines’ (2010: 290). Cities are the nodes where globally circulating trends or second-hand clothes from Europe are adapted according to local needs and aesthetics (Hansen 2000) – and they are the nodes from which new styles are distributed to smaller cities and rural areas. Conversely, fashion designers working in African cities take their designs to the world (Rabine 2002). At the same time, cities like Dakar, Lagos, Kampala or Johannesburg are firmly embedded in reciprocal relations with smaller towns and rural regions in their respective countries. In particular, with craft playing an ever-bigger role in contemporary fashion designs in Africa and beyond, rural communities have also (re) gained attention.

‘Fashion and Styles in African Cities’: The project Fashioning the Afropolis stems from the joint research project ‘Fashion and Styles in African Cities’ by art historians and anthropologists from Germany, Nigeria and Cameroon. We started from the assumption that fashion cultures are linked to their cities in manifold ways. We asked how the visual and material cultures of the urban centres affect fashion and fashion designers, and how, for example, a lack of infrastructure shapes the work 8

Introduction

of designers. How is each city represented through patterns, materials and accessories? How do city and fashion mutually condition and infiltrate each other? We deal with the spatiality of fashion systems and look at the various ways fashion and city intersect. What are the respective places ‘for fashion as social practice, body language, narration of time, and a means of communication of style’ (Calefato 2019: 31)? Until the end of the twentieth century, the shop, the gallery and the theatre in Europe were the arena for fashionable appearance. What comparable locations and events can be identified in Dakar or Lagos? What role does fashion play in the construction of identities and self-representation of the manifold urban social milieus? How does it influence and challenge notions of gender in predominantly heteronormative societies? What is the role of sartorial styles in protest movements? Furthermore, we consider the transnational relationships of fashion designers and producers, and processes of globalization, along with the growing importance of new media and online social networks. During the course of our research, we were confronted with the notion and imagination of certain attitudes and beliefs about each city’s specificity. Far from conceiving cities as possessing an all-encompassing and unique Eigenart that would have an effect on each and every part, we strove to find connections between distinctive metropolitan cultures of consumption, shops and shopping, the wearing of fashionable dress in the spaces of the city, the long history of representation and media. The dynamism of each city seems to be particularly evident in its form of mobility and public transport – with Dakar’s car rapide, the Lagos danfo and the matatu in Nairobi, all lavishly converted and designed, the latter being put centre stage in the fashion clip Looku produced by The Nest Collective. Thus, it is hardly surprising that these icons appear again and again as design references or backgrounds in fashion photography. In order to contribute to the above-mentioned debates, we aimed at empirical research that systematically, and with concrete examples, captures the interplay between fashion and the city, between the various actors, as well as the importance of the media. Our joint research project started with a regional comparative approach in three cities: Dakar, Douala and Lagos, selected because these West African countries share a long and rich history of exchange in fashion and textiles. While Lagos and Dakar have long established themselves as creative capitals with a global scope, it is only in recent years that the urban fashion scene in Douala has taken shape. Bearing in mind that research on urban Africa should not focus solely on megacities (Coquery-Vidrovitch 1993), comparing Lagos as a megacity and Dakar and Douala as medium-sized cities proved to be highly fruitful. DAKAR: All over the continent, fashion made in Senegal is associated with elegant beauty, and Senegalese tailors are widely accredited with inventiveness and creativeness. The rich history of fashion in Senegal is intimately linked to an early cosmopolitanism connected to a taste for the new in the fashioning of the persona. Soon after trading posts had been established along the Atlantic coast in the mid-eighteenth century, they evolved into urban centres, most of all Saint-Louis. Up to today, this city celebrates and re-enacts its cosmopolitan past and the heritage of the signares. These female entrepreneurs functioned as cultural mediators between local and European middlemen and traders 9

Fashioning the Afropolis

during the epoch of the slave trade and they exercised considerable influence on urban culture in terms of social life, fashion and architecture (Jones 2019). When the seat of the former colonial capital of French West Africa was transferred from Saint-Louis to Dakar in 1890, the latter soon took on the role of a fashion capital too. In the context of French colonial assimilation politics, the European suit was part of the sartorial convention and habitus for the men of the évolué class before independence and also later on during the presidency of Léopold Sédar Senghor, whereas women acted more freely in terms of fashion. They navigated between wearing so-called traditional and western-style fashion as well as tradi-moderne, which alludes to a combination of both styles. A prime example is the voluminous fashionable robe bloc which became famous in the 1940s and 1950s and was, like any new style and fabric, more popular in Dakar than anywhere else in the country (Konaté 2009: 239). Associated with Lamine Gueye’s political party Bloc Africain, the robe bloc showed how urban women in Senegal used clothing to ‘reinvent themselves in powerful new ways’ (Konaté 2009: 240). The importance of a public self that strives to represent to the highest standards is also reflected in the concept and practice of sañse, a Wolof expression derived from the French (se) changer that points towards a key aspect of fashion, namely change. The linguist Deborah Heath analyses sañse as a code and context of performance (1992: 20), as an arrangement of social relations and as a starting point for the construction of social identity and distinction: ‘Sañse forges the link between having and being, displaying both wealth and social identity’ (1992). Seminal studio photographers in Senegal like Mama Casset and Meïssa Gaye produced unique insights into the practice of sañse over a period of one century (Paoletti and Biro 2016). That lifestyles and fashions from Senegal far exceeded the country’s border and became vanguards for the Francophone world is also reflected in the groundbreaking magazine BINGO. Founded in 1953 and published in Dakar and Paris, it was the first glossy magazine dedicated to a Francophone audience that ‘saw themselves as cosmopolitan even when limited material resources made this an imaginative rather than realized project’ (Jaji 2013: 116–17). The steady colonial comparison between Paris and Dakar, which, before independence in 1960, was often called the ‘Paris of Africa’, has long waned and Dakar has transformed itself from a colonial to a global city (Mustafa 2006). What is more, the fashion city of Dakar has eclipsed the fashion city of Paris as Senegalese living in the European, North American and Asian diasporas are strongly geared to the latest fashion trends created in Dakar. With Dakar being the epicentre in terms of fashion production, distribution and consumption, a fashion system in its own right has been established in the country which, at the same time, strongly relies on the import of fabrics, mainly from Europe and Asia. Fashion in Dakar was exploding in the 1980s during a period of great financial instability in which urban middle-class women, ‘ordinary cosmopolitans’ as referred to by Hudita Nura Mustafa, entered tailoring as entrepreneurs (1998: 30). She convincingly argues that the making, circulation and display of fashion resulted from this crisis and, up to today, functions as both strategy and expression – in a city whose fashion signature 10

Introduction

is ‘diversity of style, hybridity and an unrelenting capacity to appropriate’ (1998: 20, 22). Dakar’s streetscape is proof of this, where persons in grand boubous and hip-hop outfits refined with a local touch walk side by side and where ‘sartorial code-mixing’ (Kastner 2019) has become a decisive feature of urban fashion. Besides being home to thousands of tailors that ‘are fabricating an African modernity that addresses the hybridities, contradictions and aspirations of the post-colonial condition’ (Mustafa 1998: 15), and that, on a daily basis, create fashionable outfits according to the latest trends and in line with the religious and ceremonial calendar of the Muslim population, Dakar is also a centre for young labels. They often work with denim or recuperated material and, more and more, revisit locally produced textiles such as woven or batik cloth as well as popular styles like the grand boubou whose cut is adapted to urban life and harsh economic circumstances. Youth-led civil movements, among which Set Setal in the late 1980s left the most visible traces in the newly appropriated and remade urban space of Dakar, are strongly connected to the local hip-hop and graffiti scene (IAM 2016: 98–103, Rabine 2014). The city’s fashion producers share a strong relationship to Dakar’s urban space and their work ‘is predicated on a relationship with the urban environment’s visual and conceptual resources’ (Grabski 2009: 216). Grabski (2009) convincingly demonstrated how the city of Dakar provides a regionally as well as a globally inflected matrix of visual, material and conceptual propositions that shape and account for the close bonds that exist between the urban fabric and fashion production. The practices of recycling (récuperation), accumulating, displaying and (re)ordering are features of the urban experience strongly connected to a densification of space resulting from urbanization and economic globalization (Grabski 2015) – principles that are also reflected in fashion. Renowned fashion designers and events such as Adama Paris’ annual Dakar Fashion Week or the biennale Dak’art are accompanied by cutting-edge fashion interventions, among others by Senegal’s most prominent vanguard designers Oumou Sy and Selly Raby Kane. Moreover, recent initiatives such as #localattitude and #madeinsenegal promote locally produced fashion and create a platform for creative and commercial exchange. This builds on older practices that have formed the Senegalese art realm, namely the strong collaboration and mutual impacts between the fields of fashion, music, photography and others that contribute to a fruitful transcending of genres. DOUALA: As is true for many other African cities, Douala as a ‘fashion city in the making’ has experienced a boom in locally produced fashion in recent years. More and more Cameroonian fashion designers have initiated their own labels and are successful on an international level. The number of fashion shows and festivals organized in Douala has increased, as has the presence of ‘Fashion made in Cameroon’ in the public space and in the media. Douala as a multicultural and multi-ethnic melting pot with over three million inhabitants is Cameroon’s largest city and dominant in the spheres of economics and culture. As a port city, Douala was a hub for transregional trade in precolonial times, as well as for trade with Europeans and with various African populations. This has shaped the self-concept of the coastal population, recently referred to as ‘Sawa’ (Eckert 11

Fashioning the Afropolis

1999; Malaquais 2004). The historically grown opposition to the capital Yaoundé, the seat of the political and administrative elite of the ruling party, has further informed the Doualian sense of identity. This historical opposition between the two most important cities in Cameroon has often been translated into a distinctive representation and practice of fashion. Indeed, in Yaoundé the state-based bureaucratic elites who are the driving forces of the city’s economy and cultural activities have managed to forge a distinctive identity based on their self-adoption of western-style dresses, notably suits and ties, which they tend to dramatize as signs and symbols of power and social prestige. In Douala, a particular type of dress style mirroring the city’s economic features and the population’s entrepreneurial spirit has been appropriated by many city dwellers who often self-identify as débrouillards (hustlers or resourceful persons). Some of Douala’s inhabitants favour the modern flair of African-European attire. Accordingly, during the ‘Years of Smoldering’ that brought about some democratization in the early 1990s, young urbanites in the popular neighbourhoods of Douala formed a resistance movement (Malaquais 2001). They were associated with the radical left-wing opposition incarnated by the Social Democratic Front, the then main opposition party. In some instances, their resistance to the regime of President Biya (in power since 1982) took the form of the rejection of western-inspired dress styles which many associated with the corrupt political and bureaucratic elites of Yaoundé. This resistance was also translated into a reinvention of a unifying and trans-ethnic cloth that exalted the country’s glorious fashion past, and especially resuscitated the nationalist spirit that had taken root in Douala during the German colonial period (1884–1914). Many young ‘combatants’ and ‘freedom fighters’ of the popular neighbourhood of New Bell who were engaged in a reinvention of the Douala tradition made the kabba cloth a marker of cultural and regional belonging, and especially a powerful tool for asserting their resistance identity against the French-backed Biya regime they despised. The attempt of some young designers to emphasize their identity as Doualian can be interpreted against this background. These designers look to the typical styles of dress on the coast, like kabba, as a source of inspiration for new pieces and as a leitmotif for fashion shows. This first western-inspired, initially rustic and unsophisticated ‘cover’ (kabba is a local distortion of the English word ‘cover’) was turned into an elegant garment by the end of the nineteenth and the beginning of the twentieth century. Contemporary fashion designers such as Parfait Behen, Rodrig Tchatcho and Ly Dumas, subjugated by the originality of the kabba, decided to ‘modernize’ or ‘reinvent’ it by turning it into a haute couture item of clothing (Mokake 2010). The process of politicization of attire and its revitalization are also manifest in the evocation of old fabric patterns and manners of dress for newly produced theme fabrics (pagnes à thème), which are printed on the occasion of (neo)traditional festivals like Ngondo or private and political ceremonies. In the wake of the renaissance of so-called traditional African textiles and clothes or the return to the alleged authentic African fashion, some contemporary African fashion and decoration designers have begun to show interest in ndop and do not hesitate to revisit this famous Grassfields fabric to adapt it to model fashion (Warnier 2010; Dumas 2020). 12

Introduction

The far-reaching absence of political control and formal structure in some parts is counterbalanced by informal economies, self-organizing neighbourhoods and the spontaneous use of public space. Parallel to the ‘independent’ arts initiatives and spaces established in the late 1990s (the most important being Doual’art), globally successful couturiers like Ly Dumas and Anna Ngann Yonn bolster the growth of local infrastructure and engage in private teaching. Like visual arts practitioners, fashion producers have also intervened systematically in public space. Designers like Jules Wokam and Alioum Moussa work at the intersection of fashion and art and serve both fields. Parallel to their engagement with participatory art in Douala, they convey specific urban practices of récuperation to the production and design of fashion (Oberhofer 2012). This way of working seems to be directly related to the scarcity of materials and resources, as is generally true for Douala’s economy (Fodouop 2005). Thus, in Douala, a close link between art and fashion is encountered, both referencing and sourcing from the urban. The works of one of the city’s best-known artists, architects and (fashion) designers, Jules Wokam reflects this interplay, as does his use of the principle of récuperation. According to Michaela Oberhofer, the ‘materiality of the city [. . .] is paralleled by the materiality of fashion’ (2012: 80). LAGOS: With its estimated population of fifteen to twenty million people, the port city of Lagos is a cosmopolitan, multi-ethnic and multi-religious metropolis and one of the most important fashion centres, along with Johannesburg, in Africa. As early as in the fifteenth century, Yoruba-speaking groups had settled on some of the lands, bordering the lagoon around today’s Lagos. Portuguese sailors reached these areas in the eighteenth century and dubbed the place ‘Lagos’, with Eko remaining the local name. Under the Portuguese, and later with British and French involvement, Lagos developed into a centre for the transcontinental slave trade. After its official abolition in the 1850s, emancipated Yoruba slaves from Brazil or Cuba or liberated captives from Sierra Leone settled in Lagos, contributing to the city’s cosmopolitan character and giving some of its material culture and architecture an eclectic and mixed appearance (Akinsemoyin and Vaughan-Richards 1977: 9–10). From the early 1860s, Lagos was under British colonial rule and in 1914 it became the capital of the protectorate of Nigeria. From the first decade of the twentieth century onwards, Pan-African ideas started circulating in Lagos, and under Herbert Macaulay und Nnamdi Azikiwe, the national movements ultimately led to independence in 1960. In the years before, dress had its place in the politics of resistance to colonial rule as exemplified by Funmilayo Ransome-Kuti’s use of dress and style as a weapon to counter colonial politics in Abeokuta and beyond (Johnson-Odim and Mba 1997). Afrobeat legend Fela Kuti took fashion – ankara jumpsuits or simply his underwear – to conspicuously reject western dress codes (Durosomo 2017). Repeatedly, contemporary fashion designers like Buki Akib made Fela Kuti’s sartorial style and his activism the inspiration for their work. Asked about her relationship to Lagos, Akib underlined the importance of the city’s vibrant visuality as well as its club cultures (Akib in Jennings 2011: 102). Her menswear collection ‘Fela’ from 2011 referenced Fela’s exuberant, rebellious manner with a giant coat with augmented patchwork – an 13

Fashioning the Afropolis

allusion to his famous outfits, but also a symbol of the male rock-star attitude of the 1970s (Pinther 2013). In the years after independence, dress as an expression of national identity played a major role in Nigeria. A revitalization of local textile techniques in the postcolonial years of the late 1970s even led to a short-termed and often bypassed ban on textile imports. Thus, the demand for locally produced garments and for textiles and cutting techniques like aso oke, adire, lace and ankara remained high until the 1980s. Notably, the centuriesold transregional textile trade, which characterizes the whole of Nigeria, provided the basis for creative processes of appropriation and transformation (de Negri 1966). As a result of the oil boom in the 1970s, the city area not only quadrupled in just twenty years but also became a lively fashion centre, with lace playing an important role in the display of wealth and luxury (Plankensteiner and Adediran 2010). New settlements and Africa’s largest model city Festac Town were built, and bridges and elevated roads constructed to connect the different parts of the growing city. Today, they feature prominently in fashion photography, exemplified in many editions of the now-defunct Mania magazine – in concrete city life they often provide a framework for a range of informal uses seeking to compensate for the far-reaching decay of the infrastructure. In 1991, Abuja, located in the interior of Nigeria, became the country’s new capital. While the population there is only expanding slowly, Lagos has spread like a rhizome over the last few decades, continually expanding, with new areas of swampland being dried out such as the controversial Eko Atlantic project, officially called Nigeria International Commerce City.

The book’s agenda For this volume, we aimed at deepening our focus with regard to the cities of Dakar, Douala and Lagos and, at the same time, widening the scope by including cities such as Cairo, Khartoum and Johannesburg that were not in the foreground in the context of our research project. Our intention was thus to contribute to an update of empirical and theoretical perspectives that take the steadily growing fashion realities on the African continent into account. Moreover, we wished to stress the temporalities of fashion by paying special attention to long-standing fashion histories and connectivities. What had started out as a general focus on the interactions of fashion and city developed into a more integrative and finally tripartite approach over the course of our research, led by the fashion scenes and designers we talked to and worked with. The scholarly as well as artistic contributions in the three sections of this volume – namely, (1) Histories and archives, (2) Materialities and aesthetic practices and (3) Bodies and media – are informed by and refer to the city and to urban spaces. At the same time, the various flows and discursive aspects of fashion are taken into account – as, in one way or another, all the essays deal with fashion’s potentiality to provide rich visual, material, symbolic and narrative spaces with which to articulate, negotiate and perform societal issues and political debates (Gaugele and Titton 2019). 14

Introduction

Histories and archives Whereas fashion in the sense of seasonally changing garments permanently renews the promise of the (totally) new, it often simultaneously refers to and even directly quotes historical elements with regard to techniques, patterns, materials and iconography. As an integral part of material and visual culture and its concomitant discourses, fashion conveys individual as well as cultural memories on the one hand, and becomes an agent of oblivion on the other. In this part of the book, the focus lies on textile histories, going back to the colonial past as well as to the independence era when local fabrics and techniques were rediscovered as a source of new fashion identities, as well as on fashion as archival material. Considering fashion and textiles per se as a repository of tactile and practical knowledge and memories, individual contributions in this section discuss how contemporary fashion designers and artists use, adapt and update local textile and sartorial traditions. The affective power of dressing and thus its ability to be used as a form of resistance and protest lie at the heart of Marie Grace Brown’s contribution. Woman in a White Tobe: Activism, Nostalgia, and a Viral Image in Sudan starts from a now iconic image of a young woman from Khartoum, Alaa Salah as she is known today, dressed in a white tobe and standing on top of a car. Brown’s essay traces the complex and, at times, ambivalent historical roots of this garment that made it instantly understandable to a Sudanese audience as a symbol of (female) civic engagement. In line with recent media theory, she demonstrates how Salah’s image, having gone viral, was immediately able to unleash its power due to the way it is embedded in collective memory. As with similar image politics during recent upheavals – such as ‘The Woman in the Blue Bra’ in Cairo or ‘The Lady in the Red Dress’ in Istanbul – the white tobe with its highly symbolic and dense historical associations became the pars pro toto of an entire movement, with social media reinforcing its agency. Sartorial styles as an expression of the emancipated status of their wearers is the topic of Frank O. Ugiomoh’s essay Afro-Brazilian Dress Modes in Family Photo Archives in Lagos. He addresses sartorial practices that accompanied freed slaves (or their descendants) returning to Lagos from Brazil (Àgùdà) or from Sierra Leone (Sàró) in the second half of the nineteenth century. Whereas the eclectic and ‘baroque-like’ style of their AfroBrazilian homes is far better documented, their role as image-makers – photographers (Nimis 2001) and tailors alike – has not been researched in any great depth to date. Ugiomoh’s contribution starts by looking at how fashion as a medium communicates through form, colour and material, but also via photography and video. Based on family photo archives, Ugiomoh focuses on their sartorial ways of mixing Victorian European forms with local practices; he also takes into account the visibility of Afro-Brazilian fashion in present-day Lagos – the latter foregrounded in Nigerian musician Davido’s video 1 milli (2020). In Tracing Threads of Time and Space in Conceptual Fashion Design in Lagos, Alexandra Weigand presents case studies on the work of Lagos Space Programme, IAMISIGO and Maxivive – contemporary designers who claim to tell their own stories independently 15

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of external expectations, whether they be national or international. Her paper focuses in particular on the capacity of design materials to store and to convey knowledge of the past. At the same time, she argues, the future potentialities of textiles are explored, and societal and political issues present in today’s Lagos are invoked by ‘unpacking’ hidden or forgotten societal beliefs. Michaela Oberhofer’s visual essay on The Transformation of Ndop Fabric is likewise an account of the manifold entanglements and travels in space as well as in time of a ndop, a cotton fabric painted with geometric patterns and dyed indigo. It is an example of fashion innovations linked to the (pre)colonial city of Foumban, at that time ruled by Ibrahim Njoya, as it testifies to the adaptation of ndop in present-day fashion design. Graphic designer Claudio Barandun translated the rigid ornamentation of ndop for the layout of this essay.

Materialities and aesthetic practices The second part of the book focuses on the practices involved around the making and wearing of fashion. It deals with questions of materiality and its modification that are tied to distinctive aesthetic practices and reflected on different kinds of surfaces – architecture, the body or textiles. Departing from the rich history regarding the role of textiles on the African continent and the multiple forms of textile experiments, we approach textiles in their urban environment and the ways specific visual and material cultures in cities like Lagos or Dakar shape and inspire fashion production. Through a multi-sensory perspective, we want to highlight the sensuous aspects of fabrics that come into their own only when worn on the body. Particularly in times of crisis and transformation, ‘a successful performance of a total look establishes a reputation of urban savvy’ where ‘the body itself becomes a valuable site of production’ (Sylvanus 2013: 41). In this context, transformative practices like ennobling, democratizing and recycling contribute to an aesthetic of assemblage and accumulation and gain particular relevance in striving for a place and position in the urban space. The desire for social mobility may also involve profound changes in urban fashion cultures as, for example, in Abidjan and Douala where a sinonization of fashion practices has not only provoked a new orientation towards Sino-African connectivities but also contributed to changing body and beauty ideals. In addition to trends and materials beyond the continent, fashion and styles in the Afropolis are inspired by a renewed interest among many (urban) fashion designers in so-called traditional fabrics and ways of dressing. This often leads to a cooperation with (rural) craftspeople and involves explorative research into material and techniques. The use of new techniques and technologies by craftspeople and designers alike also plays a central role in rendering ‘traditional’ materials suitable for today’s fashion design. In Born to Shine: Fashionable Practices of Refining and Wearing Textiles in Dakar, Kristin Kastner builds on the central role of textiles and textile manipulation in the making of the persona in Senegal by taking a close look at the principles of accumulation, refinement and récuperation. Special techniques have been developed by weavers, dyers, 16

Introduction

tailors and fashion designers that fulfil the aesthetic criteria of an urban society striving to shine. A profound examination of the surface of the various textiles shows how fashion makers, inhabitants of Dakar, and the city itself share in the creation of fashion design that builds on a long history of cosmopolitanism on the Atlantic coast and is pursued in the steady and innovative refining and accumulating of textile surfaces. Basile Ndijo’s contribution Looking East: Bobaraba Vogue and the Sinonization of Fashion and Beauty in Douala deals with the increasing sinonization of fashion and styles in Douala. In addition to the transfer of ‘made in China’ clothes and fashion accessories to local bobaraba ideals of beauty and body images, the paper argues that the growing fascination of the local middle class with Chinese glamour can be related to both the elite and popular urban culture in Cameroon.7 It now sublimates what many Cameroonians indistinctively refer to as look or style chinois, as a sign and symbol of the new modernity, as well as a marker of social distinction. Both phenomena speak to the emergence of new fashionscapes bypassing the former western fashion centres for the benefit of new Afro-Asian links. This change of fashion and chic, as Ndijo argues, owes much to its dissemination in music clips. Kerstin Pinther’s Between Presence and Evocation: Fashion Design, Photography and Place-Making in Lagos traces the ways Lagosian histories and stories are inscribed in fashion and, at the same time, asks how fashion itself forms and remakes the urban landscape. Fashion design from Lagos by far transcends the city’s boundaries, with urban designers tending to cooperate more and more with craftspeople in the countryside. By exploring ‘traditional’ forms of textile production and sartorial styles, today’s conceptual fashion designers such as Maki Oh or Gozel Green blur the boundaries not only between the urban and the rural but also between past, present and future. The contribution Cairo Ascending by visual artist Rana ElNemr in collaboration with the fashion designer Alaa Abo El Goud invites readers to share their techniques when navigating a dense and complex city like Cairo. By taking the city under construction as an intertwined knot, the two artists build ties with nonhuman beings in the streets they walk and where they seek protection with their physical and social bodies. Plants, family memories and old objects were incorporated into the clothing project ‘Home’ from 2019.

Bodies and media The third part of the book tackles the manifold ties between bodies, media and the city. Being a primary resource and repository of identity and self-expression, the body is a medium in itself. It is through and via the body that fashion and styles come into their own, also when considering the widely shared practice of adjusting custom-made unique pieces to the individual body whose silhouette and aesthetics are tied to each respective life cycle. In this context, fashion celebrates normative ideas about the body, while in others bodily ideals and gender norms may be challenged by fashion designers. The interrelations between media and bodies are also justified by the fact that the media at large do not only convey and shape certain body ideals and representations; they also 17

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play a crucial role in the diffusion and spread of certain images and visions of the body. This can be either conformist or subversive, traditionalist or modernist, post-modernist or Africanfuturist and so on. This intrinsic embeddedness of fashion and style in the broader context of bodily representation and ideas about the person and the self is conveyed through different types of media from early-twentieth-century studio photography and glossy magazines up to contemporary photography and the current highly popular use of new media such as blogs and Instagram. Adopted and adapted by many fashion designers and photographers alike, these new media allow for transcending formerly limited possibilities of access and distribution and facilitate new forms of cooperation. In addition, many fashion designers use Instagram to share details of their form finding and production processes, confirming ‘a platform for alternative modes of fashion discourse’ (de Perthuis and Findlay 2019: 3). By taking the (mediated) body centre stage, the contributions in this part of the book deal with these multi-layered entanglements across different forms of media and spaces as well as between fashion, street styles in motion and the city. The first two contributions stress fashion and sartorial styles as eminent parts of historic and contemporary expressive, sometimes rebellious, city cultures, indispensable for the making of self. Trans-Worlding: Fela Kuti’s Sartorial Rebellion and Pan-African Influence by Nomusa Makhubu traces Fela Anikulapo-Kuti’s sartorial rebellion – manifest in his way of dressing (or only wearing his pants) as well as in some of his lyrics – across the African continent. She highlights the centrality of the body as a powerful medium through which the late Nigerian musician and human rights activist expressed his (dress) resistance against the Eurocentric representation of the African body, or communicated his Pan-Africanist vision of aesthetics to a broad public. Unlike many post-independence African pop stars, Fela dressed less to shine than to reject both the dominant neocolonial capitalist system and postcolonial western-inspired dress codes. In particular, Makhubu demonstrates how his idiosyncratic approach towards fashion as an anti-colonial and resistant practice is mediated through space and time – eventually to be adopted by a South African urban working-class youth subculture known as izikhothane. Makhubu argues that the Johannesburg dandy, isikhothane, uses a performative aesthetic to turn daily life into an arena for political contest and thus counteract alienating attribution. With Our Tribe: The Sartists’ Portrayal of Post-Subculture in Johannesburg, Cher Potter foregrounds the complex and sometimes conflicting social attachments of the socalled Born-Free Generation living in Jozi (Johannesburg). In their campaign, the design collective the Sartists place the long-term proposition of Zuluness at the centre of their own neo-tribes construct. Potter shows how the dress codes of the Swenka and Pantsula subcultures and their counter-hegemonic struggle have been reappropriated and reinvented by Johannesburg’s fashion-conscious community as an act of remembrance, within the city as well as online. In Africanfuturist Dakar in Selly Raby Kane’s Designs, Enrica Picarelli explores the fashion designer’s multimodal aesthetic of alterity. Strongly inspired by and active in collective work, Kane’s designs reflect a strong commitment to the city and its inhabitants. 18

Introduction

Her unique urban narratives connect references to the city’s past with mystical and (African) futurist layers. Picarelli engages with Kane’s use of multiple (digital) media that opens up perspectives to the temporal and spatial dimensions of the designer’s work and suggests that the conceptual lens of ‘worlding’ allows Dakar’s specific atmosphere and its perpetual state of self-redefinition to be grasped. The visual essay by Andrew Esiebo entitled From Second Hand in Lomé to Second Life in Paris took off as a research project in Lomé, Togo’s capital, where the secondhand clothing industry is booming. By following Amah Ayivi, the Paris-based Togolese designer, stylist and founder of the boutique Marché Noir [Black Market] in his search for ‘real vintage’ pieces at the Grand Marché de Hedzranawoe, Esiebo captures the globalization of fashion, constituted by flows and various forms of adaptation from an unusual perspective. In Paris in his boutique in Marais, Ayivi creates his collections from the ‘second-second hand’ he has imported from Lomé. In the epilogue, Victoria Rovine revisits the idea of Fashioning the Afropolis and reads it against the background of her current research into the (colonial) textile trade between Bamako and Paris.

Acknowledgements Fashioning the Afropolis stems from the joint research project ‘Fashion and Styles in African Cities’ between 2016 and 2020. It was generously funded by the German Research Foundation (DFG). In the run-up to the book, we organized several workshops in Lagos, Leipzig and Munich. We would like to thank the following people for important contributions and impulses regarding content, but also for organizational support: Kunle Adeyemi, Olu Amoda, Naluwembe Binaisa, Elke Gaugele, Bolaji Kekere-Ekun, Odessa Legemah, Okechukwu Nwafor, Michaela Oberhofer, Gozi Ochonogor, Odun Orimolade, Enrica Picarelli, Annette Schemmel, Simona Segre Reinach, Monica Titton and Victoria Rovine. Our thanks also go to our copy editor Christine House and our student assistants Susanna Baumgartner, Clarissa Bluhm and Antonia Köppel. We thank Frances Arnold and Rebecca Hamilton from Bloomsbury Publishing for the productive and supportive cooperation.

Notes 1. See also Jennings as well as Miescher in Gott et al. (2017). Shade Thomas-Fahm recalled fashion events in the 1960s in Lagos (Interview with Shade Thomas-Fahm, Lagos, 8 October 2017 and 10 October 2018). 2. Online magazines and blogs such as Nataal initiated by the editor of the now-defunct Arise magazine, Helen Jennings, as well as Afrosartorialism by Enrica Picarelli testify and document the ever-growing and diversifying fashion scenes. Whereas the past – for instance the 1980s in Nigeria – was marked by the development of a celebrity culture with

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Fashioning the Afropolis its own lifestyle magazines (Jennings 2011), the 1990s and 2000s witnessed the founding of fashion and art magazines like the above-mentioned Arise Magazine, and Clam – both were internationally operated, and, in part, produced and read in the African diaspora. Clam intentiously linked Africa, Europe and Asia. Ebony and Drum in turn were instrumental in the 1960s, particularly in circulating fashionable trends on the African continent as well as between Africa and the diaspora (Ford 2015: 8–9, 45). 3. De Greef makes extensive use of the notion of the sartorial as an alternative archive that ‘makes evident other histories, relationships and interpretations’ (2019: V). 4. Recently an exhibition and catalogue, edited by Hannah Azieb Pool took up the topic of Fashion Cities Africa: ‘Whether in Nairobi, Casablanca, Lagos or Johannesburg’, she writes in her introduction, ‘fashion is a pillar of identity, a way to take risks and contextualise a sense of place. Across the continent, and its diaspora, intergenerational conversations are happening through the medium of bespoke caftans, contemporary Maasai beadwork and loom-spun ase-oke’ (2016: 15, her italics). The exhibition Connecting Afro Futures: Fashion, x Hair x Design (2019) at the Kunstgewerbe Museum, Berlin, organized by Claudia Banz, Cornelia Lund and Beatrace Angut Oola likewise focused on fashion scenes in selected African cities. 5. https://www​.fashionscout​.co​.uk​/talent​/creative​-dna (accessed 12 May 2021). 6. This includes the fact that the role of other, non-western fashions and dress practices as well as textiles has not been adequately explored or appreciated. An exception is the chapter on ‘Nubia in Paris: African Style in French Fashion’ in Rovine (2015: 70–105). 7. Whereas an orientation towards Asian styles – either in the form of the sari or the cheongsam – is already documented in Lagos and Accra (Richards 2016: 11–12) in the late 1950s, bobaraba is a more recent phenomenon, characterized by a love for body shapes with enhanced bottoms and large breasts. Abidjan-based photographer Joana Choumali has documented this trend in her series Awoulaba, Baule for ‘beauty queen’. On the one hand, she followed the local production of mannequins in this style, but on the other hand, she critically reflects on this global phenomenon by overblending images of ‘awoulaba-celebrities’ like Kim Kardashian or Beyoncé with those of the opposite ideal of beauty, the ‘taille fine’. The result is a hybrid representation of what a ‘perfect woman’ is supposed to be – ‘a disconcerting and destabilizing ensemble of shapes and symbols and colors and ideas’, as Joana Choumali cites Maria Pia Bernardoni on her homepage. https://joanachoumali​.com​/index​.php​/projects​/photography​/awoulaba​-taille​-fine (accessed 12 May 2021).

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Introduction Lehnert, G., ed. (2012), Räume der Mode, Paderborn: Wilhelm Fink. Machado, P., S. Fee and G. Campbell, eds (2018), Textile Trades, Consumer Cultures, and the Material Worlds of the Indian Ocean, London: Palgrave Macmillan. Malaquais, D. (2001), ‘Anatomie d’une arnaque: feymen et feymania au Cameroun’, Les Ètudes du CERI, 77: 1–46. Malaquais, D. (2004), Architecture, pouvoir et dissidence au Cameroun, Paris: Éditions Karthala. Masquelier, A. (1996), ‘Mediating Threads: Clothing and the Texture of Spirit/Medium Relations in Bori (Southern Niger)’, in H. Hendrickson (ed.), Clothing and Difference: Embodied Identities in Colonial and Post-Colonial Africa, 66–93, Durham: Duke University Press. Miller, D. (1994), ‘Style and Ontology’, in J. Friedman (ed.), Consumption and Identity, 71–96, Amsterdam: Harwood Academic Press. Miller, D. (2005), ‘Introduction’, in S. Küchler and D. Miller (eds), Clothing as Material Culture, 1–19, Oxford: Berg. Mokake, F. M. (2010), ‘The Kabba Dress: Identity and Modernity in Contemporary Cameroon’, in A. G. Adebayo, O. C. Adesina and R. O. Olaniyi (eds), Marginality and Crisis: Globalization and Identity in Contemporary Africa, 71–80, Lanham: Lexington Books. Mustafa, H. N. (1998), ‘Sartorial Ecumenes: African Styles in a Social and Economic Context’, in E. van der Plas and M. Willemsen (eds), The Art of African Fashion, 13–48, Trenton: Africa World Press. Mustafa, H. N. (2006), ‘La Mode Dakaroise: Elegance, Transnationalism and an African Fashion Capital’, in C. Breward and D. Gilbert (eds), Fashion’s World Cities, 177–200, Oxford and New York: Berg. Niessen, S. (2003), ‘Afterword: Re-Orienting Fashion Theory’, in S. Niessen, A. M. Leshkowich and C. Jones (eds), Re-Orienting Fashion: The Globalization of Asian Dress, 243–66, Oxford and New York: Berg. Nimis, E. (2001), ‘Nigeria: The Photographic Giant’, Africultures, 31 May. Available online: http:// africultures​.com​/nigeria​-the​-photographic​-giant​-5534/ (accessed 3 April 2021). The Nest Collective (2017), Not African Enough, Nairobi: The Nest Arts Company Limited. Nuttall, S. (2008), ‘Stylizing the Self ’, in S. Nuttall and A. Mbembe (eds), Johannesburg: The Elusive Metropolis, 91–118, Durham: Duke University Press. Nuttall, S. and A. Mbembe, eds (2008), Johannesburg: The Elusive Metropolis, Durham: Duke University Press. Oberhofer, M. A. (2012), ‘Fashioning African Cities: The Case of Johannesburg, Lagos and Douala’, Streetnotes, 20: 65–89. Odu, M. (2019), ‘The Evolution of African Fashion Landscapes’, in C. Banz, C. Lund and B. Angut Oola, (eds), Connecting Afro Futures: Fashion x Hair x Design, 72–73, Bielefeld and Berlin: Kerber. Paoletti, G. and Y. Biro (2016), ‘Photographic Portraiture in West Africa: Notes from “In and Out of the Studio”’, Metropolitan Museum Journal, 51 (1): 182–99. Picton, J., ed. (1995), The Art of African Textiles: Technology, Tradition and Lurex, London: Barbican Art Gallery. Picton, J. (2010), ‘Nigeria Overview’, in J. B. Eicher and D. H. Ross (eds), Berg Encyclopedia of World Dress and Fashion, Vol. 1 Africa, 290–6, Oxford and New York: Berg. Picton, J. and J. Mack (1979), African Textiles: Looms, Weaving, and Design, London: British Museum Publications. Pinther, K. (2013), ‘Negotiating Signs of Africa in the Fashion Design of Xuly Bët and Buki Akib’, in B. Haehnel, A. Karentzos, J. Petri and N. Trauth (eds), Anziehen. Transkulturelle Moden, 28–40, Bielefeld: transcript. Pinther, K., L. Förster and C. Hanussek, eds (2012), Afropolis: City, Media, Art, Johannesburg: Jacana Media.

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Fashioning the Afropolis Pivin, J. L and N. Fall, eds (1997), ‘Special Mode Fashion’, Revue Noire, 27. Plankensteiner, B. and N. M. Adediran, eds (2010), African Lace. A History of Trade, Creativity and Fashion in Nigeria, Ghent: Snoeck Publishers. Polhemus, T. (2011), Fashion & Anti-Fashion, Morrisville: Lulu​.com​. Pool, H. A., ed. (2016), Fashion Cities Africa, Bristol: intellect. Potvin, J., ed. (2009), The Places and Spaces of Fashion, 1800–2007, London and New York: Routledge. Rabine, L. (1997), ‘Dressing Up in Dakar’, L’Esprit Créateur, 37 (1): 84–108. Rabine, L. (2002), The Global Circulation of African Fashion, Oxford and New York: Berg. Rabine, L. (2014), ‘“These Walls Belong to Everybody”: The Graffiti Art Movement in Dakar’, African Studies Quarterly, 14 (3): 89–112. Renne, E. (1995), Cloth That Does Not Die: The Meaning of Cloth in Bùnú Social Life, Seattle: University of Washington Press. Renne, E. (2010), ‘“These Walls Belong to Everybody”: The Graffiti Art Movement in Dakar’, in B. Plankensteiner and N. M. Adediran (eds), African Lace: Eine Geschichte des Handelns, der Kreativität und der Mode in Nigeria, 71–89, Ghent: Snoeck Publishers. Richards, C. (2016), ‘‘The Models for Africa’: Accra’s Independence-Era Fashion Culture and the Creations of Chez Julie’, African Arts, 49 (3): 8–21. Robinson, J. (2006), Ordinary Cities: Between Modernity and Development, London and New York: Routledge. Rogerson, C. M. (2006), ‘Fashion and the Growth of ‘African’ Brands in South Africa’, Report, African Clothing & Footwear Research Network. Rovine, V. (2008), Bogolan: Shaping Culture through Cloth in Contemporary Mali, Bloomington: Indiana University Press. Rovine, V. (2009), ‘Viewing Africa through Fashion’, Fashion Theory, 13 (2): 133–9. Rovine, V. (2015), African Fashion, Global Style: Histories, Innovations, and Ideas You Can Wear, Bloomington: Indiana University Press. Segre Reinach, S. (2006), ‘Milan: The City of Prêt-à-Porter in a World of Fast Fashion’, in C. Breward and D. Gilbert (eds), Fashion’s World Cities, 123–34, Oxford and New York: Berg. Sieber, R. (1972), African Textiles and Decorative Arts, New York: Museum of Modern Art. Simmel, G. ([1905] 1995), ‘Philosophie der Mode’, in M. Behr, V. Krech, and G. Schmidt (eds), Georg Simmel: Gesamtausgabe Band 10, 9–37, Frankfurt a. M.: Suhrkamp. Simone, A. M. (2004), For the City Yet to Come: Changing African Life in Four Cities, Durham: Duke University Press. Skov, L. and M. Riegels Melchior (2010), ‘Research Approaches to the Study of Dress and Fashion’, in J. B. Eicher and D. Ross (eds), Berg Encyclopedia of World Dress and Fashion, Vol. 10 Global Perspectives, 11–16, Oxford and New York: Berg. Steele, V. (1998), Paris Fashion: A Cultural History, Oxford: Oxford University Press. Sylvanus, N. (2013), ‘Fashionability in Colonial and Postcolonial Togo’, in K. T. Hansen and D. S. Madison (eds), African Dress: Fashion, Agency, Performance, 30–44, London et al.: Bloomsbury. Sylvanus, N. (2016), Patterns in Circulation: Cloth, Gender, and Materiality in West Africa, Chicago: The University of Chicago Press. Teunissen, J. (2005), ‘Global Fashion/Local Tradition: On the Globalisation of Fashion’, in J. Brand and J. Teunissen (eds), Global Fashion, Local Tradition: On the Globalisation of Fashion, 8–23, Warnsveld: Terra. Tulloch, C. (2010), ‘Style—Fashion—Dress: From Black to Post-Black’, Fashion Theory, 14 (3): 273–303. Van der Plas, E. and M. Willemsen, eds (1998), The Art of African Fashion, Trenton: Africa World Press.

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Introduction Veblen, T. ([1899] 1986), Theorie der feinen Leute, Frankfurt a. M.: Suhrkamp. Vinken, B. (2019), ‘Fashion: An Oriental Tyranny in the Heart of the West?’ in D. Bartlett (ed.), Fashion and Politics, 61–71, New Haven and London: Yale University Press. Warnier, J.-P. (2010), ‘Royal Branding and the Techniques of the Body, the Self, and Power in West Cameroon’, in A. Bevan and D. Wengrow (eds), Cultures of Commodity Branding, 155–66, London: Routledge.

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PART I HISTORIES AND ARCHIVES

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CHAPTER 2 WOMAN IN A WHITE TOBE ACTIVISM, NOSTALGIA AND A VIRAL IMAGE IN SUDAN Marie Grace Brown

In April 2019, an image of a lone woman with one arm outstretched, standing on top of a car in front of a crowd of protestors went viral (Figure 2.1). The woman, later identified as architectural student Alaa Salah, aged twenty-two, was one of thousands of Sudanese who had been demonstrating against the government since December 2018. She was dressed in an impeccable white cotton garment, called a ‘tobe’; her gold disk earrings glinted in the dusk. Further points of light surrounded her: streetlights and innumerable smartphone screens held aloft to capture the scene. Lana Haroun, the young Sudanese woman who snapped the (later iconic) photo on her mobile phone, explains what she saw in that moment: ‘[Salah] was representing all Sudanese women and girls and she inspired every woman and girl at the sit-in. She was telling the story of Sudanese women . . . She was perfect’ (Mezzofiore 2019). For those unacquainted with Sudan’s history, the aesthetics of the photo are what makes it so striking. The femininity of the soft folds of the tobe and the oversized earrings stand in sharp contrast to the surrounding sea of smartphones. But for Sudanese audiences, the tobe is an instantly recognizable marker of feminine national identity. Many have noted the garment’s links to kandakas, the Nubian queens of the Kush dynasty, established in the eighth century BCE. But Salah and her white tobe also reference a more recent history of women’s public engagement: a moment in which Sudanese fashion, political protest and urban mobility were knit tightly together. This chapter traces the historical roots of that recognition. Generations of Sudanese women have used fashion to lay claim to overlapping landscapes of public space and authentic citizenship. Distinct from any political status conferred by the state, an authentic citizenship is one grounded in history, tradition and ritual; it rests on and within the body, rather than on paper. Critically, in the case of Sudan, this authenticity has been deployed as a means of protest against successive governments. Of particular analytic importance is the tobe, an everyday garment worn by a majority of Sudanese women. This chapter contends that the tobe possesses deep political currency, a potential for subversion, precisely because it is ordinary and familiar. Its wearer evokes a specific cultural authenticity, which in turn casts those who oppose her as outsiders. The notable and sustained presence of Sudanese women during the December 2018 Revolution,1 the international response to Alaa Salah’s image, and the subsequent resignation of President Omar al-Bashir and the establishment of a transitional government all testify to the continued political power of women’s

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Figure 2.1 Image of Alaa Salah, 8 April 2019. Twitter @lana_haroun, Photographer: Lana Haroun.

fashion – a power that takes on additional dimensions in a new age of mobile technology and social media. The politics of authenticity Meaning ‘bolt of cloth’, the tobe is a rectangular piece of cotton fabric measuring two metres wide and four metres in length, which a woman drapes around her head and body whenever she is in public. First introduced in the late eighteenth century, the tobe was an imported luxury item favoured by wives of merchants and a new class of urban elites, whose use of cotton cloth spoke of their social status and connection to global trade networks. In the 1880s, much of northern and riverain Sudan came under control of the Mahdi, a militant religious leader who imposed a strict interpretation of Islamic law that required women to cover their heads and bodies. As religious fervour increased under Mahdist rule, the tobe satisfied women’s need for chaste clothing. And though it remained an imported item, the messaging of the garment shifted from one of luxury to morality and communal belonging (Ali-Dinar 1995). Under Anglo-Egyptian imperial rule (1898–1956), the tobe continued its transformation from an elite to an everyday dress. Now satisfying imperial as well as Islamic standards of modesty, the white tobe became the preferred uniform of a nascent class of students, teachers, nurses and midwives. During this same period, 30

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women activists consciously capitalized on the sociopolitical power of the tobe, using its modesty and century-long history to advance modern demands of gender equity. In the years leading to independence in 1956 and beyond, nationalists and women activists have lauded the tobe as Sudan’s national costume, declaring it ‘beautiful’ and ‘right’ and a crucial part of Sudan’s ‘indigenous culture’ (Ibrahim 1994: 197–8). Today, Sudanese women favour brightly coloured and elaborately patterned tobes, as seen on display in a market stall in Figure 2.2. Thus, the use of white tobes on the part of female protestors in the 2018 December protests contrasted sharply with contemporary aesthetics and intentionally evoked a specific cultural narrative. The simplicity of the white garment belied the depths of its meaning. The declaration that the tobe belongs to an indigenous Sudanese culture raises important methodological concerns about how we define local and how we position women within claims of tradition and authenticity. Scholars of dress in Africa have rightly argued that the globalization of African fashion predates the colonial period and that the ‘tradition’ that is evoked in African clothing is a long history not of isolation, but of transnational connection, trade and adaptation (Rabine 2002: 28). However, while the production and circulation of textiles, forms and garments (such as the tobe) may be global, sartorial messages are local. As Jean Allman reminds us, fashion is not a ‘universal language . . . [but] deeply vernacular’ (2004: 6). Any analysis of dress must be based on the rhetoric of ‘on the ground’ signs and symbols. Patrizia Calefato also likens

Figure 2.2  A tobe merchant displays his stock in an Omdurman market, 2010. © Marie Grace Brown.

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the symbolism of dress to language, ‘a kind of syntax’ which follows ‘a set of more or less constant rules’ and grants the garment, and the body it covers, meaning (2004: 5). Since independence in 1956, successive governments and political parties have cast Sudanese women as bearers of a conservative Islamic morality. Women are ‘fashioned . . . through the media, the schools, the legal apparatuses and community organizations to develop an “authentic” Sudanese culture based on an “original” Islam’ (Hale 1999: 376). Sudanese secularists have also manipulated gender ideology for their own ends. Emphasizing the role of women as wives and mothers and advocating for the end of ‘negative’ or foreign influences on women’s culture, secularists are also in search of an authentic Sudanese culture. Within both groups, behaviour that does not fit within the essentialized category of the ideal woman is punished or rejected. Critically, however, Sudanese women themselves are savvy players in the politics of authenticity. They have both embraced and rejected the roles assigned to them. And thus, we must not conclude that concepts of ‘authenticity’, ‘belonging’ or ‘inclusion’ are devoid of real meaning. Our task as feminist scholars, as Sondra Hale explains, is to determine ‘to what degree it is the women themselves, as primary actors in their own story, who are creating (inventing) their own identity . . . and to what degree they collaborate in their placement by men’ (1999: 376). A close reading of fashion aids in that determination. Through their sartorial choices, Sudanese women become primary actors, lay claim to ‘authenticity’ and use it for political ends. The invocation of kandakas during the December 2018 protests is one such example. Demonstrators and supporters employed the imagery of the Nubian queen to convey messages of beauty, courage and purpose.2 Early activists of the women’s movement in the 1950s referenced kandakas as well (el Badawi 1966: 1). In both cases, the historical details of the ancient dynasty, which did boast a number of strong female leaders, mattered less than the sense of a sui generis Sudanese culture that predated the existing state. As will be demonstrated later, the persistent political power of the tobe rests in the fact that it adheres to, rather than overturns, the syntax of Sudanese fashion. Past and present, Sudanese women have consciously followed the established rules of dress, so that they might break barriers elsewhere.

Centres and peripheries: The interweaving of fashion and activism Khartoum sits at the confluence of the Blue-and-White Niles; if one looks closely, one can see the seam at which the two rivers – each a distinct shade of blue – cleave together. However, this idyllic locale has proved a challenge for modern urban development. Surrounded by rivers to the north, east and west, the only possible direction for Khartoum’s growth has been to the south, which has historically been home to former slaves, temporary urban migrants and displaced persons. Since the early twentieth century, successive colonial and independent governments, under pressure to expand, have levelled Khartoum’s southern neighbourhoods and forcibly relocated their inhabitants, many of whom resettled at the city’s new southern border. This persistent push of vulnerable groups to the edges of Khartoum mirrors their marginal position 32

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within the sociopolitical landscape. Historian Ahmad Sikainga argues that ‘by preventing migrants from the remote parts of the country from residing in the capital, the central government has tried to emphasize the marginality of these regions and perpetuate the political and economic inequalities in the country’ (1996: 183). The political and urban centres of Sudan overlap, both literally and figuratively, and the occupation of one paved the way for membership in the other. The focus of the December protests was the army headquarters, located in one of the oldest parts of central Khartoum. In addition to the leadership of urban professionals, the influx of protestors into the city centre was an act of urban reclamation on the part of groups who have been physically and politically marginalized. One of the most visible groups was Sudanese women, who, by some accounts, comprised 70 per cent of the demonstrators. They too were staking a claim to Sudan’s political centre. Cities are gendered landscapes; women, youths and other vulnerable groups do not always traverse the same routes as men. Female protestors in the December Revolution carried a double message. Their presence, chants and drumming – contrary to social and legal codes of modesty – were an act of gender critique, shaming Sudanese men for not protecting the rights of women. At the same time, in commandeering the city centre, Sudanese women demonstrated their equity with men by sharing the same space and dangers. However, equity should not be confused with sameness. The rules for women’s bodies in public space differ drastically from the rules for men. In order to navigate the 2018 protests, Sudanese women drew upon a choreography of body movements and fashion that had been established over half a century earlier. As a tool for activism, the tobe’s political function is deceptively simple: a modest garment, the tobe protects women’s presence in public space. This in turn allows for women’s entry into political and civic debate. Throughout the twentieth and twentyfirst centuries, in northern Sudan a strict culture of gender segregation, surveillance and enclosure has limited the movements of women and kept their lives centred on the domestic responsibilities of home. The tobe functioned as its own form of enclosure, shielding the body from the dangers and uncertainty of the streets. But as the tobe gained currency as an everyday form of dress, the modest garment freed a young woman’s movements from the strictures of space, time and familial supervision. Speaking of her time as a schoolgirl in the 1950s, activist and educator Haga Kashif Badri explains, ‘The girl students could move about with their toobs [sic] on after 9 o’clock in the evening without fear and without anybody escorting’ (2009: 25–6). Her simple words belie the dramatic shifts taking place in women’s relationships with public space. Imperial education and civic programmes had young girls travelling farther and staying out later, away from the critical eyes of men and older female relatives. When the women’s movement began in the late 1940s, activists from across the political spectrum used the tobe in much the same way. Members of the Islamic reform group, the Republican Sisters (the women’s branch of the Republican Brothers) followed a strict dress code when in public; they wore a white tobe with no accompanying makeup or gold jewellery. Asma Mahmoud Mohammed Taha, one of the leaders of the Republican Sisters, explained that both the tobe and the colour white were preferred for 33

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their simplicity, functionality in hot weather and spiritual connection.3 Similarly, Nafisa Ahmed el Amin, one of the leaders of the leftist Sudanese Women’s Union (SWU), states that she and her peers sought support for their activism by drawing upon their respected family connections, ensuring they were always well dressed, and refraining from wearing bright colours (2010). When Asma Mahmoud or Nafisa Ahmed donned the tobe, they were moving points of private space within the unprotected public. The white or pale colours of their clothes were of critical importance in marking their protected status. Other women in public view – slaves, tea sellers and traditional midwives – all wore tobes made from locally spun cotton and dyed a dark indigo. As they navigated the streets of Sudan’s capital cities, these labouring lower-class women were frequently subjected to harassment and violence. Thus, in very real ways, white tobes shielded women’s bodies from censure. Counter-intuitively, these imported white garments marked not only a privileged social class but also an authentically Sudanese identity. Figure 2.3, taken some time in the early 1950s, shows Helen Salib, Fatima Shawki and Asma Ahmad, three of only seven female students at the University of Khartoum, in conversation in the school’s central courtyard. Helen, in her wool coat, stands in sharp contrast to her classmates. The difference in the young women’s dress reflected a difference in familial and cultural origins. Helen belonged to a Christian family with Greek and Egyptian roots, though the family had been living in Sudan for generations. Fatima Shawki and Asma Ahmad, on

Figure 2.3  Female students standing in the main quadrangle of Khartoum University College, c. 1951–6. D. M. H. Evans Papers, Reproduced by permission of Sudan Archive at Durham University. 34

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the other hand, were ethnically Sudanese. Helen’s decision not to wear the tobe provides evidence of the extent to which the garment served as a national identifier – indicating the entry of Sudanese women, specifically – in public space. It is worth noting, too, that given the minimalist background of the photograph, it is the existence of women in white tobes which definitively locates this scene in Sudan. Collectively, white tobes created a visual spectacle of Sudanese women’s political engagement. In 1951, students at the Omdurman Girls’ Secondary School staged a strike, protesting the poor quality of their education and their mistreatment at the hands of British schoolmistresses. Photographs of the strike captured a line of girls marching in white tobes, extending beyond the frame of the camera. Two years later, on the eve of independence in 1953, when Britain announced a three-year transition period of self-government, the Women’s Awakening Society organized a march covering the 13 kilometres from Khartoum to Omdurman. This was to be the first public demonstration of women in Sudan’s modern history. Haga Kashif Badri describes the scene: ‘The demonstration consisted of hundreds of women, in their national toob [sic], shouting “Long live Sudan”, “Independence” and “Long live the Sudanese woman”’ (2002: 119). Thus, by the middle of the twentieth century, the white tobe was a visual shorthand for a new type of Sudanese woman: one that was increasingly urban and educated, and who claimed a right to move safely through Khartoum’s streets. The visual symbolism of women in white was repeated in the 2018–19 protests. A month before the image of Alaa Salah went viral, students at Ahfad University, Sudan’s premier university for women, staged a sit-in and intentionally wore white tobes. Photographs of the young women, such as Figure 2.4, were shared on social media with the accompanying hashtag #thewhite_tobe. Pictures circulated of children and infants in white tobes as well. The tobes for children were costumes, not regular modes of dress. But they speak to the importance of the white tobe as an icon of national identity and a revolutionary history. Yet, concerns over cultural recognition and personal safety in public space continue into the twenty-first century. Beginning in 1991, two years after the coup that brought Omar al-Bashir to power, a series of public order laws criminalized acts deemed ‘contrary to public morality’ (The Criminal Act 1991: Art. 145–58). The law, whose provisions were intentionally vague and open-ended, was overwhelmingly – and violently – applied to women and women’s social behaviours. Criminalized acts included indecent dress (such as trousers or uncovered hair); singing and dancing at celebrations; social mixing with men; use of public transportation; and begging on the street. Collectively, the public order laws were ‘designed to exclude and intimidate women from actively participating in public life’ (SIHA 2017). Notably, the codes targeted a unique cross section of Sudanese women, including activists, students, migrants and displaced persons – all of whom traversed public space with heightened levels of visibility and vulnerability. The unprecedented number of female demonstrators in the December 2018 uprisings signalled an unmistakable rejection of the public order laws and the government which had implemented them. Simply by occupying the streets, Sudanese women were violating multiple provisions of the public order laws. Not captured in photographs is the intense 35

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Figure 2.4 Women protesting at Ahfad University, Khartoum, 2 March 2019. Twitter @Derwish6611.

aural environment of the demonstrations. In addition to their physical presence, women claimed a vocal plane by singing songs, reciting poetry and pounding drums. As in the 1950s, the tobe served as a counterweight to radical behaviours and accusations of impropriety. In an interview, Alaa Salah stated that at an earlier demonstration she was in danger of being arrested, only to have the police stop when they saw her tobe (Salih 2019a). Respectable clothing was presumed to go hand in hand with respectable behaviour. Other protestors were not as fortunate. Mahi Aba-Yazid wore trousers to a demonstration in early June 2019 in deliberate defiance of the public order laws. When the sit-in was broken up by a paramilitary organization, Aba-Yazid was shot and then beaten, all the more harshly she believes, because of her sartorial choice (Bektas 2019). The June raid in which Aba-Yazid was injured was one of the most violent of the protests, especially for women. Hospitals reported at least seventy cases of rape, though the number of unreported rapes and attempted assaults is assumed to be much higher (Salih 2019b; Byaruhanga 2019). In placing themselves at risk, women attempted to revoke the authority of the government to control their bodies and their movements. The violence that followed was a painful indicator of the persistent prejudice towards women’s urban presence. In November 2019, women gained a significant victory when Sudan’s transitional government repealed the public order laws. However, the underlying statutes governing morality, including proper dress, remain in place as part of the country’s criminal code. Moreover, even as activists celebrate this important step for women’s rights, they caution 36

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that women remain woefully underrepresented in official political spaces – holding only a small percentage of seats within the transitional government. It remains to be seen as to what extent the expanded legal tolerance of women’s social behaviours will be put into daily practice and how such tolerance might afford women a greater role in political institutions. For the moment, urban and public spaces remain difficult terrains for women to navigate.

Nostalgia and bodily belonging The first day that Alaa Salah’s image went viral, she remained unknown. It was left to others to explain the symbolism of Salah’s dress. Hind Makki, an interfaith educator and blogger, provided one of the most authoritative and complete explanations on her Twitter feed. Sharing the image of Salah, Makki wrote: I’ve been seeing this pic on my #Sudan_Uprising TLs today and it’s amazing. Let me tell you why . . . She’s wearing a white tobe (outer garment) and gold moon earrings. The white tobe is worn by working women in offices and can be linked w/ cotton (a major export of Sudan) . . . Sudanese everywhere are referring to female protestors as ‘Kandaka,’ which is the title given to the Nubian queens of ancient Sudan whose gift to their descendents [sic] is a legacy of empowered women who fight hard for their country and their rights. The romantic imagery of Nubian queens was popular among activists and the international press. Yet, critically, Makki’s tweet also highlights some of the defining characteristics of twentieth-century Sudan, including booming cotton production; growing women’s professionalism and activism; and moon iconography, a symbol of feminine beauty in Arab-Islamic cultures. Makki continued, ‘Her entire outfit is also a callback to the clothing worn by our mothers & grandmothers in the 60s, 70s, & 80s who dressed like this [. . .] while they marched the streets demonstrating against previous military dictatorships’ (2019). This reference to mothers and grandmothers is of critical importance. Alaa Salah in her tobe represented not only an ancient cultural heritage but also a much more recent inheritance: a kinship of protest, but also of aesthetics and ritual. When Sudanese audiences looked at Salah’s white tobe, they saw not only the activism of past generations but also a reminder of the beauty standards and traditions that had defined their grandmothers as Sudanese women. Fashion cannot be divorced from the body it adorns. The soft folds of the tobe caressed bodies that had been indelibly marked as Sudanese women. For much of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, northern Sudanese womanhood was defined through a collection of body rituals: female genital cutting; cheek-scarring, shillukh, to indicate tribal origin; the mushat, a rigidly braided hairstyle; the zar spirit-possession cult; luxury toilettes such as henna, lip-tattooing; and dukhan, a fragrant exfoliating smoke bath. These rites corresponded to key moments in women’s reproductive lives. 37

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The onset of puberty, marriage and the birth of a child. Notably, each of these intimate moments was, in fact, a communal event, performed and celebrated in the company of other women. Thus Sudanese womanhood could not be attained alone; even hairbraiding required an extra set of hands (Cloudsley 1983: 31–4; el Tayib 1976: 262–7). Body traditions and bodily sensations affirmed women’s social identities. Writing of women’s tattoo culture in colonial Mozambique, Heidi Gengenbach explains that ‘women used their skin to map a social world in which boundaries of belonging were rooted . . . in shared feminine culture, bodily experience, and geographic place’ (2003: 109). So too in Sudan. Tattoos and scars served as landmarks of culture, experience and place. Writing of the social logic behind genital cutting, anthropologist Janice Boddy explains that in northern Sudan, ‘anatomical sex dictates nothing; rather it indicates a potential that needs to be socially clarified and refined’ (2007: 112). For both sexes, circumcision belonged to a larger set of lessons on morality and gender roles and responsibilities. Only once Sudanese children understood what it meant to be a ‘man’ or a ‘woman’, would genital surgery transform the body into male or female (Boddy 1989: 57–8). For women, these lessons of gender, belonging and reproductive responsibility were affirmed again and again in subsequent body rituals. The result was a specialized rhetoric with tangible signs, symbols and references that affirmed a woman’s relationship with her own body and those of her peers. The pain of a tattoo was the price a woman paid for the assurance of her place on the social map. This visceral understanding of social maps makes fashion a resonant political instrument within Sudan. Beginning in the 1940s, male nationalists and female activists condemned a number of women’s bodily and sensuous traditions as behaviours of a backwards society that had no place in a modern nation-state. For example, shillukh – the practice of scarring children’s cheeks to indicate tribal origin – lost its significance as younger generations of Sudanese moved to urban areas and increasingly intermarried (Sharkey 2003: 64). In some areas, parents also scarred the cheekbones of their marriageable daughters with a small, rounded ‘T’, meant to resemble the footprint of water birds on the sand and considered a sign of beauty (Boddy 2007: 62). Yet, tribal marks of desirability and belonging signalled otherness when displayed on crowded city streets. And regional affiliations gave way to a nascent national identity that was Arab, Muslim and urban. However, the move away from so-called backwards rituals did not mean that the Sudanese had abandoned the body as a critical site of social messaging. As scars fell out of fashion, clothing gave shape to a national aesthetic that was both forward-looking and grounded in a recognizable cultural history. The male intelligentsia, eager to prove their readiness to rule, adopted the western styles of British imperialists, though a number added their own flourish, such as the trend of pairing ‘purple socks with startlingly brown shoes’ (King-Hill 1942: 9). Western culture also influenced men’s measures of feminine beauty. After encountering Euro-American beauty standards and Hollywood starlets through travel abroad, cinema and novels, Sudanese men were vocal in their desire for educated wives whose faces were free of scars or tattoos (Sharkey 2003: 64). During the same period, women took advantage of an economic boom and new purchasing power to transform the tobe into an object of consumer-driven fashion. In the early 1960s, tobes grew heavy with embellishments, boasting bright colours, embroidery and scalloped edges. By the 38

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end of the decade, daring women were wearing the sheerest tobes possible and offering a glimpse of their short skirts and dresses underneath. Two things are important to note here. First, the bodily pain which had granted communal belonging had been replaced in many instances by the sensuous pleasures of fashion: the unexpected brashness of a purple sock or the gossamer new tobe that the wearer had purchased for him or herself. Second, Sudanese men and women had not stopped reading the body or its adornments. Despite drastic aesthetic changes, the tobe remained constant as a visible sign of Sudanese womanhood. Moreover, as permanent body marks lost their meaning, women’s fashion gained importance as an everyday performance of tradition, civility and identity. Sudanese women turned the fluidity of fashion to their own political advantage. At a 1969 national conference on literacy, Fatima Ahmed Ibrahim, a long-time leader of the Sudanese Women’s Union, argued that women’s sociopolitical rights were wholly in keeping with Sudanese tradition. As evidence of her sincerity, Fatima Ahmed asked the audience to compare her choice of clothing, the tobe, with the western business suits of President Gaafar Nimeiry and the male politicians who stood next to her. Recall, the tobe is also made from foreign textiles, which in the 1960s included fabrics from England, Japan and Switzerland. Thus, Fatima Ahmed walked a fine philosophical line when she compared President Nimeiry’s foreign business suit with her equally imported yet culturally grounded tobe. Her audience well understood the distinction. It was not the place of manufacture that mattered, but the relationships and meanings crafted around the tobe that granted the garment authenticity and national importance. At a time of significant political change, Fatima Ahmed was highlighting a social anxiety about ‘cross-dressing’ – the wilful adoption of forms of dress outside one’s socially assigned gender, class or ethnicity – in order to challenge the agreed-upon syntax of sartorial language. As Marjorie Garber describes, the cross-dresser or transvestite ‘indicate[s] the place of . . . “category crisis,” disrupting and calling attention to social, cultural, or aesthetic dissonances’ (1997: 16). The ‘category crisis’ is the social space and historical moment in which borders become permeable and border crossings are enabled – if not always acknowledged. The 1960s in Sudan were such a moment, in which accusations of foreignness and imported ideals clashed with claims to authenticity. The October Revolution of 1964 ushered in a brief moment of parliamentary democracy, granted all Sudanese women the right to vote, and saw Fatima Ahmed Ibrahim elected to parliament. But by 1968, the new civilian government had failed to relieve Sudan’s economic crisis, draft a permanent constitution or address the rising violence in Southern Sudan. Along with other leftist parties, the SWU supported the military coup of Gaafar Nimeiry in May 1969 in hopes of replicating a movement similar to the Free Officers in Egypt. Upon Nimeiry’s seizure of power, the SWU delivered a memorandum urging action towards equal wages, pensions and working conditions as well as payments of up to half a man’s salary to support his divorced wife and their children. Nimeiry initially accepted these demands. However, the regime’s hold over the government was still tenuous and ‘before the ink settled’ on the new legislation, Nimeiry realized he could draw greater support from the political Islamists, rather than the left. In his opening speech to the People’s Assembly, Nimeiry 39

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strongly criticized the Women’s Union for having forced him to adopt what he referred to as ‘imported’ laws (Anis 2001: 36). When Nimeiry and Fatima Ahmed met at the conference, the long-time activist turned the tables and accused Nimeiry of being the cultural importer, a cross-dresser of bad faith, who disrespected prevailing norms and was subject to inauthentic or foreign influences. Certainly, Nimeiry had no intention of being provocative; his western business suit played upon signs of authority and respect that were recognized at global and governmental levels. However, Fatima Ahmed called upon a different authority: a sartorial history and community that was grounded in Sudanese values and systems. In one of her most famous quotes, Fatima Ahmed explained her activism in this way, ‘We held that feminism is indigenous to our culture, and full equality can be reached on the basis of our own religious and cultural precepts [. . .] We stressed the beauty and rightness of our national costume, the toab [sic]’ (Ibrahim 1994: 197–8). Fatima Ahmed made no distinction between her clothing and her political aims. Both had their origins, their ‘rightness’, in an imagined indigenous culture. In a time of civil war, government coups and false promises, Fatima Ahmed fashioned herself, and the women who supported her, as models of beauty, discipline and patriotism. Critically, ‘beauty and rightness’ can be claimed by any woman who wears the tobe. Over the course of the twentieth century, the tobe evolved from a luxury garment for elites to the uniform of a growing urban, professional class before finally becoming the everyday dress for the majority of northern Sudanese women. The tobe survived the backlash against women’s traditional body rites and outlasted fleeting beauty trends. (In the mid-1970s, an ethnographer erroneously predicted that the American beehive hairdo might become a permanent style in Sudan because it set off the folds and drapes of the tobe so well (el Tayib 1976: 289).) Under the Islamist regimes, which instituted shariah law in 1983, Sudanese women have been required to dress modestly and cover their hair. In response, women on the political left have taken up or returned to the tobe, preferring its national connotations to the religious messaging of the hijab. Again and again, Sudanese women have affirmed the currency of the tobe in their lives. The tobe’s political power lies in its familiarity, its extra-ordinariness. This garment of mothers and grandmothers recalls past activism, yes, but also familial moments of delicate braids, perfumed breasts and hennaed hands and feet. And it is this intimate grounding in an authentic Sudanese womanhood that opens the possibility for subversion and radical acts.

At the edges of authenticity It must be said that the white tobe was not the preferred dress of every Sudanese grandmother. Fashion, like any language, silences certain voices even as it elevates others. As a national costume, the tobe with its accompanying narrative oversimplifies and ignores the sartorial history of marginal groups, particularly those in the rural peripheries and what was once Southern Sudan. Since 1958, the Sudan government 40

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has increasingly defined the state as Arab and Islamic, with an economic and political base centred on the riverain north. Successive regimes have sought the erasure of other cultural identities directly through ‘state (or state-supported) violence and indirectly through neglect, attrition, or coerced assimilation’ (Hale and Kadoda 2016: 5). The tobe, with its linked history to northern trade routes and the rise of a conservative Islam in the late nineteenth century, is an undeniable part of this cultural hegemony. A similar argument can be made about the narrow focus on Alaa Salah as the icon of the December 2018 uprising. Commentators have rightly pointed out that Salah – young, urban and well educated – represents only the most elite strata of protestors. As such her image obscures the persistent presence of lower-class women and women from Sudan’s peripheries who lent their voices and labour to the December 2018 protests. Moreover, critics argue, the ‘myopic’ focus on Khartoum ignores the decades-long role that working-class women and women from marginalized regions ‘have played as drivers of popular resistance against dictatorship, political marginalization and state violence’ (Elamin and Tahani 2019).4 Thus, I fully acknowledge the multiple women and sartorial voices that are excluded from this chapter and hope that others will take up the mantle of telling these histories. And yet, the power of fashion lies in its plasticity and possibilities for re-interpretation. Some of those who have been marginalized by the Sudanese state have nevertheless found sociopolitical currency, and even joy, in its national costume. Anthropologist Rogaia Abusharaf has documented the conscious and considered adoption of the tobe on the part of internally displaced women living in squatter settlements on the outskirts of Khartoum. These women, from Southern Sudan, Darfur and the Nuba mountains survived unspeakable violence at the hands of the state. In addition to the loss of loved ones and their homes, these diverse groups of women have been displaced from their cultural communities. In response, many have adopted the tobe and other bodily rituals, such as hennaing and genital cutting, in order to satisfy both individual and social desires. In interviews conducted in the early 2000s, displaced women noted the tobe’s beauty and comfort and possibilities for individual expression, but also recognized the garment’s use in closing the distance between themselves and Khartoum society. Fashion and body rights made claims to a cultural citizenship. Considered together, the tobe as a means of assimilation on the part of displaced women and as a sign of political protest as employed by activists are not dissimilar acts. Both groups of women look to the tobe for a shared set of identity and aesthetics. Wrapped around bodies of all shapes and sizes, the tobe offers a keen sense of inclusivity in which beauty and belonging are prized in the face of the state’s discriminatory practices. In the simple act of dressing, we find possibilities for what Abusharaf refers to as ‘everyday and informal avenues of peace and reconciliation’ (2009: 80–2).

A new accessory for activism A lone woman standing on top of a car. But look to her feet and she is surrounded by innumerable points of light. Some are from the streetlights in the Khartoum dusk. The 41

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majority are the reflection of smartphone screens, held by the women and men who have gathered around her. When Lana Haroun saw Alaa Salah on the roof of the car, she ran forward and snapped a few photographs with her phone. Haroun knew she had captured something special and showed the photo to her friends, who urged her to post it on Twitter. These multiple acts of sharing, in outwardly expanding circles (and here we might include the retweets on the part of Hind Makki and others), instilled a sense of ownership among the demonstrators and their supporters. As Haroun later told CNN, ‘This is my revolution’ (Mezzofiore 2019). Recent scholarship has described in detail the contributions of mobile technology to the success of the Arab Spring protests in 2011. Social media platforms not only aided in the logistics and organization of the demonstrations but also provided a virtual shared civic space for unprecedented popular political engagement. In this case, mobile technology and the now-ingrained behaviours of retweeting and photo sharing allowed protestors and sympathizers to rapidly reach consensus on the symbolism behind Salah’s outfit. Yet, while we understand how technology serves as a platform for individual and communal expression, we are only beginning to understand how technology shapes identity formation in both physical and cyber spaces. In an ambitious volume on identity, mobility and technology in Sudan, the editors ask ‘how our derived (and partial) identities or movements in cyberspace change the way we think and act and [. . .] the knowledge we produce’ (Hale and Kadoda 2016: 3). In a partial answer to the above question, I suggest that the scholarly focus on networks has overlooked the materiality of the mobile phone itself and its implications for women’s command of public spaces. Writing in the earliest stages of the expansion of wearable technologies (phones, smart watches, music players and earbuds), Calefato comments that mobile technologies have not only transformed how we communicate but ‘also brought about changes in the field of proxemics (the use human beings make of space) and kinesics (the meaning of our gestures)’. Curiously, this discussion appears in Calefato’s chapter on the grotesque, arguing that such objects are turning our bodies into ‘an ensemble of technological prostheses’ (2004: 36). Today, however, so-called wearables are ubiquitous extensions of ourselves – not prostheses but accessories. We find value in wearables not only because of the data that is transmitted through them but also because of the mobility and kineticism that is made possible when we are adorned by them. In Sudan, mobile technology was introduced on a popular scale in 2004. From 2006 to 2009, the number of mobile phones in Sudan skyrocketed from five to fifteen million (Boddy 2016: 189). By 2013, there were approximately 73 mobile phone subscriptions for every 100 persons in Sudan (Hale and Kadoda 2016: 21). Since providers charge higher rates for calls made outside their networks, many Sudanese carry more than one phone, each connected to a different service provider. Fashion has adapted to the demands of connectivity and the awkwardness of multiple devices: men’s traditional jallabeyas have been restyled with secure pockets to hold phones and prevent thefts. And Sudanese women accessorize with handbags and purses to accommodate the phones they now carry (Boddy 2016: 190). 42

Woman in a White Tobe

Mobile phones and handbags are critical indicators of Sudanese women’s evolving relationship with public and semi-public space. The Sudanese have long prized girls’ education. The lasting effects of the oil boom in the first decade of the twenty-first century spurred the construction of colleges and universities, while lowering the relative costs of attendance. As a result, Sudanese women now attend university at a vastly increased rate and account for the majority of student populations. Mobile phones are a crucial element of this educational turn. Families consider it ‘necessary’ for a daughter at high school or university to carry a phone, thus enabling parents and brothers to monitor her movements and ensure her safety (Boddy 2016: 194). Similarly, women who are self-employed as hair braiders or henna stylists use mobile phones to schedule appointments with their customers, rather than opening up a public shop front. Additionally, these women can travel directly from their home to a client’s house, using their phones to arrange for taxis and to ring when they’ve arrived to ensure that someone opens the door. These quick calls of notification (often simply a ‘missed call’ to avoid usage charges) reduce the time women spend on the street, thus allowing ‘them to operate within the imposed limits of “respectable” behaviour’ (Brinkman, de Bruijn and Bilal 2009: 74). There are clear parallels here between women’s ‘modest’ use of their mobile phones and the functions of their tobes. Both objects provide simultaneous protection and access. Both are worn or carried on the body, an extension of one’s corporeal self. Therefore, it is worth considering the mobile phone as a fashion accessory in its own right – one that works in tandem with the tobe and other forms of modest dress to expand women’s urban mobility. Going forward, it will be important to place these messaging platforms – fashion and wearable technology – alongside, and in analytic conversation with, one another. A study on poetry exchanged through text messages in Sudan offers a glimpse of what this connectivity might look like. The new technology prompted and encouraged a ‘resurgence’ of the older literary practice, while also instilling a ‘feeling of belonging’ and ‘imagined connectedness’ (Lamoureaux 2009: 224). The same argument can be made for the viral image of Alaa Salah. Along with Lana Haroun, the women clamouring to take a photo of an unknown woman in a white tobe recognized a storied legacy. In saving or sharing their photos of Alaa Salah, demonstrators laid claim to an imagined connectivity. Woven into the threads of the garment is a rich history of activism, kinship and national belonging. The spirits of these women, alongside their daughters and granddaughters, look to Salah and her tobe and say ‘my revolution’ as well. Notes 1. The civil demonstrations that led to the resignation of President Omar al-Bashir and the establishment of a transitional government began in December 2018 and continued through the summer of 2019. Collectively, these protests are known as the December 2018 Protests or the December 2018 Revolution. 43

Fashioning the Afropolis 2. See, for example, this cinematic editorial of four women demonstrators in the December 2018 Protests, Defining Kandaka: Discussing protest, change and ambition with the women of Sudan (Olusanya n.d.). 3. The Prophet Muhammad is said to have voiced his preference for white cloth (Taha 2010). 4. Relatedly, Sondra Hale critiques scholars’ continued focus on the Sudanese Women’s Union to the exclusion of women’s grassroots, informal and civic organizing taking place elsewhere (Hale 2016).

References Abusharaf, R. M. (2009), Transforming Displaced Women in Sudan: Politics and the Body in a Squatter Settlement, Chicago: University of Chicago Press. Ali-Dinar, A. B. (1995), ‘Contextual Analysis of Dress and Adornment in Al-Fashir, Sudan’, PhD diss., University of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia. Allman, J. M. (2004), ‘Introduction’, in J. M. Allman (ed.), Fashioning Africa: Power and the Politics of Dress, 1–10, Bloomington: Indiana University Press. el Amin, N. A. (2010), Conversation with author, 5 October. Anis, A. I. M. (2001), ‘Charting New Directions: Reflections on Women’s Political Activism in Sudan’, MA diss., Mount Saint Vincent University, Halifax. el Badawi, Z. (1966), The Development of the Sudanese Women Movement, Khartoum: Ministry of Information and Social Affairs. Badri, H. K. (2002), Al-Ḥarakat al-nisā’iyya fi al-sudān, 2nd edn., Khartoum: Khartoum University. Badri, H. K. (2009), Women’s Movement in the Sudan, 2nd edn., Omdurman: MOB Center for Sudanese Studies. Bektas, U. (2019), ‘Beaten and Abused, Sudan’s Women Bear Scars of Fight for Freedom’, Reuters, 11 July. Available online: https://www​.reuters​.com​/article​/us​-sudan​-politics​ -women​-widerimage​/beaten​-and​-abused​-sudans​-women​-bear​-scars​-of​-fight​-for​-freedom​ -idUSKCN1U612C (accessed 11 May 2020). Boddy, J. (1989), Wombs and Alien Spirits: Women, Men, and the Zar Cult in Northern Sudan, Madison: University of Wisconsin Press. Boddy, J. (2007), Civilizing Women: British Crusades in Colonial Sudan, Princeton: Princeton University Press. Boddy, J. (2016), ‘Engendering Change: New Information Technologies and the Dynamics of Gender in Northern Sudan’, in S. Hale and G. Kadoda (eds), Networks of Knowledge Production in Sudan: Identities, Mobilities, and Technologies, 187–200, Lanham: Lexington Books. Brinkman, I., M. de Bruijn and H. Bilal (2009), ‘The Mobile Phone, “Modernity” and Change in Khartoum, Sudan’, in M. de Bruijn, F. Nyamnjoh and I. Brinkman (eds), Mobile Phones: The New Talking Drums of Everyday Africa, 69–91, Bamenda: Langaa Research and Publishing Group. Byaruhanga, C. (2019), ‘Rape and Sudan’s Revolution: “They Were Crying and Screaming”’, BBC Africa, 15 June. Available online: https://www​.bbc​.com​/news​/world​-africa​-48634150 (accessed 11 May 2020). Calefato, P. (2004), The Clothed Body, trans. L. Adams, Oxford: Berg. Cloudsley, A. (1983), Women of Omdurman: Life, Love and the Cult of Virginity, London: Ethnographica.

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Woman in a White Tobe The Criminal Act 1991 for Sudan, Khartoum: The Ministry of Justice. Defining Kandaka: Discussing Protest, Change and Ambition with the Women of Sudan (n.d.), [Filmclip] Dir. Jolade Olusanya. Available online: https://wepresent​.wetransfer​.com​/story​/ defining​-kandaka​-philipp​-raheem (accessed 11 May 2020). Elamin, N. and T. Ismail (2019), ‘The Many Mothers of Sudan’s Revolution’, Al-Jazeera, 4 May. Available online: https://www​.aljazeera​.com​/indepth​/opinion​/alaa​-salah​-sudanese​-mothers​ -190501175500137​.html (accessed 11 May 2020). Garber, M. (1997), Vested Interests: Cross-Dressing and Cultural Anxiety, New York: Routledge. Gengenbach, H. (2003), ‘Boundaries of Beauty: Tattooed Secrets of Women’s History in Magude District, Southern Mozambique’, Journal of Women’s History, 14 (4): 106–41. Hale, S. (1999), ‘Mothers and Militias: Islamic State Construction of the Women Citizens of Northern Sudan’, Citizenship Studies, 3 (3): 373–86. Hale, S. (2016), ‘Notes on Sudanese Women’s Activism, Movements, and Leadership’, in F. Sadiqi (ed.), Women’s Movements in Post-‘Arab Spring’ North Africa, New York: Palgrave Macmillan. Hale, S. and G. Kadoda (2016), ‘Introduction’, in S. Hale and G. Kadoda (eds), Networks of Knowledge Production in Sudan: Identities, Mobilities, and Technologies, 1–22, Lanham: Lexington Books. Ibrahim, F. A. (1994), ‘Arrow at Rest’, in M. Afkhami (ed.), Women in Exile, 191–208, Charlottesville: University Press of Virginia. King-Hill, M. (1942), Somehow Overdone: A Sudan Scrapbook, London: Peter Davies. Lamoureaux, S. (2009), ‘Imagined Connectivity, Poetic Text Messaging and Appropriation in Sudan’, in M. Fernández-Ardèvol and A. Ros Híjar (eds), Communication Technologies in Latin America and Africa: A Multidisciplinary Perspective, 221–44, Barcelona: IN3. Makki, H. (2019), ‘I’ve Been Seeing This Pic On My #Sudan_Uprising TLs Today and It’s Amazing’, Twitter, 8 April. Available online: https://twitter​.com​/HindMakki​/status​ /1115338807811956737 (accessed 11 May 2020). Mezzofiore, G. (2019), ‘This Woman Has Come to Symbolize Sudan’s Protests’, CNN, 10 April. Available online: https://www​.cnn​.com​/2019​/04​/09​/africa​/photo​-woman​-chanting​-sudan​ -uprising​-scli​-intl​/index​.html (accessed 11 May 2020). Rabine, L. W. (2002), The Global Circulation of African Fashion, Oxford: Berg. Salih, Z. M. (2019a), ‘“I Was Raised to Love Our Home”: Sudan’s Singing Protester Speaks Out’, The Guardian, 10 April. Available online: https://www​.theguardian​.com​/global​-development​ /2019​/apr​/10​/alaa​-salah​-sudanese​-woman​-talks​-about​-protest​-photo​-that​-went​-viral (accessed 11 May 2020). Salih, Z. M. (2019b), ‘Sudanese Doctors Say Dozens of People Raped During Sit-in Attack’, The Guardian, 11 June. Available online: https://www​.theguardian​.com​/world​/2019​/jun​/11​/sudan​ -troops​-protesters​-attack​-sit​-in​-rape​-khartoum​-doctors​-report (accessed 11 May 2020). Sharkey, H. J. (2003), ‘Chronicles of Progress: Northern Sudanese Women in the Era of British Imperialism’, Journal of Imperial and Commonwealth History, 31 (1): 51–82. Sikainga, A. A. (1996), Slaves into Workers: Emancipation and Labor in Colonial Sudan, Austin: University of Texas Press. Strategic Initiative for Women in the Horn of Africa (SIHA) (2017), ‘Criminalisation of Women in Sudan: A Need for Fundamental Reform’, Kampala. Taha, A. M. M. (2010), Conversation with author, 23 October. el Tayib, G. (1976), ‘An Illustrated Record of Sudanese National Costumes’, MA diss., University of Khartoum, Khartoum.

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CHAPTER 3 AFRO-BRAZILIAN DRESS MODES IN FAMILY PHOTO ARCHIVES IN LAGOS Frank A. O. Ugiomoh

Photographic images of Afro-Brazilian architecture and expressive culture have long been associated primarily with the oeuvre of Pierre Verger.1 Although we owe him some of the most striking images of Neo-Baroque architecture in Lagos, sartorial expressions of the so-called returnees from Brazil, Cuba and Sierra Leone are widely absent from his work. Exceptions are known from Ouidah and Agoue in present-day Benin. A photograph taken around 1936 by Verger depicts a member of the well-known de Souza family at a graveyard. The man’s ‘western’ dress style is foregrounded – showing the importance of dressing well for social positioning at that time. In addition, two oil paintings are particularly striking – one life-size, the other slightly smaller – placed next to the man as if family history had literally been dropped into the picture (Figure 3.1). This chapter aims to fill this research gap by focusing on sartorial practices manifest in family photo archives of the descendants of slaves who had returned from the Americas and Sierra Leone to Lagos. In order to situate their idiosyncratic dress practices, I will first give a short overview of their history followed by a rough outline of their architecture and craft production. The main part of my contribution, however, is dedicated to two family archives whose photographic images keep the memories of their ancestors alive. I will demonstrate how Lagos is not only one of the most important fashion cities in Africa today, but was already a veritable centre of sartorial styles in the nineteenth century, with the Afro-Brazilians as ‘image-makers’ – photographers as well as dressmakers. My contribution thus underlines how Afro-Brazilian fashion marked some of the city’s cultural extravaganza. The intent here is to rekindle collective memory within the framework of historical representations. I will conclude by focusing on the meaning and importance of African-Brazilian dress cultures as identity markers in today’s Lagos.

Afro-Brazilian architecture and material culture in Lagos Under the Portuguese, and later with British and French involvement, the Atlantic port city of Lagos developed into a centre for the transatlantic slave trade (Mann 2007). Some decades before and after the British abolition of this forced displacement, freed slaves returned to Lagos as well as to other cities. The Àgùdá, also called Amaro in Lagos, were mainly from Brazil as well as from Cuba; Sàró was the term used for ex-slaves and their descendants from Sierra Leone. Whereas the former settled in Popo Àgùdà or Popo

Afro-Brazilian Dress Modes in Lagos

Figure 3.1  Roberto Norberto Francisco de Souza (1879–1956). Photograph by Pierre Verger, c. 1936, Quidah. © Pierre Verger Foundation.

Amaro, the Sàró built new homes in Olowogbowo; both quarters were located on Lagos Island, known locally as Ìsàlẹ̀ Èko, whereas other groups from the Caribbean settled in Ebute Metta on Lagos mainland.2 According to Strickrodt, the Afro-Brazilians on the West African Coast ‘were a highly heterogenous group, and it is not clear whether a common sense of identity existed before the end of the nineteenth century’ (2008: 38). Recent research has demonstrated how these groups – nowadays sometimes generically referred to as Afro-Brazilian or ‘emancipados’ – constituted the majority of the elite class in Lagos during and after the abolition of the slave trade (Castillo 2016: 25). They ‘created homes – psychological places of familiarity and comfort – in Anglophone colonial Nigeria and beyond’ (Teriba 2018: 234). It is in this context that a new architectural style evolved – today referred to as Afro-Brazilian. However, apart from minor distinctions between the Creole (Englishinfluenced) and the Brazilian (Caribbean-influenced), an overall Neo-Baroque style dominated the buildings ranging from private residencies to mosques and churches. The emergence of these forms owes much to the skilled craftsmanship of the returnees who had often been trained as artisans, builders, architects and stonemasons in Brazil. According to Laotan (1943), others, in recognition of their creative skills, were sent to England to receive further training. Thus, the Public Works Department trainees from England, as architectural engineers, may well have added further layers to the building techniques, and introduced even more eclectic dimensions to the Afro47

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Brazilian architectural style. A formal evaluation of the now demolished ‘Elephant House’ once owned by Samuel Herbert Pearse (1866–1955) of Sàró heritage and the ‘Water House’ by Da Rocha of Brazilian heritage demonstrates that while each building exhibits a uniqueness of its own, both are unified by their adoption of Brazilian Baroque architectural style. The Afro-Brazilian architectural style was novel and was eventually appropriated by indigenous (Yoruba) architecture at that time (Vlach 1984 and 1976: 50). The newly created style had variants in terms of shapes and formal structures. These included bungalows and two-storey houses, otherwise known as Sobrado (Teriba 2017: 141). Unique to this architecture are modelled or ornate railings, beams, columns, arched windows and doors. Some are designed with sloping roofs with light or roof vents and parapets (Alonge 1994; Castillo 2016; Teriba 2017). The Pearse ‘Elephant House’ built after 1907 (and demolished in the 1970s) in Olowogbowo District, Marina, is one example.3 The ingenuity of the Afro-Brazilians remains legendary, as Laotan (1943) notes. For example, the master mason Joao da Costa made the foundations of the Central Mosque, and the building was completed by his apprentice Sanusi Aka. Laotan mentions a certain Clemencia Guimaries who was also a Brazilian descendant, and who ‘had the distinction of being the leading dress-maker of Victorian Lagos’ (Laotan 1943: 8). Laotan further comments on the skilfulness of the Afro-Brazilians in general terms. Some of the Brazilian gentries were great Portuguese scholars and withal proficient in one trade or another. Thus we found among them, besides wealthy merchants and traders, master masons, carpenters, painters, cabinet makers and master smiths. . . . On the women’s side, proficiency in bakery, (bread, cakes, tarts, etc.), laundry and dressmaking distinguished the Agudas, and their Protestant rivals. (Laotan 1943: 6) To sum up, the Afro-Brazilians’ acquired status equipped some of them for work opportunities in formalized government institutions as well as in public and private enterprises. In these spheres, they brought along novel cultural and social sensibilities. As skilled craftspeople in diverse fields, they were able to make a living and facilitated the advancement of Nigerian society. They replicated the semblance of their previous places of domicile and cultural life in Lagos (Teriba 2018). However, apart from their influence on architecture, the Afro-Brazilians’ contribution to other cultural fields, such as furniture and fashion, has yet to be studied in depth.

Yoruba sartorial styles between Africa and the Americas Although the identity-forming significance of architecture has been widely recognized, many Afro-Brazilian buildings are endangered, and some have even been destroyed in recent years. Scholars as well as architects have called for the conservation of these buildings (Alonge 1994; Castillo 2016; Teriba 2017; Edvige and Giles 2017). In addition, 48

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today’s Afro-Brazilian communities strive to keep the memories and the heritage of their descendants alive. Food and particularly dress cultures as important identity markers play an eminent role in this regard. Unlike most architecture, dress is an ephemera. It is a means of communication and accords identity to its wearer. Roach-Higgins and Eicher define dress as an assemblage of modifications of the body and/or supplement to the body. Dress so identified, includes a long list of possible direct modifications of the body such as coiffed hair, colored skin, pierced ears and scented breath, as well as an equally long list of garments, jewelry and accessories and other categories of items added to the body as supplements. (1992: 1) Dress thus acts as an identity marker for both the individual and the group. Wass confirms the sociological implication of dress as a cultural symbol, saying it may provide structural information which integrates individuals or groups of individuals with the man-made environments of political, social, and economic systems. Dress may also serve to establish and maintain boundaries around groups of individuals representing variations of status, power, and role. (1975: 2) Fashion is subject to drifts and cyclical dynamics of change and resurgence and closure, as it sketches a specific figure in space, thereby defining epochs and ideologies. Against the fast pace of fashion, photography as an archival medium records the memories of past styles and events associated with them. In addition, clothing itself is a medium that records and preserves traces of people for whom it served as a second skin (see Renne 1995). Textiles, clothing and fashion themselves carry individual as well as cultural memories. There is a long history in many West African societies of remembering family and/or societal events with wax prints or other fabrics. Photography again captures the moment of being together by contributing to the photo album as a diary of fashion (Pinther 2007). Thus, for my own research, family photo albums as well as enlarged photographs framed and mounted on the walls of homes, together with memories and oral narrations, offer valuable resources and information with regard to the fashion history of the Àgùdá and Sàró in Lagos. This chapter aims to offer answers to some of the many open questions. Does the centrality of dress and fashion pair with the architectural style of the Afro-Brazilians? Did the returnees also take over sartorial practices from Brazil or Freetown? How did they relate to the traditional, especially the Yoruba, dress forms? And what changes did Yoruba styles undergo on their migration to the Americas and back again to West Africa? Most of the people enslaved from the Bight of Benin were from the Yoruba – a group with a long history of textile production using cotton and other fibres. They also engaged in trading with Europeans in the West African region as far back as the fourteenth century; linen, woollen cloths, copper bracelets, glass beads and coral were among 49

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the items Europeans traded in West Africa in exchange for ivory, palm oil, pepper and cotton fabric. Such ancient cultural exchanges and trading transactions explain how the sophisticated fashion styles catered to different social levels and gender concerns. Yoruba dress history is full of adaptations of hitherto foreign sartorial traditions (Oyeniyi 2015). This not only helps to understand how later Afro-Brazilian dress modes became inextricably linked with their self-images as a distinct group, but also explains why among the Yoruba the Afro-Brazilian style was well received and partly integrated. The complete ‘classical’ regal dress for a Yoruba woman of influence combines the head tie (gele), shoulder shawl (ikpele or iborun), wrapper (iro) and the waist wrap (amure or iro igbanu). The Yoruba way of dressing appears to have defined the sartorial style of Africans in Brazil, especially that of the women. Images show, for instance, a portrait of Louisa Angelica Nogueira da Rocha posing with her son Candido, c. 1870 (Figure 3.2).4 Louisa Angelica’s dress reflects the fashion taste of Brazilian women of African origin. Her distinct garment reveals her status as a matron.5 The flowing Bahian gown is made of ornate, embroidered lace with crocheted patterns trimming the hem. A shawl-like piece called pano da costa (meaning ‘cloth from the coast’)6 is draped over her left shoulder and she is wearing an intricately designed head wrapper called torco. She is seated gracefully with a rosary of the Catholic faith replacing the traditional ornate neck beads of the Bahian lady. The gown is seen here as a replacement for the wrapper or iro and the torco for the gele. While the Bahian style with its flowing gown remained

Figure 3.2  Portrait of Louisa Angelica Nogueira da Rocha posing with her son Candido, c. 1870. © Artistic rendition by Ibim Cookey. 50

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unadorned, the Yoruba added damask to the hitherto woven cotton strips called aso oke or the ‘top cloth’.7 The Yoruba designs for the male would include variations known as agbada usually made from damask. To indicate status and wealth they often took the shape of a voluminous gown worn over the sokoto, trousers ending at the ankles or the heels. Various caps known as fila together with embroidered handwoven cloth thrown over the shoulder of the agbada complete the Yoruba sartorial assemblage (Lyndersay 2011: 295–342).8

Fashion and family photo albums as alternative archives Dress styles remain volatile when considered alongside other aspects within a defined cultural space. At the end of the nineteenth century, the use of the camera was already well established. It facilitated collective memory-building across many cultural connections (Gordon and Kurzwelly 2018). The family photo album has its roots here. Recently, the archival resource value of such albums has been appreciated by researchers for its diverse interpretive layering. As Sandbye (2014: 13) notes, family photo albums are structures of ‘affect and feelings’, as much as they are ‘flirtatious contact zones’ (2014: 15), while chronicling history. It is in this context that she also draws attention to the medium’s social value as well as its role as an identity maker. Hence, ‘the photo album as an archive is a visual material that communicates, circulates, is used, and is stored’ (2014). Sandbye’s suppositions, while fitting, call for situating the dynamics of the archive and the vast gathering of concepts that frame the term. Schwartz and Cook (2002) regard archives as ‘social constructs’, while also situating their roots in ‘diverse institutions and social groups’ information needs and values’ (2002: 3). They go further to reference Thomas Richards for whom the archive is ‘a utopian space of comprehensive knowledge, . . . not a building nor even a collection of texts. However, archives are the collectively imagined junction of all that was known or knowable’ (Richards 1993; quoted in Schwartz and Cook 2002: 4). The first professional studios in Nigeria offering portrait and passport photography, run by Sierra Leoneans, Liberians or ‘Brazilians’ opened in Lagos as early as 1880. Among them were H. S. Freeman, Emmanuel Rockson, Alfred Mamattah and George S. A. da Costa (Nimis 2001; Haney 2010: 132). Although the works of these early photographers were fairly well documented, today it is increasingly difficult to access them, which is why individually owned family photo albums and archives have gained substantial value as fascinating familial data resources regarding personal, collective and material memories.9 To explore the cultural, social and aesthetic dimensions of fashion and clothing styles in photo albums and archives, I follow Godat et al. (10 May 2019) who underscore that each fashion style operates within specific broad aesthetic parameters related to group identity and personal interests. This involves acknowledging that ‘fashion items associate colours, patterns, fabrics and broader stylistic references such as a period or sub-culture’ (Godat 2019). 51

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Sartorial practices in two family photo albums and archives This chapter presents selections from two family photo archives which were accessed in Lagos. The portrait of Adeola Holloway, alias Mammy Adeola, was retrieved from the family home at Olowogbowo, Marina, Lagos. There it is mounted as a framed photograph on the wall, in the living room. It shows her sitting on a chair, dressed in an exclusive Bahian gown. She was born to missionary parents in Oyo, from where she was later abducted and sold into slavery. As a result of the anti-slavery abolition prosecution drive under Adolphus Mann from the Church Missionary Society, she was freed and resettled in Free Town, Sierra Leone. Together with her children and second husband, also an emancipated slave, she resettled in Lagos. There she died in the middle of the nineteenth century10 (Figures 3.3 and 3.4). The second photograph depicts Samuel Herbert Pearse, sitting, flanked by his son and daughter on either side.11 His father, Rev. Samuel Pearse, was born in Sierra Leone but relocated to Lagos in 1856, where his son was born. Pearse junior completed his primary and secondary education in Lagos. In 1883, he became an apprentice salesman at Messrs. W. B. MacIver and Company. In 1888, he and a friend established the firm Pearse and Thompson in Marina, Lagos, with a branch in Leadenhall Street, London. His wealth and fame are attributed to trading in ivory and rubber goods. He was a member of the Lagos Auxiliary of the Anti-Slavery and Aborigines Protection Society.

Figure 3.3  Portrait of Adeola Holloway, alias Mammy Adeola. Unknown studio photographer. © Busola Holloway (Lagos). 52

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Figure 3.4  Samuel Herbert Pearse with children. Unknown studio photographer. © Joke Silva. He held many influential and distinguished positions in the social, cultural and political spheres in Lagos, such as accompanying a Yoruba chief ’s delegation to London as an interpreter. In August 1920, he received an invitation from Marcus Garvey to attend the first international convention of the Universal Negro Improvement Association (UNIA) in New York, which, however, he declined (Joke Silva, Lagos, 23 November 2020).12 Both photographs present a balance of traditions in their fashion and styles. Adeola Holloway is wearing a formal Bahian ankle-length gown of crinoline, an open weave fabric, usually made of horsehair or cotton. As was customary at the time, the dress had a high waist. The gown rests on the floor in draped soft folds. Pearse’s daughter’s apparel is typical of Victorian-style fashion. Both female dresses have pagoda sleeves and high necklines and collars. However, the girl is wearing neck collar beads. Father and son are dressed in Victorian-cum-Edwardian male fashionable garments – the boy in a double-breasted promenade man’s suit and his father in a coat of leather. The well-tailored outfits identify the subjects as belonging to the elitist class in colonial Lagos. Their photographic poses recall the conventions of studio photography from Europe. Edwards associates such a posture as elitist with the subjects’ ‘artfully contorted position’ as they ‘gaze thoughtfully into space . . . designed to give dreamy reflection and sensitivity’ (2006: 21). Another photograph (Figure 3.5) stems from the repository of Chief Angelica Yewande Oyediran.13 It shows two women wearing Bahian blouses and voluminous skirts, typical of Caribbeans of African ancestry. Their garments are accompanied by other dress 53

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Figure 3.5  Two sisters of the Irmandade Boa Morte, Salvador, Bahia, c. 1900. © Source Angelica Yewande Oyediran.

accessories, such as the Roman Catholic chaplets or collar beads and bracelets. Their photographic poses with their rigid frontal orientation strongly recall the conventions of studio photography from Europe. Edwards (2006: 20) associates such a posture as elitist with the subject’s ‘artfully contorted position’ as she ‘gazes thoughtfully into space . . . designed to give dreamy reflection and sensitivity’ (2006: 21). The Afro-Brazilians’ preference for Victorian dress sense began to wane at the close of the nineteenth century. A leading factor informing the decline relates to the colonial government’s high-handedness towards local Nigerian businesspeople. Manifest in the actions of the colonialists was a policy of discrimination and prejudice. ‘Dissension’ led to ‘a minor cultural renaissance’ (Gbadegesin 2010: 120–50). The local people initiated a return to tastefully fashionable local dressing modes. Abandoning the Victorian style heralded a new era of self-identity, opening up opportunities for sartorial fusion practices (Wass 1975: 57). Thus, the elite class kept pace as a motive force regarding what was deemed trendy and fashionable. As fashion is always open to innovations, such developments usually result in the introduction of new craft technologies. The Bahian dress has maintained its importance within the West African coastal communities. In Sierra Leone, the dress style is identified as kabas, usually made from gara cloth (Catalano-Knaack 2011). A similar fashion is known as onyonyo among the Efik in Calabar, in southeastern Nigeria. It is adopted as traditional clothing worn, in particular, as wedding gowns by brides and friends. The style comes as a flowing gown 54

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(Falae 2018). Curiously, the fashion has retained its original name in Bahia among Afro-Brazilians in Lagos. As we shall see, the dress type is the costume adopted for the Afro-Brazilian Bumba Meu Boi Festival. Venkatesh et al. (2010: 640) underline fashion’s capacity to aesthetically convey ‘embodied identities’ in that it ‘is constantly evolving based on the prevailing tastes and cultural dispositions’. Fashion and identity-making are symbiotic; Di Summa notes: ‘The story we tell about ourselves is the story we inhabit, and somehow it must have a “sense of an ending”, something allowing for emotional closure and, ultimately, for learning something about who we really are’ (author’s original emphasis). Comparing fashion with a game, Di Summa points out the importance of playful repetitions and experiments, allowing new ideas to flow. The history of sartorial practices is exemplary here. . . . To become good at the game of fashion one needs to play frequently and try the same moves several times. It is mostly through repetition and imitation that novelty emerges; that styles become iconic thus beginning to create their own history. (2018: n.p.) The Afro-Brazilians who lived in Lagos during the nineteenth and twentieth centuries demonstrated consistency and flexible dispositions in fashion. Two styles dominated the era: the Bahian exclusively female dress as well as Victorian male and female attire. The returnees’ sociocultural identities remain visible in the photographs they commissioned. Added to the dynamics of changes in fashion is the emancipados’ reassertion of their African cultural persona as a reaction to the cultural insensitivity and harsh economic policies of the colonial administrators (Gbadegesin (2010: 100; Wass 1975: 57). Thus, fashion modes in this context might be perceived as rebellious acts.

Afro-Brazilian fashion in today’s Lagos Afro-Brazilian fashion styles and dress practices have become residual cultural codes and a means of reinforcing collective identity. One example is the Bumba Meu Boi, a street festival celebrated by Afro-Brazilian families in Lagos at the beginning of a new year.14 Today, the festival, whose celebratory events are similar to the Brazilian caretta parades, is organized by the Brazilian Descendants Association in Lagos. On this occasion women wear multicoloured Bahian costumes with elaborate face make-up and headgear. As a festive event, it complements the fashion photographs in family albums, reinforcing both collective and individual memory. With regard to collective memory, Gadamer in The Relevance of the Beautiful (1977: 22–55) focuses on the essential dimensions that art encompasses: the elements of ‘play, symbol and festival’. For Gadamer, play is the outcome of a ‘free impulse’ for anyone who engages in it – a phenomenon of living self-representation. In other words, like a festival, play is an activity that unites humanity – both are often based on the concept of symbolism. The symbol is a disguised ‘token of remembrance’. The ubiquitous family 55

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photo album or archive and the Brazilian Bumba Meu Boi Festival create contexts for bonding. Celebrations flow with tradition as re-enactments of repetitive performances. The work of art is rooted in tradition, which Gadamer (1977: 49) elaborates on: Tradition means transmission rather than conservation. This transmission does not imply that we simply leave things unchanged and merely conserve them. It means learning how to grasp and express the past anew. It is in this sense that we can say that transmission is equivalent to translation. Tradition as translation and transmission is embedded in the rekindling of collective memory that the family photo album and archive as well as the restaged festivals exhibit. These inherent values also address the dispersal of the offspring and families of the AfroBrazilians from their initial settlement abroad to the spaces in the Brazilian quarters of Popo Àgùdà and throughout Lagos. The diffusion led to the formation of the Brazilian Descendants Association that organizes the Lagos-Brazilian Bumba Meu Boi Festival. The enactments of the festivals have become a space for celebration and cultural and spiritual re-connection and symbolization. Ladies, for instance, who participate in the formal dinner during the festivals must wear the Bahian dress.15 No doubt, some of the Afro-Brazilian legacies are now history along with the cultural trappings that defined them from early 1800 up until now. Photographs from family archives and the festivals have become genuine sources for integrating hitherto mute facts into historical knowledge and the framework of mainstream art. By interfacing with personal, collective and national memories, they provide wide-ranging documented information. This work’s primary objective focused on updating the history of Lagos as a fashion city in Africa. My aim was to investigate Afro-Brazilian family photo archives in Lagos from about 1860 to the present. The beginning era corresponds with the prevalence of Victorian-style fashion when the ceremonial Bahian gown defined the lady, while the suit was associated with the gentleman. After the minor cultural revolution, to which Gbadegesin (2010) alluded, the male and female traditional Yoruba dress assumed the status of a cultural statement for the returnees. As already noted, the returnees constituted the majority of the elite class in Lagos in the late nineteenth and the first half of the twentieth century. While Victorian fashion sustained between 1860 and early 1900, the Bahian dress has witnessed a long patronage as an identity marker up to the present. The defiance of the colonizer, mentioned by Gbadegesin (2010) at the time, initiated a return to well-tailored African styles known as agbada among the Yoruba. The choreographed pictures discussed correspond to the expectations of the elite regarding fashion and posture. However, it is essential to note that the traditional Bahian women’s dress has remained significant as a fashionable dress type and a costume component of the Brazilian Bumba Meu Boi Festival, which now offers a stage for collective memory. The Bahian dress has also remained fashionable in Bahia Brazil as a symbol of the African descendants’ identity up until today. The emancipation of African slaves who resettled in Lagos constitutes one of the narratives that prefigured significant cultural negotiations and displacements implicit in mutual 56

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relationships. The resettlement in Lagos of the returnees allowed for interculturality that flourished within a politics of recognition in many cultural spheres. Family photo albums and archives, as well as the festivals, play a critical role in retrieving and reconstructing the Afro-Brazilian narratives in Lagos while emphasizing their fashion history.

Acknowledgements This chapter is the outcome of a research grant within the DFG-project ‘Fashion and Styles in African Cities’ between 2018 and 2020 conducted in Lagos, Nigeria. I am also grateful to the following people for their cooperation and assistance: Joke Silva, Bisi Silva’s sibling, their mother, the late Dr Marianne Abimbola Silva. Included here is Chief Angelica Yewande Oyediran, the daughter of Chief Angelica Folashade Thomas, the daughter of Candido Joao Da Rocha, a returnee son of an ex-slave from Brazil. Among others, I would also like to mention Barr. Seyi Martins, the current president of the Brazilian Descendants Association, Busola Holloway, Aduke Gomez, Jahman Anikulakpo, Don Barber and Toyin Akinosho, the photographers Godson Ukaegbu Timipre Willis-Amah and Hakeem Saleem and Arch. Ibim Cooky, a portrait artist.

Notes 1. Although Verger’s work was extraordinary in terms of the wealth of archival material, he was not the first to write about the Afro-Brazilians and their architecture. In fact, local accounts, like that of the Lagosian Anthony Laotan entitled The Torch-Bearers or Old Brazilian Colony in Lagos, was one of the very first accounts, dating from 1843. My text makes considerable use of his findings. For a more detailed overview of the literature, see Strickrodt (2008). 2. Alonge (1994: 64) reports that the resettlement of the freed slaves began about 1820 in locations outside Popo Àgùdà. By 1854 Popo Àgùdà had become a recognized settlement for the returnee slaves. 3. Samuel Herbert Pearse’s photographs were in the custody of Marianne Abimbola Silva and retrieved from Joke Silva. A photograph of the Elephant House taken by Da Costa, Lagos, can be found in the Red Book of West Africa, edited by Macmillan (1920). 4. The Facebook page of the Black History Studies includes her image taken by Pierre Verger. According to this site, Angelica Louisa Nogueira da Rocha was married to John Esan of Yoruba origin. He was sold into slavery at the age of ten and returned to Lagos twenty years later together with his wife and son. The Black History Studies group refers to the book by Mariano Carneiro da Cunha entitled Slaves to the Left: Brazilian Architecture in Nigeria and the People’s Republic of Benin. 5. Interview with Angelica Yewande Oyediran, Lagos, 4 January 2021. 6. http://nationalclothing​.org​/america​/123​-brazil​/825​-pano​-da​-costa-–​-traditional​-afro​ -brazilian​-shawl​.html​#google​_vignette (accessed 24 April 2021). 7. Interview with Angelica Yewande Oyediran, Lagos, 4 January 2021. 57

Fashioning the Afropolis 8. She also provides extensive literature and illustrations on Yoruba dress traditions. The detailed images and a brief historical sketch hints at a chronological depth that goes as far back as some archaeological finds in the region (Lyndersay 2011: 73–80). The dress culture detailed in Lyndersay’s illustrations caters to gender, class and social/group, including style dynamics among the Yoruba ethnicity subgroups. Lyndersay also provides evidence of styling and pattern drafting that inform the diversity of styles and embroidery in the Yoruba sartorial practices. 9. Field investigations show that some interviewees were barely aware of the relevance of these early photographs, and were surprised at the ease with which such a search could be accomplished (Interview with Aduke Gomez, Lagos, 15 May 2020). 10. Interview with Busola Holloway, Lagos, 12 January 2021. 11. Photograph retrieved from Joke Silva. 12. Information provided by Joke Silva. 13. Interview with Angelica Yewande Oyediran, Lagos, 4 January 2021. 14. Interview with Bisi Silva, Lagos, 3 November 2017. 15. Interview with Angelica Yewande Oyediran, Lagos, 4 January 2021.

References Alonge, M. M. D. (1994), ‘Afro-Brazilian Architecture in Lagos State: A Case for Conservation’, PhD diss., Newcastle University, Newcastle upon Tyne. Castillo, L. E. (2016), ‘Mapping the Nineteenth-Century Brazilian Returnee Movement: Demographics, Life Stories and the Question of Slavery’, Atlantic Studies, 13 (1): 25–52. Catalano-Knaack, K. E. (2011), ‘The Traditions and History of Indigo Dyed Textiles in Sierra Leone as they relate to the Art and Life of Haja Kadiatu Kamara’, MA diss., University of Missouri, Kansas City. Di Summa, L. T. (2018), ‘Why Fashion is More than a Mere Consumer Object’, Aesthetics for Birds, 3 July. Available online: https://aestheticsforbirds​.com​/2018​/07​/03​/why​-fashion​-is​ -more​-than​-a​-mere​-consumer​-object/ (accessed 20 December 2019). Edvige, J. -F. and C. Giles (2017), ‘‘Lagos’ Afro-Brazilian Architecture Faces Down the Bulldozers’, CNN, 19 July. Available online: https://edition​.cnn​.com​/2017​/07​/19​/architecture​/ nigeria​-afro​-brazilian​-architecture​/index​.html (accessed 20 April 2020). Edwards, S. (2006), Photography: A Very Short Introduction, Oxford: Oxford University Press. Falae, V. (2018), ‘Cross River Traditional Attire’, Legit, 29 October. Available online: https://www​ .legit​.ng​/1200392​-cross​-river​-traditional​-attire​.html​?utm​_source​=direct​&utm​_medium​=rads (accessed 6 May 2020). Gadamer, H. -G. (1977), The Relevance of the Beautiful and Other Essays, ed. R. Bernasconi, trans. N. Walker, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Gbadegesin, O. A. (2010), ‘Picturing the Modern Self: Politics, Identity and Self Fashioning in Lagos, 1861–1934’, PhD diss., Emory University, Atlanta. Godart, F. and C. Galunic (2019), ‘A Theory of Style’, Aeon Magazine, 1 May. Available online: https://aeon​.co​/essays​/networks​-of​-elements​-drive​-human​-creativity​-do​-they​-also​-stifle​-it (accessed 2 January 2020). Gordon, R. and J. Kurzwelly (2018), ‘Photographs as Sources in African History’, Oxford Research Encyclopedia of African History, 30 July. Available online: https://oxfordre​.com​/africanhistory​/ 58

Afro-Brazilian Dress Modes in Lagos view​/10​.1093​/acrefore​/9780190277734​.001​.0001​/acrefore​-9780190277734​-e​-250 (accessed 16 May 2021). Haney, E. (2010), Photography and Africa, London: Reaktion Books. Laotan, A. B. (1943), The Torch-Bearers or Old Brazilian Colony in Lagos, Lagos: The Ife-Loju Printing Works. Lyndersay, D. (2011), Nigerian Dress, the Body Honoured: The Costume Arts of Traditional Nigerian Dress from Early History to Independence, Lagos: Centre for Black and African Arts and Culture. Macmillan, A., ed. (1920), The Red Book of West Africa, London: W. H. & L. Collingridge. Mann, K. (2007), Slavery and the Birth of an African City: Lagos, 1760–1900, Bloomington: Indiana University Press. Nimis, E. (2001), ‘Nigeria: The Photographic Giant’, Africultures, 31 May. Available online: http:// africultures​.com​/nigeria​-the​-photographic​-giant​-5534/ (accessed 25 April 2021). Oyeniyi, B. A. (2015), Dress in the Making of African Identity: A Social and Cultural History of the Yoruba People, Amherst: Cambria Press. Pinther, K. (2007), ‘Textiles and Photography in West Africa’, Critical Interventions, 1 (1): 113–23. Renne, E. (1995), Cloth That Does Not Die: The Meaning of Cloth in Bùnú Social Life, Seattle: University of Washington Press. Roach-Higgins, M. E. and J. B. Eicher (1992), ‘Dress and Identity’, Clothing and Textiles Research Journal, 10 (4): 1–8. Sandbye, M. (2014), ‘Looking at the Family Photo Album: A Resumed Theoretical Discussion of Why and How’, Journal of Aesthetics & Culture, 6 (1): 1–17. Schwartz, J. M. and T. Cook (2002), ‘Archives, Records, and Power: The Making of Modern Memory’, Archival Science, 2: 1–19. Strickrodt, S. (2008), ‘The Brazilian Diaspora to West Africa in the Nineteenth Century’, in I. Phaf-Rheinberger and T. de Oliveira Pinto (eds), AfricAmericas: Itineraries, Dialogues, and Sounds, 36–68, Madrid and Frankfurt a. M.: Iberoamericana Vervuert. Teriba, A. (2017), ‘Afro-Brazilian Architecture in Southwest Colonial Nigeria (1890s–1940s)’, PhD diss., Princeton University, Princeton. Teriba, A. (2018), ‘A Return to the Motherland: Afro-Brazilians’ Architecture and Societal Aims in Colonial West Africa’, in B. Dogramaci and K. Pinther (eds), Design Dispersed: Forms of Migration and Flight, 232–47, Bielefeld: transcript. Venkatesh, A., A. Joy, J. F. Sherry Jr. and J. Deschenes (2010), ‘The Aesthetics of Luxury Fashion, Body and Identify Formation’, Journal of Consumer Psychology, 20 (4): 459–70. Vlach, J. M. (1976), ‘Affecting Architecture of the Yoruba’, African Arts, 10 (1): 48–53, 99. Vlach, J. M. (1984), ‘The Brazilian House in Nigeria: The Emergence of a 20th-Century Vernacular House Type’, The Journal of American Folklore, 97 (383): 3–23. Wass, B. M. (1975), ‘Yoruba Dress: A Systematic Case Study of Five Generations of a Lagos Family’, PhD diss., Michigan State University, Michigan.

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CHAPTER 4 TRACING THREADS OF TIME AND SPACE IN CONCEPTUAL FASHION DESIGN IN LAGOS Alexandra Weigand

Models dressed in flowing avant-garde silhouettes appear on the all-black catwalk to the spherical, digital sounds of ‘Earth by Means of the Currents’ by *AR, as if from another sphere. Nuanced shades of grey determine the colour range, softly falling lapel jackets are worn over long tunics, elegant long vests to workwear overalls and trousers, contrasted by wrap skirts and lab coats made of a local blue-and-white-patterned fabric called adire, the patterns of which are the label’s own designs. Lagos Space Programme’s collection entitled ‘Project 3.1 Awo-Workwear’ is dedicated to the babaláwo,1 the Ifá diviners and healers of the Yoruba, and is presented by male and female models. Hidden reflective materials incorporated into the outfits create shiny effects when the models move, sending silver flashes towards the audience. Then the spherical sounds fade and so does the futuristic momentum of the ‘sartorial projects exploring African futures’ (Lagos Space Programme n.d.). It is the first day of the Lagos Fashion Week in October 2018.2 At a later hour, Maxivive will showcase its collection, featuring a large number of specially recruited models, male and female, in eccentric outfits, to confront the viewer right at the beginning with slogans such as ‘Bad Bitch No Underwear’, ‘This Dick Needs A Private Jet’ or ‘Buysexual’, printed on hoodies, T-shirts and trousers. To Carly Simon’s song ‘You’re so vain’ the collection with the name ‘How to marry a billionaire’ presents itself in glittering, sparkling and elaborately crafted outfits, from trashy to sporty to elegant, unconventional and genderless, with an ironic side-blow to ‘dressing for seduction’ – ‘BINGO’3 – and the monetary interests linked to it. Ignoring all gender norms, veiled male models announce the finale, a ‘wedding’ where an androgynous-looking (female) groom finally lifts the veil for the male bride. On the third and final day of the Lagos Fashion Week, IAMISIGO presents its collection entitled ‘Gods of the Wilderness’. The models appear as entities between humans and animals, archaic-looking, with flowing silhouettes enveloping their bodies. With their rough and sandy texture, the coarsely woven cotton fabrics seem to have been dried by the sun. Royal blue, rust red, burgundy and bottle green are contrasted with pale yellow and orange shades, the monochrome tones by colourfully striped, handwoven fabrics. The models wear masks vaguely reminiscent of animal masquerades, decorated with loops and tassels, which also cover individual elements of the garments or even the entire outfit. The textured three-dimensional materials result in new silhouettes loosely surrounding the bodies, with yarn loops gently swinging up and down, as if feathers or furs were swaying in the wind.

Conceptual Fashion Design in Lagos

This text will look at conceptual fashion design in Lagos, Nigeria’s vivid economic centre and one of Africa’s fashion capitals.4 It takes up the concept of Appadurai’s ‘scapes’ (1996) that is characterized by global and cultural flows and its transfer to fashion (Calefato 2019) to highlight fashion as fluid ‘landscapes [ . . .] marked by objects and signs, bodies and images, myths and narrations’ (Calefato 2019: 32). This will allow us to consider fashion today as being shaped by flows instead of classical models such as imitation and distinction, the trickle-down effect from upper to lower classes, or the interaction between institutional fashion and subculture (see Calefato 2019: 33). For this study, I propose to consider contemporary fashion as ‘“new archives” of contemporary life’, taking into account the fact that ‘networks and social relations all over the continent are being transformed and institutionalized in new forms’ (Mbembe 2001: 1). Based on the concept of the (clothed) body as a ‘medium of memory, of inscription, storage and transformation of cultural signs, . . . the meaning of which is subject to the rules of discourse’5 (Öhlschläger and Wiens 1997: 10), clothing can be seen as the body’s second and ‘social’ skin (Turner 2012). Treating fashion as an archival site of sociocultural inscription and manifestation of Zeitgeist opens up new possibilities for analysis and contextualization, especially when it comes to conceptual fashion. According to Victoria Rovine (2015: 158), conceptual fashion can be compared to the work of studio artists, ‘whose practice privileges the production of meaning over primarily aesthetic concerns’. She notes that ‘[c]onceptual fashion design is a recent development in global fashion markets, typified by the work of Comme des Garçons, Hussein Chalayan, and Maison Martin Margiela’ and that ‘this strand of fashion design addressed contemporary anxieties and speculations about body and identity’ (2015). Having established their brands in the last ten years, Lagos Space Programme, IAMISIGO, and Maxivive are part of a young generation of designers in Lagos that aim at a local as well as a global audience.6 By presenting their high fashion7 design collections at fashion weeks in Lagos and other cities on the African continent, such as Johannesburg or Nairobi, or in Europe, they form part of the global fashion system. What unites their work is a conceptual approach to fashion, with materiality playing a major role. Materiality, according to Elke Gaugele and Monica Titton (2014: 169), is key to forming ‘alternative aesthetic politics from a postcolonial as well as from an environmental and ethical perspective’ and thereby reflecting current debates and discourses, in both fashion and society. The method for analysis used is therefore a material discourse analysis, not only to interpret objects as signs of the social but also to focus on the materiality itself, thus linking the ‘relational structure of meaning’ with the ‘particular materialities of clothing’ (Woodward 2005: 21). Understanding the ‘body surface as a principal site of social and political action’ (Hendrickson 1996: 3) means acknowledging the social and political implications of dress and thus its ability to indicate and support societal change and debate. In consequence, this text will investigate the role of conceptual fashion, its materiality and the references, narratives and discourses embedded within. It will examine the strategies of designers to shift boundaries and recode existing social norms, and the points of reference drawn both geographically and temporally from their place of origin – Lagos. 61

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Refiguring the cultural archive as future memory – Lagos Space Programme My first meeting with Adeju Thompson, the founder of the menswear label Lagos Space Programme, is in Victoria Island, the financial and business district of Lagos located between the Gulf of Guinea and the lagoon of Lagos. ‘VI’, as it is called locally, is the home of exclusive fashion: this is where the high-end concept stores Alára and Temple Muse are located and the showrooms of most Lagosian designers, and where the various fashion weeks8 take place. Our meeting point is a creative hub and gallery space on the eighth floor of a high-rise with a view of a city divided by water: the neighbouring Lagos Island, Ikoyi, and the Lekki Peninsula, and, in the distance, the mainland beyond the Lagos Lagoon. The coastal megacity is the largest in sub-Saharan Africa9 and is shaped by its location as an Atlantic port, its colonial past, by Saros and Amaros (former slaves who migrated from Sierra Leone and Brazil in the 1830s), its role as Nigeria’s capital after independence in 1960 until 1991, by civil and military rule in the postcolonial era, and today by governmental plans to turn Lagos into ‘Africa’s model megacity’.10 Its everchanging cityscape is driven by economic growth, as illustrated by the new, artificially raised Eko Atlantic City district overlooking the sea. For our meeting, Thompson wears a pair of workwear trousers from his upcoming collection, and he has brought some collection pieces and fabric samples. The latter are his own textile designs of adire, the Yoruba resist-dyed patterned fabric, which was originally made with natural indigo. Lagos Space Programme was founded in 2017, but Thompson’s career as a fashion designer began as early as 2014 when he returned to Lagos after a foundation course in Art and Design and a commenced BA course in Fashion Design in England.11 Back in Lagos he participated in a British Council-sponsored programme for young designers, which included a series of workshops and finally gave fifteen finalists the opportunity to showcase their collections during the GTBank Lagos Fashion & Design Week. His debut collection dealt with his (unintentional) return to Lagos and his emotional reaction to the situation in which he found himself: ‘coming back to Lagos was like a cultural shock’.12 Thompson’s collection, consisting of secondhand clothes from the local market that had been deconstructed and reassembled in various ways so that different garments were combined with each other, leaving the edges open and fraying, represented the state of his inner conflict, his feeling of being out of place, which gave this collection its name: ‘System Error’. Evoking associations with Japanese or Belgian designers such as Yohji Yamamoto or Martin Margiela in terms of material aesthetics, cuts and silhouettes, it was a collection that, according to Yegwa Ukpo, the co-founder of Lagos’s first concept store Stranger (2013–18), was made ‘for a man that I am not sure exists in this country yet’.13 As he puts on a waistcoat from his collection due to be presented three weeks later at the Lagos Fashion Week, Thompson explains that the collection was inspired by the babaláwo, the ‘Father of Secrets’ of the Yoruba, as it literally translates into English: I found a book on òrìṣà [the deities of the Yoruba] and I was very fascinated by it, . . . elements I found very triggering with so many different layers on 62

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them, and I found that page on the babaláwo . . . . So, I thought, how about creating a collection of babaláwo workwear . . .? Imagining a Nigeria – if Africa hadn’t been colonized – how would these institutions, these archetypes look in 2018? If there had been progress without any interruption? But also keeping in mind that even if Nigeria hadn’t been colonized, we are living in a globalized world with its exchange of culture.14 His intense collection research included trips to Osogbo, a Yoruba city north of Lagos that is well known for adire dyeing, where he developed his textile designs with dyers on-site, and had meetings with a Yoruba priestess and an online interview with a young babaláwo from a long family tradition. The result is a casual and elegant collection for the modern-day babaláwo, which consists of work overalls and trousers, long waistcoats, casual jackets, lab coats, dresses and wrap skirts that can be worn by both men and women (Figure 4.1). In terms of materials and shapes, Lagos Space Programme clearly stood out at the Lagos Fashion Week. Instead of eye-catching materials and figure-emphasizing silhouettes, Thompson draws on a reduced colour palette and interprets workwear in flowing forms: ‘You wear trousers (ṣòkòtò) with an African top (bùbá) and then you wear another layer (agbádá) which is a large gown that goes down to the ankles and is open at the sides.’15 As Thompson continues pulling on another long waistcoat which he calls a ‘utility vest’, a signature piece that is part of all his collections, he demonstrates that ‘all

Figure 4.1  Lagos Space Programme, Show finale Spring/Summer 2019 collection ‘Project 3.1

Awo-Workwear’ presented at Heineken Lagos Fashion Week 2018. © Kola Oshalusi for INSIGNA MEDIA. 63

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the pieces are interconnected so that you can reach through the different layers into your pockets’.16 He describes his fascination and amazement as a child when he was with his grandfather who was always pulling out new things from his clothes. Aleida Assmann ([1999] 2003: 19–20) sees the body as a medium of memory which stabilizes memories through habitualization and reinforces them through the power of affects. By taking up this particular form of visual communication, Thompson’s collection stores habitualized knowledge that corresponds to the experience of a local audience. The cultural codes which are inscribed into his materials communicate even if the designs themselves bear little resemblance to the original three-piece. This approach to (cultural) memory links Thompson’s work to that of the Japanese designer Yohji Yamamoto: I think the first time I tried on a piece by Yohji Yamamoto was about four years ago. It was strangely familiar, almost like it magnified all these values I had or aspired to have, it pushed me to think of clothes differently, think of clothes as objects, think of clothes as art. Right there and then I vowed to try to make clothes like that Yohji jacket . . . – because they bore memory, memory of form and that of life.17 Barbara Vinken (2005: 68–9), who calls this postmodern strand of fashion ‘postfashion’, draws attention to its function as an ‘art of memory’: ‘[a]long with the clothes, one wears also the spirits of the past’. With the lab coat, another signature piece of Lagos Space Programme, Thompson not only places himself in the tradition of postfashion (and thus designers like Yohji Yamamoto, Comme des Garçons, and Martin Margiela who have all adopted the lab coat),18 but again deals with the spirits of his people’s past. The lab coat’s loose and flowing form can be seen as a reference to Japanese shapes but also to precolonial Yoruba dress such as the agbádá (see Oyeniyi 2012: 175). In combination with the long tunics or skirts, gender-neutral clothing is created identifying Lagos Space Programme as part of ‘a new generation of designers based on the continent that are defying outdated ideas about gender within the context of identity, culture and race’ (Gbadamosi 2019).19 As a result, women make up a significant part of the brand’s clientele (Figure 4.2). The inscription of cultural memory also manifests in the material. While the structured tropical wools and cottons in a muted colour range and the silver-coloured, reflective material reference Japanese aesthetics combining tradition and technology, and highlighting form over material, Thompson’s textile designs refer to local visual knowledge systems. His blue-and-white patterned fabrics bear names such as ‘Infinity or Ifá odù’ print and are made in the adire eleko20 technique, using wax (originally starch made of cassava) to create patterns that are left out during the subsequent dyeing process. The symbols and motifs traditionally used serve as a visual language representing the Yoruba world view (Areo and Kalilu 2013: 22). They are taken from history, legends, myths, they visualize proverbs and folklores or reference environmental observations. Adire is a kind of ‘signature fabric’ used by many designers in Lagos, such as Shade Thomas-Fahm (who is credited with being the first fashion designer in Lagos to establish 64

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Figure 4.2  Lagos Space Programme, lab coat with Ifá odù print, Spring/Summer 2019 collection

‘Project 3.1 Awo-Workwear’ presented at Heineken Lagos Fashion Week 2018. © Kola Oshalusi for INSIGNA MEDIA.

her brand in 1960, the year of independence) favouring Nigerian fabrics over imports, followed by Ade Bakare, Tiffany Amber, Maki Oh and Orange Culture, to mention but a few.21 Thompson’s own designs, however, which he explores as ‘post-adire’, do not draw on existing motifs, but expand the repertoire by adding motifs and techniques. His Ifá odù print, for instance, points again to the babaláwo: its graphic patterns of strokes and spaces refer to the odù, the codified message created and interpreted by the babaláwo during the Ifá divination (see Olupona and Abiodun 2016). Thompson’s way of working can be compared to that of an archaeologist, who, in his own culture, digs up cultural knowledge that is paid little attention in the present day.22 Taking Japanese design as a model ‘to undertake an analysis of clothing in the form of clothing’ (Teunissen 2005: 15), Thompson creates conceptual collections that challenge obsolete notions of masculinity, gender norms and stereotypical ideas of African design,23 and that preserve local cultural codes as future memory. Weaving networks and new narratives – IAMISIGO While Lagos Space Programme’s research focuses on Nigeria, the founder of IAMISIGO,24 Bubu Ogisi, considers the entire African continent as a source of inspiration. If her collections were chapters in a book, each chapter would be dedicated to a country or 65

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region in Africa and its particular traditions, be it rituals, textiles or clothes, which Ogisi takes up and re-envisions. Her references range from West Africa, the Wodaabe, a nomadic Fulani ethnic group in the Sahel, to the Asante in Ghana, the Fon in today’s Benin, the Itsekiri in Nigeria, to Ethiopia, Kenya and Uganda. Travelling to all these places herself, she conducts research on materials and production methods on-site, collaborating with local weavers, dyers and artists. My first meeting with Ogisi takes place at her showroom, also located in VI, on the first floor of a smaller company building. The walls are covered with silver foil, the furnishings are designed by an architect friend of hers using recycled objects, resulting in a DIY aesthetic that is rather unusual for Lagos. Ogisi first studied Computer Science in Accra, Ghana, before completing a Masters in Fashion Business at ESMOD in Paris. She founded her women’s wear label in Accra, Ghana, and opened her showroom in Lagos after a relaunch in 2013. The name of the label IAMISIGO, which links her surname spelt backwards to ‘I am’, is a first indication that her work is dedicated to a change in perspective – a perspective that highlights the creative potential of the continent. ‘Collections are like an education media,’ Ogisi says, ‘we are so caught up with the western world, but there is so much happening around us, in Africa’ and thus she addresses a clientele in both Africa and abroad.25 To promote a fashion that is exclusively researched, resourced and produced on the African continent, Ogisi focuses on what she calls ‘ancestral textile techniques of her heritage’.26 This emphasis on the material points to the central role that textiles have always played in many cultures in Africa. Textiles represent knowledge systems that organize social life; they are attributed to healing and protective properties as well as a spiritual meaning that outlives earthly life (see Renne 1995; Abiodun 2014). Building on this high value and significance of textiles on the continent, Ogisi has produced kente fabric with weavers in Ghana, leather garments in Ethiopia, cotton fabrics in Benin and Nigeria, bark cloth in Uganda, and, recently, raffia fabrics made of palm leaves in Kenya, to name but a few. In her latest collections, recycling has become a prominent issue, so she included, for instance, PVC collected and recycled in Lagos. Lagos is her home base; from here her road trips take her to different parts of Africa, forming her transnational network. Her Spring/Summer 2019 collection ‘Gods of the Wilderness’ shown at the Lagos Fashion Week 2018 saw Ogisi manufacture everything from clothing to shoes in the old weaving city of Kano, located in the northern part of Nigeria.27 With this decision, and to use only materials exclusively produced in Nigeria, Ogisi draws attention to the current situation of the textile industry in Nigeria. Kano, once called ‘Africa’s Manchester’ (Beckert 2014: 370), is one of the last bastions of domestic production. The former highly developed textile industry with ‘one of the major world centers of cotton cultivation’ (Picton and Mack 1979: 28), which existed in West Africa since the eleventh century at the latest, encompassed the entire textile chain from the extraction of raw materials to spinning, dyeing and weaving. Here the effects of colonialism and globalization are most evident.28 After the country’s independence, Nigeria’s textile industry experienced a rise in the 1970s and 1980s and grew to become the third largest in Africa29 – Nigeria then was the second largest textile producer in Africa after Egypt (Gaestel 2017: 124). When 66

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cheap imports from China flooded the market in the 1990s and early 2000s, the decline began. Of the approximately 180 textile companies in the late 1980s, fewer than 25 exist today (Oxford Business Group 2017). The place of manufacture is of great importance to all of Ogisi’s collections: it defines the materiality, shapes and stories woven in and around the collections (Figure 4.3). Her Kano woven textiles highlight the aesthetics of the handmade: light cotton fabrics with uneven surfaces, which are then dyed in uni-colours, and coarsely woven and colourfully striped fabrics with woven-in loops that give the material a three-dimensional texture. Besides the woven ones with a long pile tasselled in some parts, there is also a flowing fabric with long yarn loops, the result of a technique Ogisi uses after weaving to create voluminous textures on different parts of the garment. This collection is dedicated to Nigerian and West African masquerade culture, she explains, inspired especially by animals, which she links to contemporary discourses on animal welfare. In 2018, ‘Animal Welfare’ was also the annual theme of the artists’ collective hFactor, located in a busy neighbourhood in Lagos Island, of which she is a member.30 Associations with masquerades arise in particular from the textile masks that the visual artist Chioma Ebenema created for the collection, but they are also inscribed into materials and forms, such as a long-sleeved, floor-length dress completely covered with long yarn loops that Ogisi calls ‘big bird’ (Figure 4.4).31 The textures of her materials, however, also point to local codes: the title cloth of the Ijebu Yoruba called aso olona, which serve as emblems of chieftaincy, priesthood

Figure 4.3  IAMISIGO, outfit lookbook Spring/Summer 2019 collection ‘Gods of the Wilderness’, Lagos 2018. © IAMISIGO, photographer: Ines Valle.

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Figure 4.4  IAMISIGO, outfit lookbook Spring/Summer 2019 collection ‘Gods of the Wilderness’, Lagos 2018. © IAMISIGO, photographer: Ines Valle.

and membership in the Oshugbo respectively Ogboni society32 (Aronson 1992: 52). Aso olona means ‘cloth with patterns’ and is created by using a third heddle or pattern stick to achieve a wide range of additional patterns and shag textures which are ‘associated with power, prestige, and things that are good’ (Aronson 1992: 54, 56). Visual knowledge such as this can also be found on the level of shapes: of the two sizes of aso olona, the larger version is worn in toga style, a form that Ogisi uses for her dresses and tops. As in most of her collections, Ogisi works with simple, clear forms. Fabrics are processed without much intervention or tailoring, drawing attention to the elaborate textiles themselves. The selvages serve as finishes, the hems remain frayed. Forms and silhouettes of her garments show reminiscences of local clothing traditions such as ìró and bùbá, the skirt and blouse of Yoruba women’s clothing, or caftan and tunics, but there are also hot pants, short tops, strap dresses, miniskirts and shirt blouses. Ogisi’s ‘Gods of the Wilderness’ collection demonstrates how she blends material aesthetics and shapes that speak to a local audience with specific aesthetic politics and storytelling to address a global clientele. The aesthetic politics of the ‘handmade’, for instance, point to centuries-old production techniques in Africa but can also be read as a ‘style of decolonization’ (Gaugele and Titton 2014: 165) associated with Mahatma Gandhi wearing a dhoti, a handloom woven cloth that became a symbol of resistance, decolonization and of political as well as economic independence (see Sircar 2014: 178). Furthermore, handmade materials can be situated within ethical and environmental 68

Conceptual Fashion Design in Lagos

discourses, as Ogisi does by describing her practice as slow fashion – an analogy to the slow food movement.33 In the case of kente, which Ogisi highlights in her Spring/Summer 2016 collection ‘Modern Hunters’, she refers to the cloth of the Asante in today’s Ghana with its cultural coding of colours and motifs. Kente is one of the most famous African textiles, associated with royalty, wealth and status – and with a political connotation: As kente rose to prominence with Nkurumah’s independence initiatives, it became allied with the Pan African and Black nationalist ideologies of the time and helped promote ideas of ‘Black power’, ‘Black pride’, and ‘Black is beautiful’. As the understanding of the cloth increased, it became a premier symbol of African heritage and a tangible link with the African continent and its history. (Ross 1998: 187) In ‘Modern Hunters’, Ogisi interweaves the aesthetic politics of the material with a local legend. The highly charged kente is juxtaposed with the story of the Asante queen mother Yaa Asantewaa, who led the last uprising against the British in 1900 and who is today commemorated ‘as a pioneer of Panafricanism’ (Pinther 2010: 65) and ‘as an icon for all Ghanaians, Africans, and people of African descent in the diaspora’ (McCaskie 2007: 163). Ogisi refers to her as a role model for leadership and the Black women’s empowerment in the present: the collection title ‘Modern Hunters’ can be seen as a reference to one of the few (if not the only) existing photographs of Yaa Asantewaa wearing a batakari – a (war) smock originally worn only by men. For her collection, however, Ogisi did not simply adopt kente, but she experimented with kente weavers in Bonwire near Kumasi to develop new material and colour combinations, which were subsequently picked up by the weavers, such as her elevencolour kente (Pinther and Weigand 2018: 79), encouraging them to continue exploring new weaves and designs.34 Looking at IAMISIGO’s collections as education media, we can learn much about the diversity and future potential of African textiles, and also about the capacity of the material itself to convey not only cultural (aesthetic) knowledge from the past but also, by invoking its aesthetic politics, debates and discourses of the present.

Questioning the norm – Maxivive I meet Papa Oyeyemi, the founder of Maxivive, at his studio in Onipanu, a bustling quarter on the mainland north of Yaba, where the busy Tejuoso market is located, and next to Mushin, where Lagosian designers (like Thompson and Ogisi) buy their leather. His studio is in the rear building of a colonial housing estate. I pass a printing workshop where posters are laid out to dry everywhere in the courtyard before a narrow staircase at the back of the building leads me to the first floor. The studio is both a work space and storage room, one of the two sewing machines is in use, and on the walls, clothes hanging on rails are sorted by ‘in season’, ‘season’ and ‘out season’. 69

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Of the fashion designers in Lagos, Maxivive is probably the most controversial. Papa Oyeyemi founded his fashion brand back in his school days and expanded it during his study of Child and Family Psychology in Lagos. His practice is characterized by experiment, then and now; he started with deconstructing clothes from the local markets and reassembling them in modified forms. During his early research he came across the fashion of Margiela and Yamamoto which helped him to better understand his own approach and aesthetics – an aesthetics that corresponded so little to the ideas of his fellow people: ‘It was a very lonely space for me, there was no other person doing what I was doing . . . . What was pretty to me was not pretty to anybody else.’35 He also chose his own way of dealing with the seasonal (western) fashion system, which divides collections into Spring/Summer and Autumn/Winter. In 2013, Maxivive was the first brand to introduce the seasons ‘Wet’, ‘Dry’ and ‘Harmattan’,36 which correspond to the climatic conditions in Nigeria. For his collections, Oyeyemi develops an annual theme that is then interpreted in a different way for each of the three seasons: Every year I work with a singular idea, for 2018 it is called ‘Glistening’. The collection is called ‘How to Marry a Billionaire’ and is the rounding part of all the ‘Glistening’-series. Imagine the effects of sunlight on a big amount of water, an ocean or something, that is glistening. Things that shine but when they actually shine they are quite deceptive in nature – it is only the surface that you see. It is a collection theme with direct reference to Lagos – ‘Lagos people are not avantgarde. Lagos people are shiny – which is one of the effects of glistening’,37 and thus it is a critical comment on the social habitus of many of his people. For the ‘How to marry a billionaire’ collection – by alluding to the 1950s Hollywood film ‘How to Marry a Millionaire’, also a reference to Nigerian ‘Nollywood’ video film production and its aesthetics38 – he places large-scale printed cotton jersey, sweatshirt and denim fabrics next to black sparkling lurex jersey, high-gloss techno fabrics and materials with silver coating reminiscent of space suits. Lace fabrics, some of them printed or embroidered, shimmering panne velvet, knitwear made of glossy viscose, transparent yellow PVC foil, plain fabrics printed all over with slogans, tulle, jerseys and a variety of other, mostly shiny, materials complete the range. For the finishing, Oyeyemi uses colourful prints, embroideries made of coloured beads, sequins, coloured threads or fringes and crochet appliqué elements as well as a kind of crochet technique to reassemble separated parts. The use of slogan prints recalls the painted danfo buses, the ubiquitous yellow minibuses that dominate the cityscape. Equipped with images and text messages, prayers, proverbs or simply a reference to the operator of the bus or the artists involved, this decoration serves as a means of establishing identity and individuality, but can also be understood as a form of subversion of and resistance to (state) standardization (see Osinulu 2008) – as in the case of Maxivive. Another local visual communication system found in Maxivive’s ‘material archive’ points to the preferred aesthetics of the Lagosian elite and their prestige clothing which 70

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Elisha Renne describes as ‘expensive garments made from African lace, cotton damasks, and figured velvets’ that ‘includes garments with embroidery, shining crystals, and supplementary weft patterning with glossy silk/rayon threads, as well as cloth woven with shiny lurex threads and openwork techniques’ (2010: 82). While Lagos Space Programme and IAMISIGO largely elude such aesthetics, Maxivive deliberately plays with them. The aesthetics of shine and glitter is not only the fashion preference of the wealthy, who display their social and economic achievements in this way but is also found at the other end of the social spectrum. Here, knock-off fashion is used to imitate the ostentatious style of the rich, which Allyn Gaestel (2017: 123) describes as ‘glamorous and loud’, with an aesthetic that ‘screams of money, for money, in the glitzy taste of the nouveau riche’. Behind knock-off fashion, which Gaestel calls ‘Versage’ in reference to copies of the lettering of the Italian label Versace, is a system of its own whose ways lead to China. Producing ‘Versage’ in a Nigerian style, Nigerian designers based in China create their own trends within knock-off fashion in constant exchange with dealers in Nigeria. But also in Lagos itself, in the small tailors’ workshops that can be found throughout the city, both fabrics and outfits are effectively spiced up, with glitter and sequins, embroidery and lace appliqués. Shine, as is evident here, serves a twofold function: it is not only an aesthetic ideal but, above all, also symbolizes status and economic success (Figure 4.5). With the use of lace in the theme of ‘Glistening’, reference is made to a recent chapter in Nigeria’s fashion history: that of African lace. During the oil boom in the early 1970s,

Figure 4.5 Maxivive, outfit Spring/Summer 2019 collection ‘How to marry a billionaire’ presented at Heineken Lagos Fashion Week 2018. © Kola Oshalusi for INSIGNA MEDIA.

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elaborate ‘lace’ (actually eyelet embroidery) became fashionable, mainly imported from Austria and Switzerland, but also produced locally. The great popularity of this material in festive dress for both women and men was due both to its aesthetics and the prestige of the opulent and high-priced fabric, which reflected the high social standing of the wearer. African lace illustrates the aesthetic preferences of a culture which takes ‘great pride to be elaborately dressed’ (Layiwola 2010: 171). With his use of dull lace for streetwear-style outfits that are sparsely embroidered or coarsely hand-printed, Oyeyemi draws on this aesthetic knowledge to deconstruct its ostentatious and classseparating effects. On the level of shapes and silhouettes, Maxivive shatters established ideals of beauty and decency. Its ‘How to marry a billionaire’ collection is a kaleidoscopic mix of male and female elements of clothing, of global street style and, again, loose references to local forms with caftan-like tops, long shirts and the gele (the headgear . . . of the Yoruba women’s outfit, here worn by a male model), presented by both male and female models. The deconstruction of gender norms is one of Oyeyemi’s concerns – ‘the mass market is gender conform’ – to overcome all categories, as a post-gender approach. ‘We design for humans in the first place’, Oyeyemi says. ‘when I did research on that collection, I saw that we have over 40 gender types. The idea of having 40+ gender, – that is too much! It doesn’t make the movement faster, it slows it down.’ Oyeyemi, who is well known for his commitment to the LGBT community and is an advocate for diversity, communicates through his collections: ‘I want to talk about how to find freedom in whatever context you are in’ (Figure 4.6).39 With his uncompromising design beyond gender norms, social classes and aesthetic standards, he challenges preeminent values in Nigerian society: ‘There has been much talk that the brand went too far, was too controversial and is not representative of the prevailing norms and values of a country that for all its flamboyance is conservative’ (Odu 2018). In the case of Maxivive, the ‘subaltern powers’ of fashion (Enwezor and OkekeAgulu 2009: 46) aim to push boundaries. At the same time, he questions social habits and the (culturally conditioned) constitutive elements of fashion by unmasking and undermining their strategies. Opposing his own vision, his collections are harbingers of a freer post-gender society liberated from social norms: ‘My designs are things that you would think of wearing in the future, not now, in a time when there is more acceptance.’40

Of cities and clothes, roots and routes Within the fluid scapes of fashion, this text captures a recent development in Lagos where a new generation of designers uses a conceptual fashion approach to shift boundaries and recode existing social norms. To introduce new visions of postcolonial identity within current discourse and debate, Lagos Space Programme, IAMISIGO and Maxivive draw on the ‘re-visiting and re-negotiating of traditional knowledge systems’, that, according to Tegan Bristow (2016: 214), can be understood as contemporary artistic practice of African-inspired future thinking. 72

Conceptual Fashion Design in Lagos

Figure 4.6  Maxivive, Show finale Spring/Summer 2019 collection ‘How to marry a billionaire’ presented at Heineken Lagos Fashion Week 2018. © Kola Oshalusi for INSIGNA MEDIA.

Their work is characterized by taking on local knowledge systems in Nigeria and beyond, by local sourcing of materials, handcrafted production of unique pieces or small series and the collaborative nature of the teamwork with local craftspeople. This commitment to updating local textile traditions, the revival of local material production and techniques, also results in a contemporary form of knowledge production. In the sense of ‘open source’, knowledge is generated in a joint production process, after which it can be used and further developed by those involved. Not only generating new knowledge – and, of course, new aesthetics – it also offers a counter-model to fast fashion with its inherent capitalist, colonial and anti-ecological structures (Figure 4.7). With the incorporation of aesthetic politics, by inscribing habitual, aesthetic and symbolic knowledge into materials and forms, fashion becomes a communication medium and a banner of a sociopolitical agenda that is communicating to both a local and a global audience. While Lagos Space Programme is digging up the local cultural archive to re-envision scarcely noticed traditions of its country, creating ‘glocal’ aesthetics in the postfashion spirit of Yamamoto, IAMISIGO is dedicated to the potential of African textiles for the economic and aesthetic autonomy of fashion produced entirely in Africa, linking it with ‘African’ storytelling that interweaves symbolically charged historical references and materials with contemporary global discourse.41 Maxivive deconstructs the class and gender consciousness displayed in dress in its (heteronormative) culture, anticipating a freed and self-determined reconfiguration in a (future) post-gender and post-class society. 73

Fashioning the Afropolis

Figure 4.7  Textile experiments ‘post-adire’ for the Lagos Space Programme’s collection ‘Project 4 Guerilla’, Osogbo, February 2019. © Alexandra Weigand.

Rooted in Lagos, from where the various national, transcontinental and global routes can be traced, conceptual fashion as discussed stores the memory of time and space in material form, defining new spaces for the role of tradition within contemporary (postcolonial) identities, as material messages of the present for the future.

Notes 1. The Yoruba spelling follows Abiodun (2014) or the quoted references. 2. The research for this text took place within the framework of the DFG (German Research Foundation) project ‘Fashion and Styles in African Cities’ under the direction of Kerstin Pinther at the Institute of Art History of the LMU Munich (2017–20). Three research stays in Lagos were connected with this project; methodically involving field research, interviews and participant observation, it extended to what Trevor Marchand (2010) called ‘knowledge-making practices’. With my background in fashion design and textile engineering, I was able to participate in Adeju Thompson’s sampling process including material research and sourcing, joint research trips and textile experiments in the town of Osogbo 2019. 3. The meaning of the term ‘bingo’ is twofold: it also refers to betting platforms in Nigeria. 4. See, for example, the exhibition and book of the eponymous title Fashion Cities Africa, which explores Lagos alongside Casablanca, Nairobi and Johannesburg (Azieb Pool 2016). 74

Conceptual Fashion Design in Lagos 5. Translation by the author. 6. For sartorial practices in precolonial and colonial Nigeria, see, for example, Byfield (2004), Eicher and Ross (2010), Oyeniyi (2012), Renne (1995); for postcolonial fashion history, see, for example, Jennings (2016), Plankensteiner and Adediran (2010), Thomas-Fahm (2004). 7. The terms ‘dress’, ‘clothing’ and ‘fashion’ are used as suggested by Roach-Higgins, Eicher and Johnson (1995: 7, 10). Contemporary fashion, however, has to be seen in the context of recent radical shifts in terms of its perception and consumption which challenge the distinction between art and design, and call for new perspectives beyond classical (western) theories of fashion, see Geczy and Karaminas (2019). 8. Heineken Lagos Fashion Week in October, GTBank Fashion Weekend in November, and Arise Fashion Week in April are the biggest events, with many much smaller ones in the months between them. 9. https://www​.statista​.com​/statistics​/1121444​/largest​-cities​-in​-nigeria/ (accessed 10 September 2020). 10. For the precolonial and colonial history of Lagos, see Mann (2007); for the architectural development, see Akinsemoyin, K. and A. Vaughan-Richards (1977); for governmental plans, see Udoma-Ejorh (2020). 11. Interview with Adeju Thompson, Lagos, 7 October 2018. The foundation course was at Coleg Menai in Wales (UK), and the BA course in Fashion Design at Birmingham City University School of Art and Design (UK). 12. Ibid. 13. Interview with Yegwa Ukpo, Lagos, 21 October 2018. 14. Interview with Adeju Thompson, Lagos, 7 October 2018. The publication that served as an inspiration for Thompson is Èṣù Ẹlégbára, the Yoruba God of Chance and Uncertainty: A Study in Yoruba Mythology by Ayodele Ogundipe written in 1978. This book represents an essential aspect of postcolonial discourse. The doctoral thesis deals with the Yoruba deity Èṣù and discusses its misinterpretations and reinterpretations which were created by western or western-influenced African scientists due to ‘assertions based on iconographic representations of the devil and the trickster within their Western, Christian socio-cultural locations’ (Olupona 2012: xvi–xvii). 15. Interview with Adeju Thompson, Lagos, 7 October 2018. See also Abiodun (2014: 166). 16. Ibid., emphasis added by the author. 17. Ibid. 18. Comme des Garçons gave the lab coat cult status, and at Margiela’s, the lab coat became a work uniform, worn by all employees, from the trainee to the chief designer and, of course, the sales staff of the Margiela stores, see Woodward (2017). 19. The article also features Nigerian brands Orange Culture and Maxivive. 20. Eleko means ‘with starch’, see Clarke (2011). 21. Interview with Shade Thomas-Fahm, Lagos, 1 September 2017; see also her book Faces of She (2004). Interview with Adebayo Oke-Lawal of Orange Culture, Lagos, 29 October 2018. Studio visit and interview with Ade Bakare, Lagos, 12 November 2019. 22. In February 2019, I visited the Yoruba cities of Abeokuta, Ibadan, Ile-Ife and Osogbo together with Adeju Thompson for research and textile experiments. Experimenting with the adire technique, reverting to the original production using natural indigo and cassava as reserve material, we also explored new ways of interpreting its aesthetics. Thompson had 75

Fashioning the Afropolis his own odù created in an Ifá divination, and for his upcoming Project 5, he will examine clothes as ‘spiritual objects’ according to the Yoruba proverb ‘We greet dress before we greet its wearer’ (also see Abiodun 2014). 23. See also The Nest Collective (2017), an artistic initiative in Kenya, whose publication Not African Enough was created to challenge stereotypical (western) expectations of ‘African’ design and to call for aesthetic independence. 24. There are different spellings of the name of the brand. For this text the one used on the Instagram profile has been taken, see IAMISIGO (n.d.). 25. Interview with Bubu Ogisi, Lagos, 31 August 2017, emphasis added by the author. At the time of the interview, IAMISIGO was represented in Abidjan, Accra, Lagos, Mumbai, New York and Paris. 26. Ibid., see also https://industrieafrica​.com​/collections​/iamisigo (accessed 23 March 2020). 27. See image and caption of Instagram post IAMISIGO on 1 February 2019: ‘all pieces from our SS19 collection were all spinned, dyed and handmade in Kano, Nigeria’, https://www​ .instagram​.com​/p​/BtV0nN​_lbZd/ (accessed 30 January 2020). The banderole of the yarn on the picture indicates that it was produced in Kano. 28. In colonial times, the destruction of the domestic textile industry aimed at replacing domestic cotton goods with European imports for the creation of new markets on the one hand, and to develop the cultivation of cotton for export to Europe on the other, see Beckert (2014: 370–1). 29. ‘Between 1985 and 1991, it recorded an annual growth of 67%, and as of 1991, it employed about 25% of the workers in the manufacturing sector’, see New Cloth Market (2011). 30. Interview with Bubu Ogisi, Lagos, 18 October 2018. 31. Ibid. 32. This judiciary society is called ‘Oshugbo’ by the Ijebu and Egba Yoruba and ‘Ogboni’ by other Yoruba subgroups, see (Aronson 1992: 52). 33. See also Gaugele and Titton (2014: 170) who perceive ‘interesting analogies between the slow food movement and sustainable fashion’ in terms of the ‘valuing of local resources and distributed economies; transparent production systems [. . .]; and sustainable products that have a longer usable life and are more highly valued than typical “consumables”’ (2014: 212). 34. Interview with Bubu Ogisi, Lagos, 18 October 2018. 35. Interview with Papa Oyeyemi, Lagos, 12 October 2018. 36. Harmattan is the period that is characterized by the dry and dusty desert wind coming from North Africa. 37. Interview with Papa Oyeyemi, Lagos, 12 October 2018. 38. During my research, I also had the chance to visit the film set of Battleground – a Nollywood telenovela based on a billionaire and his two families – located in a villa in Lekki. Fashion played an essential role in this film production: the outfits were carefully designed for each role to highlight the particular character. The renowned fashion designer Ade Bakare was engaged to design the first wife’s outfits. The opulent garments were produced in the studio on-site. Interview with creative director Mike-Steve Adeleye, Lagos, 4 September 2017; see also, for example, Krings and Okome (2013), Diawara (2010). 39. Interview with Papa Oyeyemi, Lagos, 12 October 2018. 40. Interview with Papa Oyeyemi, Lagos, 12 October 2018. 76

Conceptual Fashion Design in Lagos 41. See also Victoria Rovine’s (2009: 50) exploration of ‘African forms and imagery’ informed by ‘“tradition” . . . at the core of these representations – the wild, the distant, the untouched Africa’ in western early-twentieth-century Africanism and their use by contemporary African designers as ‘a tool for shifting control over the power to define identities and traditions’ (2009: 58).

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The Transformation of Ndop Fabric from its Production it finished. Since colonial times, this complex it was was Since finished. Sincetimes, colonial times, this production complex production production it was finished. colonial this complex process has been based on a division of labour linking male process has been based on a division of labour linking male and and process has beenartists based and on amerchants division of in labour linking male andand female very remote artisan female artists and merchants in veryartisan remote artisan and trade trade female artists and merchants in very remote and trade centres. centres. centres.

fig. a Ndop in the Wukari style with crododiles in the corner, fig. ain the Wukari Ndop in thewith Wukari style with crododiles in the corner, fig. a Ndop style crododiles incollection the corner, before 1955. © Museum before 1955. Rietberg Zürich, of before 1955. before 1955. © Museum Rietberg Zürich, collection of before 1955. Elsy Leuzinger, RAF 783. Elsyto Leuzinger, RAFRovine 783. According Victoria (2015),2 not only contemporary fash-

According to Victoria Rovine (2015),2 not only contemporary fashAccordingion to Victoria Rovine (2015),2 not onlytextiles contemporary fash-to change 22 According to Victoria (2015),2 not contemporary fashbut also traditional are subject According to so-called Victoria Rovine Rovine (2015),2 not only only contemporary fashion but also so-called traditional textiles are subject to change 2 See Rovine, l. 22 V. ion but also so-called traditional textiles are subject tosubject change ion but also so-called traditional textiles are to change See Rovine, V. l. and innovation. This also applies to the materiality, techniques Rovine, V.See l. Rovine, (2015), African ion but also so-called traditional textiles are subjecttechniques toSee change V. l. and innovation. This also applies to the materiality, (2015), African and innovation. This also applies to the materiality, techniques See Rovine, V. innovation. This applies to the materiality, techniques (2015), AfricanFashion, and practice of ndop. At the beginning of twentiGloball. (2015), innovation. This also also applies the materiality, techniques and aesthetic aesthetic practice ofthe ndop. Atto the beginning of the the twentiFashion,African Global (2015), African and aesthetic practice of ndop. At beginning of the twentiFashion, Global Style: Histories, and aesthetic practice of ndop. At the beginning of the twentiFashion, Global eth century, Ibrahim Njoya, who ruled the Bamum kingStyle: Histories, and aestheticSultan practice of ndop. At the beginning of theStyle: twentiFashion, Global ethSultan century, Sultan Ibrahim Njoya, who ruled thekingBamum kingHistories, Innovations, and Style: Histories, eth century, Ibrahim Njoya, who ruled the Bamum eth Sultan Ibrahim Njoya, who ruled the kingInnovations, and dom in Western Cameroon 1894 to 1933, established a new Style: You Histories, Innovations, and Ideas Canand Wear. eth century, century, Sultan Ibrahimfrom Njoya, who ruled the Bamum Bamum kingInnovations, dom in Western Cameroon from 1894 to 1933, established a new Ideas You Can Wear. dom in Western Cameroon from 1894 to 1933, established a new Innovations, dom in Western Cameroon from 1894 to 1933, established a new Ideas You CanBloomington: Wear.You Canand textile industry in his capital Fumban. The innovative Bamum Ideas Wear. 1931, dom in Western Cameroon from 1894 to established a new textile in industry in his capital The Fumban. The innovative Bamum Indiana Bloomington: Ideas You Can Wear. textile industry his capital Fumban. innovative Bamum Bloomington: University textile industry in his capital Fumban. The innovative Bamum Bloomington: leader incorporated foreign techniques, materials and forms into Indiana University textile incorporated industry in his capital Fumban. materials The innovative Bamum Bloomington: leader foreign techniques, and forms into Indiana University Press. Indiana University leader incorporated foreign techniques, materials and forms into leader incorporated foreign techniques, materials and into Press. the visual arts of Bamum. As well as the of a Indiana University Press. 33 leader incorporated techniques, and forms forms into Press. the arts of the theforeign Bamum. well asmaterials the invention invention of a new new the visualscript, artsvisual ofthe thearts Bamum. As well asAs the invention of a new Press. the of Bamum. as the invention of new 3 See Geary, bodily representation was an important field his the visual visual arts of the the Bamum. As As well well as the invention of a aof new See Geary,33 script, the bodily representation was an important field of his See Geary, script, theinnovations. bodily representation was an important field of his Christraud. See Geary, 1984. script, representation was an field of his As a designer, he created new styles for Christraud. 1984. See Geary, script, the the bodily bodily representation was an important important field ofthe his1984. innovations. As designer, a fashion fashion designer, henew created new styles for the Christraud. “Les choses1984. du Christraud. innovations. As a fashion he created styles for the innovations. As a fashion designer, he created new styles for the “Les choses1984. du court and his family, combining elements of Prussian military uniChristraud. “Les choses du palais”. Catalogue innovations. As a fashion designer, he created new styles for the choses du court and his family, combining elements ofmilitary Prussian military uni- “Les palais”. Catalogue court and forms, his family, combining elements of Prussian uni“Lesmusée choses du court and his family, combining elements of Prussian military unipalais”. Catalogue Victorian women’s robes or Islamic dress traditions of the du du palais Catalogue court and his family, combining ofdress Prussian military forms, Victorian women’s robeselements or Islamic traditions ofunithedu palais”. du musée du palais palais”. Catalogue forms, Victorian women’s robes or Islamic dress traditions of the du he musée palais Bamoun Foumban forms, Victorian women’s robes or Islamic dress traditions of the du muséeàà du palais Hausa with typical Bamum icons and motives.3 In addition, set Bamoun Foumban forms, Victorian women’s robes or Islamic dress traditions of the du musée du palais Hausa with typical Bamum icons and In motives.3 In he addition, he set Bamoun à Foumban (Cameroun). Bamoun à Foumban Hausa with typical Bamum icons and motives.3 addition, setdozens Hausa with typical Bamum icons and motives.3 In addition, he set (Cameroun). up his own studios at his palace in Fumban and had of Bamoun à Foumban (Cameroun). Wiesbaden: Franz Hausa with typical Bamum icons and motives.3and In addition, he set (Cameroun). up his own studios at his palace in Fumban had dozens of Wiesbaden: Franz up his own studios atstudios his palacehis in Fumban and had dozens of Wiesbaden: (Cameroun). up palace in Fumban and had weavers, embroiderers and tailors for Steiner, p. 108–113. Wiesbaden: Franz up his his own own studios at at his palace inwork Fumban and[fig. b]. had dozens dozens of of Franz weavers, embroiderers and tailors work for him him [fig. b]. Steiner, p. 108–113. Wiesbaden: Franz weavers, embroiderers and tailorsand work for him [fig. b]. Steiner, p. 108–113. weavers, embroiderers tailors work for him [fig. b]. Steiner, p. 108–113. weavers, embroiderers and tailors work for him [fig. b]. Steiner, p. 108–113.

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fig. b Presentation of embroidery samples from King Njoya’s fig. b Presentation of embroidery samples from King Njoya’s fig. b Presentation of embroidery fromsamples King Njoya’s textile postcard. © Museum Rietberg Zürich, collecfig. b workshops, Presentation ofsamples embroidery from King Njoya’s textile workshops, postcard. © Museum Rietberg Zürich, collecfig. bChristraud Presentation of embroidery samples from King Njoya’s textile workshops, postcard. © Museum Rietberg Zürich, collection M. Geary textile workshops, postcard. © Museum Rietberg Zürich, collection Christraud M. Geary textile workshops, postcard. © Museum Rietberg Zürich, collection Christraud M.Christraud Geary tion M. Geary tion Christraud M. Geary …running heads (tails) 3 …running 3 …running heads (tails) heads (tails)

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Fashioning the Afropolis During the German colonial period, Njoya also initiated the production of ndop fabric in Foumban.4 In this photograph, four craftsmen present a sample of ndop fabric made in Fumban combining the newly introduced techniques of weaving and dyeing with Bamum iconography [fig. c]. The double headed serpents inside the circles are typical of Bamum court art. The fabric is divided into square and rectangular fields showing abstract zoomorphic icons like frogs, spiders, and the four-headed motive (gbatu gbatu) relating to important symbols of the kingdom and its history.

fig. c Presentation of a ndop fabric with serpent motif from the workshops at the palace, Fumban, around 1930, photographer: Franck Christol. © Frédéric Gadmer/SPCA/ECPAD/Défense/ SPA 157 H 4893

Display of power and remembrance

Another image shows Sultan Njoya who was photographed by the German anthropologist Bernhard Ackermann in 1908 with a royal dance costume for the nja ceremony [fig. d]. While the Bamum ruler wore a uniform inspired by the Prussian military, his servants spread the wings of the traditional costume in front of the palace building. The extremely long textile in ndop style was covered with typical motives of Bamum design. In other historical photographs of missionaries and traders, masked dancers of a secret society appeared in ndop costumes. Furthermore, the batik played an important role in funeral ceremonies. Not only mourners wore ndop in memory of a deceased person, but the body of a deceased king was also wrapped and buried in it.

fig. d King Ibrahim Njoya presenting his royal costume made of ndop (ntieya) fabric, Fumban, 1908, photographer: Bernhard Ankermann. © Ethnologisches Museum – Staatliche Museen zu Berlin, VIII A 5331 and 5332.

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The term for ndop in the Bamum language is ntieya. For the Bamum history of clothing and ndop see Geary, Christraud and Adamou Ndam Njoya. 1985. Mandu Yenu. Bilder aus Bamum, einem westafrikanischen Königreich, 1902– 1915. München: Trickester.

The Transformation of Ndop Fabric from its Production While ndop fabrics were the prerogative of the male elite in the Bamileke region, the female members of the royal family in Bamum also had the right to stage themselves with ndop fabrics. Ngutane, Sultan Njoya’s oldest daughter, wore a sumptuously embroidered robe on her wedding day as well as a voluminous ndop fabric over her skirt which – together with the double gong – underlined her royal descent [fig. e].5

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Another image shows Njoya beside his wives framed by a huge ndop in the background (Geary 1985: 106).

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fig. e Ngutane, King Njoya’s oldest daughter, in her wedding dress made of ndop (ntieya) fabric, Fumban, 1916, photographer: Anna Wuhrmann. © Basel Mission Archives, BMA E-30.30.057.

In the course of the founding of new museums in the late 1920s, ndop was extended to the display of objects in Fumban. In the palace museum of King Njoya as well as in the competing museum of Mose Yeyab, the later Musée des Arts et Traditions, ndop fabrics were hung on the walls, serving as decoration for the masks or thrones exhibited in the foreground [fig. f].6 During this process of musealization and aestheticization, batik was simultaneously a museum artefact and part of the museum display itself.

For the history of the museums see Fine, Jonathan. 2016. “Selling Authenticity in the Bamum Kingdom in 1929–1930”, African Arts, 49, 2: 54–67; Geary, Christraud. 1984. “Les choses du palais”. Catalogue du musée du palais Bamoun à Foumban (Cameroun). Wiesbaden: Franz Steiner; and Galitzine-Loumpet, Alexandra. 2016. “Reconsidering Patrimonialisation in the Bamum Kingdom: Heritage, Image, and Politics from 1906 to the Present”. African Arts, 49, 2: 68–81.

fig. f Display of Bamum masks and ndop (ntieya) fabrics in the background in the palace museum, Fumban, 1937, photographer: Hans Himmelheber. © Museum Rietberg Zürich, collection Hans Himmelheber, FHH 150-11

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Fashioning the Afropolis Fashioning the Afropolis In the ndop Bamum ndop as notprestige only served as prestige clothing In the Bamum region, notregion, only served clothing In ndop the Bamum region, ndop not only served as prestige clothing the men Bamum region, not only as prestige clothing for both men and women, but also backdrop scenery for for for In both and women, but also asserved backdrop andas scenery for and and for both men and women, but also as backdrop scenery both men region, and but only also as backdrop and scenery for Infor the Bamum ndop not served asand prestige clothing the aristocracy and its insignia to display and enhance their the aristocracy andwomen, its insignia to display enhance their the aristocracy and its and insignia to display and enhance their the aristocracy and its The insignia to display enhance their for both men and women, butuse alsoof asndop backdrop and scenery forrituals and funerals power and exclusiveness. The use ndop in power and exclusiveness. in rituals and funerals power anduse exclusiveness. Theof use ndop in rituals and funerals power and exclusiveness. The ofdisplay ndop inand rituals andof funerals the aristocracy and its insignia to enhance their to as itsatoreputation as a Thus, sacred textile. Thus, ndop contributed to contributed its reputation sacred textile. ndop contributed its reputation as a sacred contributed to its reputation andop sacred textile. Thus, ndop textile. Thus, ndop power exclusiveness. useasof in rituals and funerals played aninThe important role in history making, identity politics andand played anand important role history making, identity politics and identity played an important role in history making, politics played an important role in history identityThus, politics and contributed to its reputation as a making, sacred textile. ndop memory practices in Western Cameroon. memory practices in Western Cameroon. memory practices in Western Cameroon. memory Western Cameroon. played an practices importantinrole in history making, identity politics and memory practices in Western Cameroon.

Transmediality Transmediality the course ofcentury, theoftwentieth century, the meaning of ndop as as In the course of In the twentieth the meaning of ndop ndop as meaning Transmediality In the course the twentieth century, the of ndop Transmediality In the course of the twentieth century, the meaning of as public a prestige-enhancing media was extended to architecture and andTransmediality public a prestige-enhancing media was extended to architecture and a prestige-enhancing media was extended to architecture and and public and public and a prestige-enhancing media was extended to architecture and In the course of the twentieth century, the meaning of ndop as 7 7 7 intervisual arts. The German-American missionary Paul Gebauer interspace visual arts. The German-American missionary PaulGebauer, Gebauer visual arts. The German-American missionary Gebauer interspace arts. The German-American missionary Paul Gebauer interspace avisual prestige-enhancing media was extended toPaul architecture and and public space Gebaue Gebauer, Pa Gebauer, Paul. 1979. Paul. 1979. 7 preted the pattern ofas ndop royal tapestry an idealized ground Theof ArtC preted the pattern of ndop royal tapestry as anasGebauer, idealized ground The Art preted the pattern ofof ndop royal tapestry an ground The Art Cameroon. preted the pattern ndop royal tapestry as an idealized idealized ground The Art ofof Cameroon. visual arts. The German-American missionary Paul Gebauer interspace Paul. 1979. York:Yo P New York: Portland New York: Portland ofold the old palace in Fumban burnt in 1913.7 In New plan ofthe the old palace inFumban Fumban which burnt down in 1913.7 InInThe plan ofplan palace in burnt Fumban which burnt down 1913.7 In New plan of the old palace inthe which down inwhich 1913.7 preted pattern of ndop royal tapestry as an idealized ground Artdown of in Cameroon. Art Mus Art Museum, p.278ff, Art Museum, p.278ff, Art Museum York: Portland this sense, the cartography andBamum of the Bamum roythis sense, the cartography and architecture of this sense, the cartography and architecture the Bamum roythis sense, the cartography and architecture of the Bamum royplan of the old palace in Fumban which burnt down inarchitecture 1913.7royInofNew 374; Ga 374; Galitzine374; Galitzin GalitzineArt 374; Museum, p.278ff, alty were transformed a textile surface. Loumpe alty were transformed into atextile textile surface. Loumpet 2016: 11. this sense, the alty cartography architecture oftextile the Bamum roy- 374; were transformed into ainto surface. Loumpet 20 alty were transformed into aand surface. Loumpet Galitzine-2016: 11. alty were transformed into a textile surface.

fig. g

Loumpet 2016: 11.

Ibrahim Njoya, drawing of Bamum kings with ndop

fig. g(ntieya) Ibrahim Njoya, drawing of Bamum ndopof Bamum kings with ndop fig. g Ibrahim kings Njoya,with drawing fabrics and pattern, aroundof 1930. Ibrahim Njoya, drawing Bamum kings with ndop fig.fig. g g fabrics Ibrahim Njoya, drawing of Bamum with ndop1930. (ntieya) and pattern, around 1930. © Musée d’ethnographie (ntieya) fabrics and kings pattern, around (ntieya) fabrics andpattern, pattern,around around1930. 1930. © Musée d’ethnographie (ntieya) fabrics and With the of drawing and as new artistic genres de Genève (MEG), ETHAF 033559, photographer: M. Jonathan Watts fig. g Ibrahim Njoya, drawing ofpainting Bamum kings with ndop fig. g Ibrahim Njoya, drawing of Bamum kings with ndop   emergence With the emergence ofM. drawing and painting genres de Genève (MEG), ETHAF 033559, photographer: Jonathan Watts 8 (ntieya) fabrics and pattern, around 1930. (ntieya) fabrics and pattern, around 1930. With the emergence of drawing and painting astranslated new artistic genres during the French colonial time, ndop was into these as new artistic

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See Geary, during the its French colonial time, ndop was translated into these 8 during the French colonial time, ndop translated into these new While the fabric lost materiality, was still presSee Gea Christraud M.genres 2011. With emergence ofwas drawing and painting as new artistic With themedia. emergence ofthe drawing and painting as ndop new artistic genres See Geary, new media. While the fabric lost its materiality, ndop was still pres- Christra new media. While the fabric lost its materiality, ndop was still present through its patterns and meaning. Ibrahim Njoya, a Bamum Bamum. Milan: 5 8 8 Christraud M. 2011. during the French colonial time, ndop was translated into these during the French colonial time, ndop was translated into these through its patterns and Ibrahim Bamum Continents ; Musée See Geary, SeeNjoya, Geary, ent through its patterns and meaning. Ibrahim Njoya, a paintings Bamum Bamum. Milan: 5a Bamum who started to ent draw in 1908 became famous formeaning. his media. While the fabric lost its materiality, ndop was still presnewartist media. Whilenew the fabric lost its materiality, ndop was still presd’Arts Africains, Contine Continents Musée Christraud M.paintings 2011. Christraud M artist who started tofamous draw infor 1908 became famous for; his artist started to draw 1908 became his paintings withwho coloured pencil andinink [fig. g].8 His images of king lists and Océanie, Amérindid’Arts d’Arts Africains, ent through its patternsIbrahim and meaning. Njoya, aking Bamum Bamum. MiA ent through its patterns and meaning. Njoya, aIbrahim Bamum Bamum. Milan: 5 and with coloured and [fig. g].8 images of lists with coloured pencil monarchs and ink [fig. g].8 His images of king listsHis and portraits of Bamum werepencil inspired byink photographs and ens. 1997. Les Océanie Océanie, AmérindiContinents ; Musée Continents artist who started to draw in 1908 became famous for his paintings artist who started to draw in 1908 became famous for his paintings Dessins Bamum. portraits of Bamum monarchs were inspired by photographs and ens. 199 portraits ofofBamum were inspired by photographs and 1997. Les calendars Germanmonarchs royalty, nobility and military. At the same time,ens. d’Arts Africa d’Arts Africains, Marseille – Foumban Dessins with royalty, coloured pencil and ink of [fig. g].8 Hisand images of king lists and with pencil and ink [fig. g].8 His images of king lists andDessins calendars of German royalty, nobility military. AtBamum. the same time, Océanie, Am Océanie, Amérindicalendars of German nobility and military. Atthe theBamum same time, hiscoloured drawings represented the visual inventory king(Cameroun). Milan: Marseil Marseille – Foumban portraits of Bamum monarchs were inspired by ens. 1997. L portraits of Bamum monarchs were inspired by photographs andphotographs ens. 1997. Les and his drawings represented the visual inventory of the Bamum kinghis drawings represented the inventory the Bamum kingdom featuring regalia such asvisual thrones, masks,of musical instruments Skira. (Camero (Cameroun). Milan: Bam Dessins Bamum. calendars German royalty, nobility and military. Atmusical the same time, Dessins calendars of German royalty, nobility and military. At the same time,Skira. dom regalia such as thrones, masks, instruments Skira. dom featuring regalia suchoffeaturing as thrones, masks, musical instruments Marseille – Foumban Marseille – F …running headsking(tails) his drawings theof visual inventory of the Bamum Milan: king- (Cameroun) his drawings represented the represented visual inventory the Bamum 6 (Cameroun). …running heads (tails) …running heads (tails) 6 featuring regalia dom featuring regalia masks, such asmusical thrones, masks, musical instruments Skira. dom such as thrones, instruments Skira. 6

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The Transformation of Ndop Fabric from its Production and textiles. Ibrahim used the striking white-blue ndop and textiles. Ibrahim Njoya used the Njoya striking white-blue ndop

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and textiles. Njoya used the striking white-blue ndop and pattern textiles. as Ibrahim Njoya used theIbrahim striking ndop pattern as background for thedepicted depictedkings kingsand and a prestigious background forwhite-blue the depicted kings and pattern asaaprestigious prestigious background for the pattern as a prestigious background for the depicted kings and and textiles. Ibrahim Njoya used the striking white-blue ndop asasaadecorative frame for the pictorial composition as a whole. as a decorative frame for the pictorial composition as a whole. In decorative frame for the pictorial composition as a whole. InIn as a addition decorative for the pictorial a whole. In in mural pattern as a prestigious background forcomposition the kings and addition to paper, ndop played a role role decorationasas toframe paper, ndop also played adepicted rolealso inasmural decoration as decoration addition to paper, ndop also played a in mural to paper, ndop alsopictorial played acomposition role in mural asaddition a decorative for the asdecoration a whole. InasPastor new form of artistic expression. In 1930, Frank Christoltook took new formframe of artistic expression. In 1930, Pastor Frank Christol took newplayed form artistic expression. In 1930, Pastor Frank Christol new form artistic expression. Inof 1930, Frank Christol took addition to of paper, rolePastor in mural decoration photo of aaaman standing in front ofasaa house house wallcovered coveredwith with a photo of andop manaalso standing in front of a house wall covered with a photo of man standing in front of wall a photo a man standing in front of Pastor a house wallChristol coveredtook with new form of artistic expression. In 1930, Frank [fig. h]. This photo is one of theof earliest imagesofofndop ndop ndop icons [fig. h]. Thisicons photo is of the earliest images ndop images ndop icons [fig. h]. This photo is one of the earliest Thisndop photo is one ofaone the earliest images of ndop a ndop photoicons of a [fig. h]. man standing in front of house wall covered with ininaaLater, mural painting. Later, walls of of theimposing imposing thronehall hall in a mural painting. the walls of the the imposing throne hall mural painting. Later, walls the throne in a mural painting. Later, the walls of the imposing throne hall ndop icons [fig. h]. This photo is one of the earliest images of ndop inside the in Fumban were also painted withndop ndoppatterns. patterns. inside the palace ininside Fumban were also painted with ndop patterns. thepalace palace inimposing Fumban also painted with thepainting. palace in Later, Fumban also with ndop patterns. ininside a mural thewere walls of painted the throne hall inside the palace in Fumban were also painted with ndop patterns.

er, 1979. aul.Paul. 1979. of Cameroon. Cameroon. ork: Portland Portland seum, p.278ff, m, p.278ff, alitzineneet 2016: 016: 11. 11.

fig. h Young chief in front of a mural painting with ndop fig. h Young chief chief in in front front of fig. h Young of aa mural mural painting paintingwith withndop ndop pattern, Bafoussam, photographer: Frank Christol. fig. h Young chief1930, in front of a muralBafoussam, painting with pattern, 1930,ndop photographer: Frank Christol. pattern, Bafoussam, 1930, Frankpainting Christol.with © Musée fig. h Young chief inphotographer: frontwith of a ndop mural ndop fig. h Young chief in front of aChristol. mural painting pattern, Bafoussam, 1930, photographer: Frank Both artistic practices are still relevant in the visual arts inside and

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ary, aud M. 2011. m. Milan: 5 ents ; Musée M. 2011. Africains, ilan: 5 Amérindise,; Musée 97. Les ains, s Bamum. mérindille – Foumban Les oun). Milan: mum. Foumban ). Milan:

pattern, Bafoussam, 1930, photographer: Christol.arts inside and pattern, Bafoussam, 1930, photographer: Frank Christol. du Quai Branly – Jacques Chirac, PP0022972 Both artistic practices are still relevant inFrank the visual Both artistic still relevant in the visual Njoya, arts inside and outside thepractices Bamum are palace. Sa Majesté Idrissou professor outside the Bamum palace. Sarelevant Majesté Idrissou Both artistic practices are still in the visual artsprofessor inside and Both artistic practices are still relevant in the visual arts inside andNjoya, outside thethe Bamum palace. Majesté Njoya, of art at Institute for Sa Fine Arts inIdrissou Fumban, is anprofessor important of art at the Institute for Fine Arts in Fumban, is an important outside the Bamum palace. Sa Majesté Idrissou Njoya, professor outside the Bamum palace. Sa Majesté Idrissou Njoya, professor ofartist art atand thepainter Institute for Fine Arts Fumban, an experiments important in Fumban. In hisinown works,is he artist and painter ininFumban. InArts hisan own works, he experiments of art at the Institute for Fine in Fumban, is an important of art at the Institute for Fine Arts Fumban, is important artist and painter in Fumban. In his own works, he experiments with ndop and transforms the technique by printing ndop motifs with ndoppainter and the9 In technique byworks, printing motifs 9and artist and Fumban. Inhe hisexperiments own hendop experiments artist and painter in Fumban. his own he experiments artistand painter inthe Fumban. Intransforms his own works, with ndop transforms technique byin printing ndop motifs in indigo on white industrially produced fabrics. Afterwards he works, in indigo on industrially produced fabrics. Afterwards he See also Idrissou with ndop andwhite transforms the technique printing ndop motifs with and transforms the technique by printing ndop motifs inincorporates indigo onndop white industrially produced fabrics. Afterwards these textile fragments into his paintings and he col- by Njoya. 2020. “Sens incorporates these textile fragments into his paintings and colincorporates these textile fragments into his paintings and colin indigo on is white industrially produced fabrics. inFor indigo on white industrially produced fabrics. Afterwards he Afterwards he lages. the palace, Idrissou Njoya also instrumental in spreadet signification lages. Forcourse the palace, Idrissou Njoya is also instrumental in spreadlages. For the palace,these Idrissou is also instrumental inpaintings spreading du ndop inchez public space. In Njoya the of the construction of the incorporates these textile fragments into hiscolpaintings and colincorporates textile fragments into his and Ndop ing ndop inpublicly public space. In the course of the construction of the ing ndop in public space. In the course of the construction ofof the Bamum”. new palace museum, parts of the accessible areas the les Bamum”, inthe lages. For the palace, Idrissou Njoya is also instrumental in spreadlages. For palace, Idrissou Njoya is also instrumental in spreadnew palace museum, parts of theof publicly accessible areas of the Ndop Ly Dumas. new palace museum, parts ofhim. theIn publicly accessible the palace renovated These included, example, the ingby ndop in public space. In areas the course of the construction of the ingwere ndop in public space. the course offor the construction of the . 109–132. Etoffes palace weredecorated renovated by him. These included, for example, the palace were renovated by him. These included, for example, the entrance to the palace, which was in 2018 with a huge new palace museum, parts of the publicly accessible areas of the new palace museum, parts of the publicly accessible areas of the entrance to the palace, which was decorated in 2018 with a huge entrance to the consisting palace, palace which was decorated in 2018 with a huge wallpalace painting of ndop patterns [fig. i]. Moreover, the were renovated by him. These included, for example, the were renovated by him. These included, for example, the wall painting of ndop patterns wall paintingofconsisting of ndop patterns [fig. i]. market Moreover, thein [fig. i]. Moreover, the memorials kings located in consisting the public square entrance to of the palace, which decorated in market 2018 with a huge entranceBamum to the palace, which was decorated inwas 2018 with a huge memorials Bamum kings located in the public square in memorials of Bamum kings located in the public market square in the town centre have also recently been ornamented with the wall painting consisting of[fig. i]. ndop Moreover, patterns [fig. i]. the wall painting consisting ofcentre ndop patterns the Moreover, thepatterns town have recently been ornamented with the the town white-blue centre havendop also recently been with striking [fig. j].ornamented Ndopalso is used as athe royal memorials of Bamum kings located in the publicinmarket square in memorials of ndop Bamum kings located inndop the public square white-blue patterns [fig. j]. striking patterns [fig. j]. Ndop used asmarket amayor royal symbolwhite-blue of power in the striking public space of a city in is which the is Ndop is used as a royal the town centre have also recently been with the the town centre have also recently been ornamented with symbol of power in the public space of a city inthe which the mayor is symbol of opponent power in the public space of a Thus, city inpolitics which the mayor is a strong of the actual sultan. in Fumban are ornamented white-blue patterns [fig. j]. as a royal striking ndop patterns [fig. j]. Ndop ispattern. used as Ndop apolitics royalis used aactual strong opponent ofndop the of actual sultan. in Fumban are a strong opponent thestriking sultan. Thus, politics in Fumban areThus, underlined inwhite-blue theof visual urban sphere by the use ndop of power invisual the of a the city in which thepattern. mayor is symbol of power in thesphere public space of city in space which the mayor isof ndop underlined inby the urban sphere by use underlined in the visualsymbol urban the useapublic of ndop pattern.

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The Transformation of Ndop Fabric from its Production ndop patterns by textileby companies like CICAM has ndop produced patterns produced textile companies like CICAM has 10 11 10 contributed to this proliferation in urban sartorial contributed to this proliferation in urbanpractice. sartorial The practice. The See, for example, See, for example, luxurious luxurious and expensive ndop fabrics arefabrics no longer reserved and expensive ndop are no longer for reserved for the fashion designthe fashion designthe aristocracy alone, butalone, are incorporated into everyday and brands the aristocracy but are incorporated into fashion everydayers fashion erslike and brands like Miesaa, N’Afrikart Miesaa, N’Afrikart and product (for example bags).10 Furtherand product design (forcushions example and cushions and bags).11 FurtherFurtheranddesign product design (for example cushions and bags).10 premier, Patrick premier, Patrick more, fashion like Ly Dumas, the grandthe dame of Cammore,designers fashion designers like Ly Dumas, grand dame Soh, of CamPatch Muse Soh,or Patch Muse or 12 eroonian couture,11 and Imane Ayissi promote by working Ayissi Ayissi eroonian and Imane Ayissi ndop promote ndop by Joseph-Marie working Joseph-Marie eroonian couture, couture,11 and Imane Ayissi promote ndop by working Nga alias JJ du Style Nga alias JJ du Style together with localwith craftspeople. While Ly Dumas leaves theleaves fab- the fabtogether local craftspeople. While Ly Dumas Streetstyle. Western Streetstyle. Western ric as it is traditionally made, adjusting only the colour andcolour reus- and ric as it is traditionally made, adjusting only the reusfashion labelsfashion like labels like ing ndop ing pattern bead decoration, Imane Ayissi transforms Hermès are also ndopfor pattern for bead decoration, Imane Ayissi transforms Hermès are also by ndop, inspired by ndop, ndop intondop a new aesthetic [fig.k]. The[fig.k]. batik The technique remains inspired into a new aesthetic batik technique remains for example infor 2018 example in 2018 importantimportant for his fashion based in Paris, the typical for hislabel fashion label based but in Paris, but theHermes typical created a Hermes created a geometricgeometric pattern of ndop is transformed into seriesinto of silk scarves pattern of blurred ndop isand blurred and transformed series of silk scarves based on ndop based on ndop cross-cultural haute couture cross-cultural hautefashion. couture fashion. pattern. pattern. The brief history of history ndop from pre-colonial times to the The brief of ndop from pre-colonial times to the 11 12 11 present day has shown that this unique textile hastextile always conLy Dumas has (2020) has present day has shown that this unique has always con-(2020) Ly Dumas published published a book nected distant centres trade, artisans power. In power. the past, nected distantofcentres of trade,and artisans and In the past,a book about ndop iconoabout ndop iconoas well as as today, production, materiality and aesthetic prac- graphy, well the as today, the production, materiality and aesthetic pracproduction graphy, production tice of ndop by innovation and transformation. and its history. ticeare of characterized ndop are characterized by innovation and transformation. and its history. fig. k Transforming the ndop technique and pattern in config. k Transforming the ndop technique and pattern in contemporary fashion, spring/summer collection “Asseulenn” Imane temporary fashion, spring/summer collectionby‘Asseulenn’ by Imane Ayissi, 2017, photographer: Fabrice Malard. Ayissi, photographer: Fabrice Ayissi, 2017, 2017, photographer: Fabrice Malard. Malard.© Imane Ayissi

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PART II MATERIALITIES AND AESTHETIC PRACTICES

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CHAPTER 5 BORN TO SHINE FASHIONABLE PRACTICES OF REFINING AND WEARING TEXTILES IN DAKAR Kristin Kastner

Approaching surfaces Textiles have long played a central role in the making of the social person in Senegal. Bearing in mind the importance of woven cloth and processed damask in life cycle ceremonies and social relations, this contribution delves into the techniques of accumulation and refinement of textiles in the vibrant capital of Dakar, celebrated as one of the main fashion cities on the continent.1 During the process of manipulating, ennobling and combining textile surfaces in the thousands of workshops of dyers, tailors and fashion designers, which range from street fashion to high-end fashion, specific practices of accumulation are applied that feed on the urban landscape: On the one hand, there is the récupération – the amassing, assembling, manipulating, cutting and recombining – of second-hand clothes; on the other hand, there are manifold forms of refining imported damask, through dyeing, batik, painting, embroidering and strass appliqué, that fulfil the aesthetic criteria of an urban society that strives to shine. The steady efforts to achieve an appealing appearance in Dakar’s everyday life call for an engagement with Daniel Miller’s critique on the pervasive conception of surface and the associated ideology of a ‘depth-ontology’ (Miller 1994) and suggest shifting the attention to the depth-ontology of textile surfaces in Senegalese fashion. Miller points out that ‘the term “superficial” implies that there is a relationship between surface and lack of importance’, in which he considers the ‘culprit’ to be the ‘pervasive ideology of “depth ontology”’, whereby the ‘assumption that everything that is important for our sense of being lies in some deep interior and must be long-lasting and solid’ (Miller 1994: 71). Later, Miller draws a direct line between surface and clothing by stating that ‘[s]ince it is used as a covering or as a surface, clothing is easily characterized as intrinsically superficial’ (Miller 2005: 1). Based on his own research in Trinidad, Miller even argues that ‘[w]hat they [the Trinidadians] regard as real, the real person, is considered to be on the surface’ (Miller 2005: 3). This argument will be discussed in the Senegalese context, where appearance plays a crucial role in the making of the person. I will show how different forms of movement, be they physical, social, virtual or imagined, form the textiles in the process of refining and wearing them in the urban space. During my research among various actors in the field of fashion I was fascinated by the interplay of appearance, shininess and the reworking of textiles.

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After outlining the urban fabric of Dakar and the social role of textiles in Senegal, I will focus on the main fabrics and textile traditions by connecting them to the respective places and practices of their processing. By examining the surface of the various textiles, I want to show how the city and its inhabitants contribute to shaping creative designs and, in doing so, have an impact on the urban sphere.

Urban spaces and fashionable display A strong engagement with the urban environment and the widespread practice of métissage, which means in this context the mixing of different styles, materials and techniques, is shared throughout different fashion milieus in Senegal. This practice of ‘sartorial code-mixing’ (Kastner 2019) is historically located in Senegalese urban society and is associated with the signares of precolonial Saint-Louis. Founded in the seventeenth century, the northern trading post soon evolved into an important urban centre and crossroad, which led to the emergence of a distinctive early cosmopolitan culture. Métisse women significantly shaped the economic and social life and became famous for their extravagant dress style that reflected a taste for the cosmopolitan (Jones 2013). Saint-Louis is widely known for another conspicuous practice that dates back to at least the nineteenth century, called the Takkusanu Ndar, which refers to the daily public sartorial display during the early evening hours (Kane Lo 2014), and which continues to be practised here today. In Dakar, fashion also adds to the ‘visual traffic of city streets’ (Grabski 2009a: 220), where the urban imaginary, expressed, among others, in public wall paintings and graffiti, has become a predominant feature of urban life. At the same time, the urban space is a source of inspiration for fashion makers, and trends from Dakar make their way to other regions in Senegal and to other West African countries as well as to the diasporas in the Global North. This means that Senegalese living in Paris, for instance, are dressed according to the latest trends created in Dakar implemented by the hundreds of Senegalese tailors working in the eighteenth arrondissement of Paris. They thereby reverse the conventionally assumed flows of fashion along a North-South axis by focusing on trends from Dakar, while Paris remains on the periphery. Senegal’s capital has a population of roughly 3.8 million with a strong Wolof imprint. Within the last few decades, the capital of former French West Africa has experienced a steady population growth mainly due to migration from rural areas as well as from other West African countries. Wolof as the country’s lingua franca has, according to Fiona McLaughlin (2001), spread as a genuinely urban phenomenon since the 1990s. Senegal’s unique sociopolitical system is characterized by a social contract between the Senegalese government and the Muslim Sufi orders. The vast majority of the inhabitants of Senegal adhere to Sufi Islam, which is organized and practised in brotherhoods. The most influential in both economic and political terms is the Mourid brotherhood, a powerful political player within the country with vast transnational networks that span North American to European and, meanwhile, also Asian cities.2 92

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Dakar is also a fashion capital, as Hudita Mustafa convincingly elaborated in her pioneering work on fashion and female entrepreneurship in Dakar, whereby ‘the economic and cultural conditions of la mode Dakaroise both precede and exceed colonial civilizing projects and post colonial mimicry’ (2006: 179, her italics). Walking through the streets in Dakar, characterized by ‘cosmopolitanism and crisis’ (Mustafa 2006: 180), gives the feeling of being part of a public fashion show. What is different from conventional catwalks is the population’s engagement across gender, age, religion and class as well as the intermingling of a variety of styles and fabrics, ranging from so-called traditional to hip-hop streetwear. Within the young, multifaceted and constantly growing urban society, the pervasive presence of fashion shapes the Senegalese capital, whereby claims of belonging to the urban society of Dakar are especially articulated through fashion as well as language. Here, as in other cities, young people in particular use clothing to position themselves in the urban social landscape (Scheld 2007). This is also displayed by rural migrants who, as well as trying to learn Wolof as soon as possible, often change their sartorial habits to become part of the urban lifeworld.3 Outward appearance generally plays a crucial role, and fashionable clothing is constantly observed and discussed. In this context, walking is a highly conscious and cautious activity due to the need to adhere to a distinctive habitus, which means, especially for women, a certain pace, rhythm and elegance as well as ‘coolness’ for the young. Here, Michel de Certeau’s theory of walking as a creative and interactive process comes to life (1984). Walking in Dakar, a daily and ordinary practice, becomes an act of conspicuous self-presentation, where an appropriate habitus marks or enhances – or disguises – the social position, financial background and various forms of belonging. Thus, rather than representing a stage for personal distraction, the urban catwalk becomes a social necessity, whereby ‘procuring clothing is such a powerful force in Dakar that people strategize, cooperate, manipulate and hurt each other in order to achieve their ends’ (Scheld 2007: 247). All over Senegal various sorts of fabrics function as ‘social skin’ (Turner 1980), depending on the occasion and the wearer; the handwoven cloth (Wolof: seru rabal) is mainly crafted by Mandjak weavers. This textile is known for its apotropaic power: newborns are wrapped in it, brides covered, and the deceased enshrouded (Figure 5.1). This ancient, originally Portuguese, technique was introduced in West Africa via the Cape Verde Islands in the sixteenth century (Diop 2015) and has continually experienced modifications in motives and materials. The emergence of new materials, like lurex in the 1960s, a metallic polyester thread with a glitter effect, and its subsequent import to West Africa, extended the preference for sheen by further possibilities, ‘often in response to a deeply embedded (and, in some places, apotropaic) aesthetic of shininess’ (Picton 1995: 12). Weavers in Senegal added shiny synthetic threads to cotton and have thereby contributed to the fashionable innovation of this important textile that has meanwhile also found its place in fashion and interior design. In fashion, the former model and designer Collé Ardo Sow was the first well-known person to introduce the woven cloth into haute couture, which has now also become an element of street fashion design. Moreover, new weaving designs have been developed by the Dakar-based weaver and 93

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Figure 5.1  Seru rabal, Dakar 2018. © Kristin Kastner. artist Johanna Bramble, and Aissa Dione has established a large and internationally renowned enterprise by advancing the traditional weaving loom in order to obtain considerably broader bands. In this way, these female designers have resumed the longestablished relationship between male Mandjak weavers and their female customers, for whom they used to produce in the customers’ courtyards. Apart from the woven cloth, various forms of damask play a central role in ceremonial life in terms of exchange and display in both Senegal and the diasporas.4 The semi-public spaces of the frequent life cycle and religious ceremonies, with open tents erected in the streets, allow for the display of expensive fabrics, such as the brilliantly coloured damask (bazin riche), and the different forms of locally worked damask (cuup). In the following, I will examine the surfaces of various popular textiles by taking a closer look at different practices of processing and thereby ennobling fabrics: dyeing, embroidering and appliquéing as well as the technique of récup that are applied in three different kinds of workshops: those of dyers, tailors and fashion designers. Ennobling and refurbishing: Dyers’ workshops The social obligation to wear a new outfit for every life cycle or religious ceremony keeps dyers and tailors busy and communicates the actual or alleged affluence of the wearer and her family.

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Figure 5.2  Cuup palman, dye workshop, Dakar 2017. © Kristin Kastner. After its importation from Europe, the cream white damask receives an ‘overlay of tradition’ (Heath 1992: 2) by being processed in line with local aesthetic preferences. Processed damask (cuup) in its various forms of cuup malien,5 cuup VIP, palman or takk communicates different ideas of (fashionable) temporality and belonging (Figure 5.2). A repertoire of ennobling practices leads to an increase in value: the hand-dyed cuup unique reveals an awareness for the local and traditional; the cuup takk is lavishly decorated through a stitch-reserve technique, which may take up to several months and is mainly practised by older women in the countryside; the cuup VIP is painted or handprinted after dyeing with different motives showing a fashionable taste, and is especially appreciated by women belonging to the Halpulaar (Peul) group, while the bronzecoloured, shiny palman represents the epitome of dateless elegance and brilliance after an intensive finishing with wooden clubs.6 If a woman cannot afford the first-class bazin riche imported from Europe, she has to rely on the second or third choice, which comes mainly from China. Another popular strategy during harsh economic times is redyeing: Moi j’ai des clients au marché HLM, j’ai des clients à Paris. Pendant les Magal [pilgrimages], Korité ou Tabaski, il y a beaucoup de fêtes, les cuub marchent. Il y a des gens qui ont des difficultés et qui veulent se procurer un nouveau boubou, ils amènent les anciens boubous pour changer la couleur et ils redeviennent neufs. (Demba Ndiaye, 8 August 2016, Dakar)7 An already worn grand boubou is frequently redyed by local dyers in order to make it look new and hence to fulfil the need for an impeccable and novel appearance. The recent innovations of cuup Facebook and cuup WhatsApp have become highly popular in Dakar 95

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since 2018, as will be elaborated later. This new technique was apparently first invented in Mali, but quickly adopted by dyers in Senegal. In order to obtain this sort of shiny and, compared to conventionally produced cuups, more artificially looking surface, a spray gun is used. In addition to creating distinctive ‘modern’ designs, the new spraying technique considerably shortens the conventional process of dyeing, tying and painting. As already noted, brilliance is a highly desirable quality of a fabric. This aesthetic preference is found in different material contexts well beyond Senegal and all over West Africa, be it the ‘maximum brightness and luminosity’ of sculpture and power objects, the widely observed principle of accumulation that enhances force and efficacy (Rubin 1974), the preference for a polished body surface in the form of a shiny skin that indicates health and personal worth (Rubin 1974; Rowlands 1994), or the significance of brightness and glitter in the Afro-American and Afro-Caribbean diasporas and their distinctive ‘bling-bling’ aesthetics (Thompson 2015). Hence, brightness and its production can be considered as continuous principle both in West Africa and in the diasporas.8 Regarding the Senegalese palman that nowadays can also be purchased considerably cheaper in an industrially fabricated version made in China, dyers agreed that the distinctive brilliance gained in the time-consuming and demanding process of crafted beating would never be the same: En tout cas, la teinture restera traditionnelle, surtout le battage restera traditionnel et ce sera toujours sur le bois qu’on va faire le battage. C’est pour l’éclat. Donc pour nous, un palmaan qui est en éclat, si on fait le linge, on peut le retaper de nouveau, et l’éclat va sortir. C’est ça la différence. Cet éclat-là, ils [the Chinese] ne peuvent pas le créer. Seulement ils peuvent créer des machines, et ces machines vont faire de la teinture. (Demba Ndiaye, 8 August 2016, Dakar)9 Especially when it gets dark, the aesthetic preference for shiny fabrics comes into full effect through the reflective play between artificial lighting and the garments, which creates a festive atmosphere (Figure 5.3). In addition to the distinctive brilliance, the starch of these hand-worked fabrics is highly appreciated, as it not only has a visual and haptic effect but, due to the material’s stiffness and the multi-layering, also provokes a sonic one when the wearers walk by. While maintaining traditional crafting techniques, dyers continuously develop new techniques and styles to meet the demands of a fashion-conscious population that strives for the new by preserving local aesthetic values, like shininess and surface feel as well as the crackling sound of a textile.

Combining and accumulating: Tailor shops The various sorts of hand-dyed cuup and other fabrics like the bazin riche, lace (brodé), or waxprint (wax or pagne) are processed in the thousands of tailor shops in Dakar. Combining fabrics, like imported brodé and bazin of different quality, has become an 96

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Figure 5.3  Marriage ceremony, Dakar 2016. © Kristin Kastner. essential feature, not only for aesthetic but also for economic reasons. Additionally, since the closure of the SOTIBA textile factory in 2001, waxprints imported from China have become a popular and cheaper alternative fabric for everyday use. Lacking a formalized fashion industry with prefabricated off-the-rack clothing, Senegalese men and women rely on their personal fashion makers. Hence, each piece of clothing is unique and adapted to the particular body shape: ‘Il faut mettre en valeur le tissu, il faut essayer le meilleur pour chaque tissu, même si le tissu est rien. C’est le secret de la forme. Il faut créer le moulage pour chaque corps’ (Seydou Ba, 28 March 2019, Paris).10 Fashion makers aim to exploit each textile and each body to generate beauty and shininess (Wolof: melax). Generally, styles and models are a matter of negotiation between the tailor and the client. The models were, until recently, often chosen from one of the local popular fashion magazines – which can also be purchased in the eighteenth Parisian arrondissement – like Lifa, Dakar Fashion or Diaspora. However, the importance of these magazines is currently on the wane as they are being replaced more and more by photographs on the internet, and using platforms such as Facebook and Instagram to choose a new model has become common. Tailors usually contend that it is due to their own creativity rather than their clientele’s ideas and suggestions that new clothes come into a fashionable being. Tout est possible, everything is possible, is a frequent saying among Dakar’s tailors. They emphasize the creative element of their trade over the technical aspects, and continually strive 97

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to enhance their own creative work, which is also explained as a service to God who endowed them with the gift of creativity. The tailors’ shops are popular social spaces with a continual coming and going, with peak times during the preparation of important religious events like Korité to celebrate the end of the fasting month of Ramadan (cid al-fitr), and Tabaski, the Muslim sacrifice feast (cid al-adha). During the preparatory phase, many tailors work until the early morning hours, often with their demanding clients waiting beside the sewing machine in order to monitor the manufacturing process. The tailors’ creativity, accompanied by their intense physical involvement, is stimulated by various factors. On the one hand, Dakar’s textile markets like the famous HLM market are central places for introducing and redistributing new fabrics coming mostly from Europe and Asia. On the other hand, it is each woman’s ambition to be unique and to stand out from her female rivals and (potential) co-wives that spurs on the tailors’ creative skills. In my conversations, many tailors and their clients indicated that over time fashionable outfits have become even more important in terms of social mobility and their business card. Women from other West African countries come to Dakar to participate in the latest trends and styles. The main clientele are married women, mostly voluminous, heavily perfumed and adorned dirriankhés.11 This term became popular in the 1980s in times of radical socioeconomic changes and structural adjustment programmes. In many cases, men were no longer able to provide for the domestic home and, gradually, women began to expand into formerly male professional domains to support their families (Mustafa 1998). As self-employed entrepreneurs, they started to operate mainly in the fashion sector and the cloth trade and advertised their gains and new status in the self-designed clothes they wore.12 In contemporary Dakar, the dirriankhé is a prominent figure and epitomizes the prevalent ideal of feminine beauty and elegance. The historian Aissatu Kane Lo (2014) convincingly argues for a direct link between the historical figure of the signare and the contemporary dirriankhé: she conceives the dirriankhé as the signare’s successor, especially in terms of sartorial display and economic potency. Mainly so-called traditional garments are crafted in the tailors’ ateliers, such as the grand boubou, which is made mostly out of different sorts of cuup, and the signareinspired long dress, the ndoket, the two-piece outfits taille mame and taille basse, which became popular in the 1920s and is classified as tradi-moderne. The choice and combination of fabrics and style challenge a range of dichotomies that are conventionally used to categorize fashion from the West and the ‘rest’, like local and global, original and copy, or traditional and modern that is refuted by the term ‘tradi-moderne’. The tailors and fashion designers alike also adapt so-called traditional garments to meet the realities of urban life. In particular, the grand boubou, which epitomizes a certain status and opulence, is currently subject to fashionable adaptations to meet the demands of today’s middle class, as, for example, in the collection ‘boubou en itinerance’ by the acclaimed fashion designer Lahad Gueye (Figure 5.4). This means, for instance, that the grand boubou, whose fabrication usually requires at least six metres of cloth, has become 98

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Figure 5.4  ALGUEYE, Collection ‘boubou en itinerance’, Dakar 2019. © Lahad Gueye; photo: Daouda Timera; Model: Alima Diop.

considerably smaller in volume to enable the wearer to move more freely. Moreover, this fashionable reduction in fabric also results in a welcome reduction in price. Embroidery (damina) represents the most popular appliquéing technique for both women’s and men’s clothing. The informal apprenticeship to master the various stitches and corresponding sewing machines – 217, petit fil, gros fil, Pakistani – may take up to several years. While the embroidered motives of grand boubous for men are inspired by Islamic ornamentation and limited to the neck décolletage, embroidered garments for women are considerably more exuberant and colourful and can cover the complete garment, to the point that the fabric can sometimes hardly bear the additional weight of thread. Furthermore, the predilection for decorative, shiny elements has been augmented thanks to new materials, like sequins and strass imported from Asia. This has even generated a new professional niche within the tailoring milieu, especially for girls and young women: the perleuse, whose work consists in appliquéing the small pieces onto already embroidered fabrics like the bazin riche. Collecting and recomposing: Fashion designers’ workshops Besides very famous high-end fashion designers like Oumou Sy or the successful designer and businesswoman Adama Paris, numerous other designers contribute to the diversification of fashion by creating conceptual urban fashion. The street fashion 99

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designers, who often worked as tailors before and started mainly in the late 1990s to nourish the local fashion scene, share the impulse to create something extraordinary and unique. Like the designers themselves, their clientele form part of the city’s lively art scene, and the milieus of fashion, design, graffiti, dance and music are intimately connected. Some designers follow the artistic concept of récup by using second-hand clothes as raw materials for their creations. The so-called fegg ak jay (‘shake and sell’) are dyed, cut in parts and combined with other local fabrics, thereby being granted a second life. The artistic principle and practice of récupération has been applied in Dakar since at least the 1980s. Joanna Grabski argues that by remaking the salvaged material, artists question and reverse the location of power (Grabski 2009b). Since these materials mostly originate elsewhere, ‘their remaking involves the process of transforming objects with international social biographies into locally meaningful propositions’ (Grabski 2009b: 14). In addition to being an urban strategy, récup allows for creative production despite relatively scarce means, which may even encourage creative work. Although the notions of ‘up-cycling’ or ‘slow fashion’, which have become quite popular in the Global North, are not common, most of the works would be in line with current discourses on sustainability. Many designers are critical of the widespread use of imported fabrics like the ‘typical’ African waxprints or the widely valued bazin riche (damask) as the preferred fabric in tailors’ shops. Hence, this generation of younger designers working locally tend to rely on denim as the basis for their creations, since it is considered both universal and urban and thus a sign of urban lifestyle. The denim is often combined with local fabrics like the seru rabal (woven cloth) or techniques like batik dyeing, that is often ‘urbanized’, thus creating and presenting new patterns in new contexts: l’urbain, c’est nice, c’est fashion, is a common statement, whereupon English terms are frequently used by the younger generation to indicate their urban connectedness. The shift towards the local enunciates the linking of global streetwear to local street culture. In this context, hip-hop and rap have a significant stake in the local (life)style, and fashion and music clearly influence each other. While until the 1990s, it was mainly US rap and hip-hop culture that shaped the young Dakarois lifestyle, it is nowadays the vernacular hip-hop scene, clearly expressed in the labelling Senerap and Hip Hop Galsen. Members of the art scene have been key actors in central sociopolitical movements in Senegal’s recent history, starting with the Set Setal movement in 1989, which was followed by others, like Sopi in 2000 and Y’en a Marre in 2011.13 During the period of Set Setal, the climate of political disenchantment gave rise to an ‘aesthetic revolution of sorts, carried out in the streets and on the walls of Dakar’ and to the configuration of a self-conscious urban identity (McLaughlin 2001: 154). By painting their neighbourhood, using graffiti and (re)naming streets after local football players and marabouts, the inhabitants appropriated their city and repositioned it way beyond traditionalism as well as nationalism (Diouf 2013: 56–7).14 Fashion designers, strongly inspired by the urban environment and by local hip-hop culture often connected to sociopolitical movements, create street styles that they present and promote in the streets. The urban infrastructure, like markets or the emblematic 100

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colourful minibus (car rapide), is frequently chosen as a background and stage for presentation. The Wolof names of the various fashion labels, such as the pioneer Sigil (‘Raise your head’), Bull doff (‘Don’t be silly’, which acts along the intersections between fashion, music and performance), Yokkaat (‘to continuously add and augment’, with reference to the patchwork style of the Baye Fall, a subgroup of the Mourid brotherhood), Tukki Mode (‘Travelling fashion’) or Bu ken lab (‘Nobody should drown’, with reference to the dangers of sea migration) or Niawal (‘Sew!’) and the conscious choice of materials and techniques refer to a self-conscious generation of young Afropolitans (Figure 5.5.). To articulate and communicate their fashionable positions, nearly all of them rely on the intensive use of social media. As for tailors and their clients, Facebook and Instagram have become alternatives to conventional fashion media such as print-magazines or print-photography, which are unaffordable for most of these designers. Hence, in addition to the physical urban space, the virtual space of social media has become a further important realm for presentation and inspiration. Models and new collections are spread and stories told on these platforms. Instead of two separate spaces, they increasingly overlap and animate the imaginations of their users – also of those who may not have the means for physical travel. Innovative names such as cuup Facebook and cuup WhatsApp indicate the intermingling of the different spheres. In their creations, these fashion designers express a (pan-)African and decolonial perspective, anchored within street culture. Simultaneously, they observe western trends in styling, fashion

Figure 5.5  NIAWAL, Collection ‘nawett’, jacket with seru rabal, Dakar 2020. © Niawal; photo: Daouda Timera; Model: Samira Fall.

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Figure 5.6  BU KEN LAB, prototype ‘boubou bkl’, denim, Dakar 2020. © Bu ken lab. and music, which do not deter them from working with so-called traditional styles, like a grand boubou made of récup-batik or denim as, for instance, by the street fashion label Bu ken lab (Figure 5.6). It is through this mix of materials, styles and genres that designers relate to global belonging and local situatedness at the same time. This ethos is epitomized in the creations by the internationally rising fashion design star Selly Raby Kane.15 Known for her often seemingly futuristic creations, she combines local cuup and shiny palman with elements from waxprints and applies embroidery in new contexts. For instance, she stitches the portrait of Dakarois artists, like the avant-garde film-maker Djibril Diop Mambéty, on the back of a jacket, which is part of the collection ‘Rue Jules Ferry 17’ (referring to the address of the famous and now destroyed court atelier of the artist Issa Samb alias Joe Ouakam; see Figure 10.3 in the contribution by Picarelli in this volume). Apart from historic and contemporary places, mythological or formative figures like the artists Mambéty and Samb, Kane also cites iconic symbols that shape the visual experience of everyday life in Dakar, such as, among others, the symbol of the eye, which protects every car rapide when weaving its way through the challenging city traffic, and distinctive acronyms that mark the cityscape. What is more, the socioreligious group of the Baye Fall and their distinctive dress style inspire fashion designers like Kane, and the patchwork-pattern njaxas has, in the meantime, become widely adopted as a fashionable fabric among the population.16 Within the last few decades, this subgroup of the Mourid brotherhood has considerably gained in number and visibility, especially in the cities. Both artists and Baye Fall – and often artists are 102

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themselves declared Baye Fall – continue to inspire the younger generation of designers, who pay homage to them in their creations. Deepening surfaces The various processing techniques result in an increase in value. This involves flows on various levels, since the biography of the fabrics is characterized by high mobility. Most of them are imported from Europe or Asia, then worked according to vernacular aesthetic criteria and afterwards possibly re-imported to meet the needs of the diasporas in Europe, the United States or Asia, which has been facilitated by new forms of flexible informal transportation systems that work quicker and cheaper compared to internationally operating transportation companies. Apart from transcontinental movements, the processed textiles circulate not only physically within the country when they are worn and merchandized but also on a societal level, when they are given as presents during ceremonies. When focusing on the surface of fabrics like the urbanized cuup, cuup Facebook or cuup WhatsApp, updates and modifications of traditional dyeing techniques comply with local aesthetics while makers and wearers participate in what is considered modern and fashionable. A similar feature can be observed among tailormade creations: through combining, mixing and adorning, materials from different parts of the world are worked into fashionable models that are labelled traditional or tradi-moderne. As has been shown, fashion designers draw on these practices and modify them in the urban context. The raw material of the designs is bound to the city, both substantially and conceptually: the materiality of Dakar as part of the infrastructure shapes the creations; at the same time, the urban imaginary is a source of inspiration and provides fashion makers and their clientele with a stage for presentation. Iconic cosmopolitan figures like the signares of ancient Saint-Louis and the contemporary dirriankhés of Dakar have considerably shaped the urban centres and continue to do so through their striking presence in the public space. As has become clear, surface is not superficial, and textile surfaces reveal a considerable depth when aesthetic preferences are applied to the fabrics, thus shifting attention to the depth-ontology of textile surfaces in Senegalese fashion. Through the performative act of wearing, these fabrics are intrinsically linked to the wearer’s social position, which they may also enhance or disguise. The ‘real person’, however, is not, as proclaimed by Miller, on the surface (2005: 3), but, rather, a matter of an ambivalent and, despite the shiny colourfulness, a serious interplay of representation, status and reality. The urban elegance, which has been practised since precolonial times, is hereby pursued in the steady and innovative refining and accumulating of textile surfaces as well as the widespread preference for brilliance. Notes 1. This contribution is based on ethnographic fieldwork in Dakar, Saint-Louis and Paris during a period of nine months between 2016 and 2019. The main methods draw on 103

Fashioning the Afropolis participant observation, informal conversations and interviews with various experts and actors in the field of fashion. A material-centred approach, where textiles and photographs played a central role, proved to be fruitful. Fieldwork was made possible through a postdoc scholarship provided by the DAAD in 2016 and a research fellowship within the DFGproject ‘Fashion and Styles in African Cities’ between 2018 and 2020. 2. For a highly insightful contribution to Mouride transnational economy, see Diouf (2000); for the relation between politics and religion in Senegal, see the various contributions in Diouf (2013). 3. An exception are marabouts who have migrated to Dakar from the countryside and who, according to Amber Gemmeke, maintain a rural dress habitus by wearing simple unicoloured cotton grand boubous, in contrast to vibrant colours and fashionable clothing. Compared to other migrants, they speak only poor Wolof or no Wolof at all, and the countryside is imagined as a source of power and identity (Gemmeke 2012: 93) and hence, opposed to the city. 4. For the importance of fabrics and especially the exchange of fabrics in Senegalese society and the diaspora, see Buggenhagen (2011, 2012a, b) and Kirby (2013, 2014). 5. The name ‘cuup malien’ refers to its Malian origin. Since the 1980s when many Malians came to Senegal to earn a living, they introduced different dyeing techniques that were quickly adopted in Dakar and became a new source of income, especially for women (personal communication with Demba Ndiaye, 8 August 2016, Dakar). Nowadays in Dakar, the denomination ‘cuup malien’ refers to a quality feature rather than to the location of creation, even though those who exercise the hard work of finishing the cloth with wooden clubs are still mostly migrant men from Mali. 6. For more details on cuup production, see Rabine (2002: 47–60); for the role of damask in ceremonial life, see Kirby (2013, 2014). 7. ‘I have clients at the HLM market [biggest cloth market in Dakar], I have clients in Paris. During the various pilgrimages, Korité or Tabaski, there are many ceremonies, the cuub sell well. There are people in [financial] difficulties that want to purchase a new boubou, so they bring their old boubous in order to change the colour and they become new again’ (translation by the author). 8. For the entangled history of the production of shiny textiles through indigo-dyeing and beating in Kano, see Philip (2006). 9. ‘In any case, dyeing will remain traditional, above all the tapping, which will always be done with wooden clubs. That is because of the brilliance. So for us, when you wash a paalman that is shiny and tap it again, the brilliance will come back. That is the difference. This very brilliance cannot be created by them [the Chinese]. They only can create machines and these machines will do the [industrial] dyeing’ (translation by the author). 10. ‘You have to accentuate the fabric, you have to try the best for every single fabric, even when the fabric is not good at all. That is the secret of the form. You have to create the mould for each body’ (translation by the author). 11. For the origin of the term, see Mustafa (2006: 195) and Buggenhagen (2012a: 181). 12. For the transformations in the linkages between femininity, masculinity, sexuality and changing gender and sexual roles, especially for the younger – unmarried – generation in the 1980s, see Biaya (2001). 13. For the movement Y’en a marre, see and listen to the podcast by Afrotopique (2020) with one of the central founders of the movement, Fadel Barro.

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Born to Shine 14. For the Set Setal movement and the various forms of urban artistic expression, see especially Diouf and Fredericks (2013); for Y’en a marre and the arts, see the special issue edited by Krueger Enz and Bryson (2014). 15. For Selly Raby Kane, see the contribution by Enrica Picarelli in this book. 16. For njaxas among different fashion milieus in Dakar, see Kastner (2019).

References Afrotopiques (2020), ‘Fadel Barro, Y′en a marre’, Podcast. Available online: https://www​.imagotv​ .fr​/podcasts​/afrotopiques​/13 (accessed 29 February 2020). Biaya, T. K. (2001), ‘Les plaisirs de la ville: Masculinité, sexualité et féminité à Dakar (1997– 2000)’, African Studies Review, 44 (2): 71–85. Buggenhagen, B. (2011), ‘Are Births just ‘Women’s Business’? Gift Exchange, Value, and Global Volatility in Muslim Senegal’, American Ethnologist, 38 (4): 714–32. Buggenhagen, B. (2012a), Muslim Families in Global Senegal: Money Takes Care of Shame, Bloomington: Indiana University Press. Buggenhagen, B. (2012b), ‘Fashioning Piety: Women’s Dress, Money, and Faith among Senegalese Muslims in New York City’, City & Society, 24 (1): 84–104. de Certeau, M. (1984), The Practice of Everyday Life, Berkeley: University of California Press. Diop, M. (2015), Pagnes . . . Panos . . . Les étoffes magnétiques des Manjak – Guinée Bissau – Cap Vert – Sénégal, Dakar: La Rochette Dakar. Diouf, M. (2000), ‘The Senegalese Murid Trade Diaspora and the Making of a Vernacular Cosmopolitanism’, Public Culture, 12 (3): 679–702. Diouf, M., ed. (2013), Tolerance, Democracy, and Sufis in Senegal, New York: Columbia University Press. Diouf, M. and R. Fredericks, eds (2013), Les arts de la citoyenneté au Sénégal, Paris: Karthala. Gemmeke, A. (2012), ‘Women and Magic in Dakar’, in H. P. Hahn and K. Kastner (eds), Urban Life-Worlds in Motion: African Perspectives, 73–99, Bielefeld: transcript. Grabski, J. (2009a), ‘Making Fashion in the City: A Case Study of Tailors and Designers in Dakar, Senegal’, Fashion Theory, 13 (2): 215–42. Grabski, J. (2009b), ‘Urban Claims and Visual Sources in the Making of Dakar’s Art World City’, Art Journal, 68 (1): 6–23. Heath, D. (1992), ‘Fashion, Anti-Fashion, and Heteroglossia in Urban Senegal’, American Ethnologist, 19 (1): 19–33. Jones, H. (2013), The métis of Senegal: Urban Life and Politics in French West Africa, Bloomington: Indiana University Press. Kane Lo, A. (2014): De la Signare à la Diriyanké sénégalaise: Trajectoires féminines et visions partagées, Dakar: Harmattan – Sénégal. Kastner, K. (2019), ‘Fashioning Dakar’s Urban Society: Sartorial Code-mixing in Senegal’, Sociologus, 69 (2): 167–88. Kirby, K. (2013), ‘Bazin riche in Dakar, Senegal: Altered Inception, Use, and Wear’, in K. Tranberg Hansen and D. Madison (eds), African Dress: Fashion, Agency, Performance, 63–76, London: Bloomsbury. Kirby, K. (2014), ‘Clothing, Kinship, and Representation: Transnational Wardrobes in Michigan’s African Diaspora Communities’, PhD diss., University of Michigan, Ann Arbor. Krueger Enz, M. and D. Bryson, eds (2014), ‘Special Issue: Fed Up: Creating a New Type of Senegal through the Arts’, African Studies Quarterly, 14 (3): 1–12.

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Fashioning the Afropolis McLaughlin, F. (2001), ‘Dakar Wolof and the Configuration of an Urban Identity’, Journal of African Cultural Studies, 14 (2): 153–72. Miller, D. (1994), ‘Style and Ontology’, in J. Friedman (ed.), Consumption and Identity, 71–96, Chur: Harwood. Miller, D. (2005), ‘Introduction’, in S. Küchler and D. Miller (eds), Clothing as Material Culture, 1–19, Oxford: Berg. Mustafa, H. N. (1998), ‘Practicing Beauty: Crisis, Value and the Challenge of Self-Mastery in Dakar, 1970–1994’, PhD diss., Harvard University, Cambridge. Mustafa, H. N. (2006), ‘La Mode Dakaroise: Elegance, Transnationalism and an African Fashion Capital’, in C. Breward and D. Gilbert (eds), Fashion’s World Cities, 177–99, Oxford: Berg. Philip, S. (2006), ‘Big is Sometimes Best: The Sokoto Caliphate and Economic Advantages of Size in the Textile Industry’, African Economic History, 34 (1): 5–21. Picton, J., ed. (1995), The Art of African Textiles: Technology, Tradition and Lurex, London: Barbican Art Gallery. Rabine, L. (2002), The Global Circulation of African Fashion, Oxford: Berg. Rowlands, M. (1994), ‘The Material Culture of Success: Ideals and Life Cycles in Cameroon’, in J. Friedman (ed.), Consumption and Identity, 147–66, Chur: Harwood. Rubin, A. (1974), African Accumulative Sculpture: Power and Display, New York: The Pace Gallery. Scheld, S. (2007), ‘Youth Cosmopolitanism: Clothing, the City and Globalization in Dakar, Senegal’, City & Society, 19 (2): 232–53. Thompson, K. A. (2015), Shine: The Visual Economy of Light in African Diasporic Aesthetic Practice, Durham and London: Duke University Press. Turner, T. S. (1980), ‘The Social Skin’, in J. Cherfas and R. Lewin (eds), Not Work Alone: A CrossCultural View of Activities Superfluous to Survival, 112–40, London: Temple Smith.

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CHAPTER 6 LOOKING EAST BOBARABA VOGUE AND THE SINONIZATION OF FASHION AND BEAUTY IN DOUALA Basile Ndjio

Fashion studies have pointed out the pivotal role played by members of the Chinese diaspora in the diffusion of ‘Chinese’ fashion and styles at a global level (Steele 1999; Ling and Segre-Reinach 2018). This is the case with some African-based Chinese fashion designers and businesspeople who have become key actors in the dissemination of products from the booming Chinese beauty and fashion industry in a number of metropolises of Central and West Africa. Indeed, since the early 2000s, these Africabased Chinese fashion entrepreneurs have been travelling back and forth between Africa and Southern China, designing or branding textiles or clothes. These ‘Chinese’ fashion items are subsequently exported to Africa to supply the growing local fashion markets (von Pezold 2019). The city of Douala in Cameroon exemplifies the extent to which Chinese material and consumer culture has transformed fashion practices and representation in contemporary African cities. Over the past two decades, the fashion landscape of this African urban space of over four million inhabitants has witnessed an unprecedented rise in the importance of Chinese-inspired fashion and beauty culture that now competes with the formerly predominant western mode of self-stylization. Historically Chinese economic migration to the fluvial city of Douala can be traced back to the early 1970s when the People’s Republic of China established diplomatic relations with the Cameroon government. Initially, Chinese migrants were less visible because they formed a small and secluded community of about a thousand people who had little contact with the local population. Many of them came to Cameroon under the aegis of Sino-Cameroonian cooperation and were involved in sectors such as healthcare and construction projects, while a small number of them operated in the catering service. Yet, the development of transnational Chinese business interest groups in Douala coincided with Chinese business migration towards Cameroon in the late 1990s and early 2000s. Over the past decade, this has prompted an influx of Chinese migrants to Cameroon’s economic capital and main city. Though there are no reliable official figures regarding the number of Chinese nationals residing in Douala, unofficial sources estimate this number to be between 20,000 and 30,000 (Konings 2011; Ndjio 2009, 2014). A large number of business and residential settings where many Chinese migrants live and work in Douala were established between 1998 and 2001 when the first Chinese migrants began to open their shops and stores in the commercial district of

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Akwa, thus prompting a vitality in building and property development in a short span of time. The evolution in Chinese business tenure came after 2005 when some Chinese businesspeople, encouraged by the expanding economic opportunities offered by the city, began to purchase (sometimes at exorbitant prices) both private and state land on which they erected impressive buildings inspired by Chinese building models (Ndjio 2017). Since then, these Chinese commercial spaces, which are mostly located in the centre of Douala, have been providing a platform for local Chinese business. Among mainstream scholars on China-Africa relations, there is a general tendency to focus on mineral resources, agriculture, business trade, infrastructure projects, and military and medical cooperation (Alden 2005; Kaplinsky, McCormick and Morris 2007). Cultural aspects of these connections, as for instance beauty and fashion, are rarely discussed. This chapter offers a new perspective on Chinese-inspired fashion and style issues in the city of Douala, thus bypassing western-centric research foci on the interplay of ‘African’ and ‘western’ fashion designs and dress practices. In more general terms, the chapter deals with new aesthetic visions of the body and fashion in Douala: what Sarah Nutall has referred to as the ‘stylization of self ’ which, according to her, is illustrative of how the global consumer culture is expressing itself in urban African settings (Nutall 2004: 430–52). More precisely, the chapter analyses the great change that has occurred since the early 2000s in the moral economy of beauty, elegance and fashion in Douala. This has been prompted by the growth in Chinese fashionscapes1 and by what I refer to as the sinonization of contemporary fashion cultures in parts of Africa. I use this new concept (sinonization) to give meaning to the increasing flows of Chinese-manufactured fashion and cosmetic products towards Africa at large.2 I also use it to highlight the way in which some young women from Douala try to clothe or reshape their bodies with products from the Chinese beauty and fashion industry. An example of this sinonization of contemporary African consumer culture is the popularization of a fashion and beauty trend which is known in Douala as bobaraba. However, the influence of China reverberates not only on dress styles or different types of fabrics used by many inhabitants of Douala but also on their bodies. The chapter’s main argument is that the current stylization of the bodies of young women from Douala cannot be fully understood without reference to this sinonization process. This is because since the early 2000s, local women have increasingly refashioned their bodies with Chinese material and various beauty and cosmetic products. In addition, it is thanks to cheap fashionable clothing and sartorial material imported from China that low-income earners – women as well as men now – clothe their bodies or give them a new form. As far as the methodology is concerned, the chapter is based on ethnographic research conducted over the past five years in the city of Douala, which hosts one of the largest Chinese business communities in Central Africa. Much of the fieldwork was conducted in the various local commercial avenues, business centres and popular markets. The field investigation focused particularly on Cité Chinoise (Chinese City), Cité Commerciale Chinoise (Chinese Commercial City), and Centre Commercial Chinois (Chinese Commercial Centre) of Douala. Most of the Chinese fashionscapes mentioned 108

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earlier are located in these Chinese commercial and business enclaves. These are special transnational economic and commercial spaces where imported Chinese beauty and fashion items are designed, manufactured or traded by local Chinese tailors, designers and merchants and their native partners – all are increasingly playing a pivotal role in the making of the African beauty and fashion future.3

Chinese Bobaraba and the aesthetic of roundness What Filip de Boeck has conceptualized as ‘bodybuilding’ (de Boeck and Plissart 2004; de Boeck 2011) provides an interesting starting point for this discussion of fashion in the city of Douala. The main argument that informs this section is that what is generally referred to as fashion is unconceivable without the pervasive cultural practices of body transformation or decoration in which many residents of Douala are involved. This is because in this urban space, fashion is generally represented as a form of body decoration or modification; it is often perceived as an expression of the various ways the body is or can be shaped, framed, designed or (re)modelled. In other words, in the city of Douala fashion is about dressing up and making up or adorning the body. It is especially about a body whose shape, silhouette and skin can be aesthetically transformed or remodelled through different techniques of bodybuilding.4 The expression tunage du corps (revamping of the body) is often used in the urban popular language to give meaning to a work or performative action on the body. This includes the various practices that aim to beautify women’s bodies and to give them a certain shape and form, notably a curvy form, which is an obsession with many young women of Douala. The aesthetic ‘bodybuilding’ as well as the quest of many Doualais women for a curved body is the result of a prevalent culture of roundness that generally associates rotund bodies with good health, well-being and wealth, and even with high social status. This dominant local ideology especially promotes roundness as the prime symbol of a woman’s beauty and attractiveness. Indeed, in many parts of contemporary Central Africa, for many local women being attractive or good-looking means having a forme (corpulence), as it is often said. The contrast – taille fine – is seen by many as the epitome of unattractiveness, even ugliness. This idealization of women with a generous shape has prompted the emergence of a fashion and beauty movement commonly known across West and Central Africa as bobaraba.5 Historically, the term ‘bobaraba’, which derives from the Malinke language,6 initially made reference to women’s prominent buttocks. But, over time, the concept has become more inclusive in its meaning to the point that it now refers to the different beauty commodities, sartorial accessories and cosmetic products imported from China with which many local women try to yellow their black skins, to boost their posteriors or to increase the size of their breasts. Though the bobaraba phenomenon first emerged in Abidjan around 2008 and initially embodied the Malinke’s ideals of beauty and appealing body shape, it has gradually become a transnational phenomenon that now determines the local perception of fashion and beauty in a number of places in West and Central Africa. This includes the 109

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city of Douala where the term ‘bobaraba’ has been appropriated by the trendy Doualais youth who increasingly use it to represent a certain form of beauty and fashion. This new term has progressively supplanted the former traditional concepts of beauty and attractiveness. This local appropriation is the result of the growing influence of Ivorian urban culture on the urban life in Cameroon. This impact resonates, for example, in music, cinema and fashion. In other respects, in the city of Douala, people increasingly associate the term bobaraba with a certain type of female garment which magnifies the embonpoint of a woman’s posterior or dramatizes the size of her breasts. The bobaraba vogue has induced the adoption of specific dress styles by many young trendy Doualais women. These clothing styles are now commonly referred to as bobaraba style (style bobaraba) or bobaraba fashion (mode bobaraba). There are also bobaraba clothes, namely tight-fitting shirts and robes that now figure among the much sought-after women’s clothes. Though some local tailors have begun to produce bobaraba clothes as well, most of the women’s garments that constitute the so-called bobaraba fashion or style are, however, designed or manufactured in China and shipped to Central and West Africa where they are sold at the various local markets. In many respects, the bobaraba vogue can be understood, above all, as a fashion and beauty trend that exemplifies the transnational flows and circulation of ideas, practices and imaginations about fashion and style between China and a number of cities in West and Central Africa. More importantly, this fashion phenomenon underscores both the interconnections and mutual influence between the thriving Chinese fashion culture and industry, on the one hand, and African fashion ideals and representation, on the other. Indeed, the Chinese-manufactured dress styles for West and Central African clientele are generally designed in line with the local bobaraba ideals of beauty and elegance. These include traditional Chinese dresses that are often Africanized or given a bobaraba form when they are made for African markets. Even the imported or locally produced mannequins on which these Chinese-manufactured outfits are displayed are sometimes modified so as to suit the local ideals of women’s beauty or to conform to the culturally idealized curvy female body. Conversely, some of the very popular bobaraba dress styles which celebrate, above all, women’s tight-fitting attire are often inspired by Chinese ethnic dresses such as the famous traditional Chinese women’s dress commonly referred to as Cheongsam (also known as Qipao in Mandarin). The appropriation by the bobaraba style of this popular high-necked and close-fitting dress (Clark 2000) partly explains why bobaraba garments differ, for instance from the traditional large kabba, with which some Cameroonian women conceal their large measurements. In other respects, the bobaraba vogue embodies a novel form of aesthetization of the body by some young women from Douala. This body is generally revamped by means of Chinese-made beauty and fashion accessories, and cosmetic products with which many local women attempt to recreate an old African beauty and fashion tradition. Yet, unlike the previous forms of bobaraba that were mostly connected to western modernity, the present-day bobaraba trend is increasingly linked to the growing fascination of a number of local women with products from the Chinese 110

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beauty and fashion culture. Some of these Chinese-manufactured products are ordered directly from well-known online websites such as Ali Baba, Wish and Amazon. However, a large number of these bobaraba products are exported from China through well-organized commercial and business networks controlled by Cameroon-based Chinese fashion and cosmetic traders, and their native associates. Over time, Chinese beauty and cosmetic articles have become so prevalent that in any major city of Cameroon, it is common to see these products being sold by local retailers or ostentatiously displayed on the shelves of one of the many Chinese shops and drugstores. It is in these Chinese fashionscapes that Chinese-manufactured sartorial goods and cosmetic products flow from Chinese wholesalers or retailers towards their increasing local African clientele. One of the main reasons why many local women prefer these Chinese products to the local ones is that they are relatively cheap and thus more affordable than locally manufactured western-imported equivalents. Indeed, while customers have to pay between fifteen and forty US dollars to get a tube or a small bottle of a homemade bobaraba cream, the price of a similar Chinese-imported product rarely exceeds ten US dollars. Moreover, unprivileged or low-middle-class Doualais women are attracted by the cheap artificial bobaraba accessories because they see them as an alternative to buttock or breast implants that are not accessible to most of them. In the city of Douala, the local sex workers are among the women who heavily invest their energy, money and time in body modification to enhance their appearance according to bobaraba ideals of beauty. These young sex workers are often depicted by the general public as chemists (chemistes) or transformers (transformatrices), because of the propensity of many to alter their physical appearance or to change their skin colour like chameleons. Symptomatic of this body manipulation is the adoption by many local sex workers of what is now commonly characterized in the local prostitution milieu as a look chinois (lit. Chinese look).7 Generally speaking, this Chinese appearance or look involves a woman arranging her hair or body in such a way that she looks Chinese. The practice also implies the wearing of imported Chinese coloured wigs, which are increasingly popular with the local women. Another characteristic of the look chinois involves the now common practice of what Cameroonians call jaunissement de la peau. This means bleaching the skin with some aggressive chemical products to the point of turning it almost yellow. In the local urban popular parlance, the yellowing process of the skin is generally called a style peau de banana or peau de papaye – that is a banana or papaya skin-style. Breaking with the old techniques of décapage de la peau that formerly aimed, above all, at whitening the Black woman’s complete body (Fanon [1952] 1967), this novel form of body transformation aspires, rather, to give a now culturally idealized colourfast yellow colour to black skin. Moreover, for many local sex workers who are obsessed with the yellowing of skin, this practice expresses a strong desire to inscribe their bodies in a global culture of fashion and elegance. This was the case of Mimi la Belle (pseudonym), a twenty-two-year-old sex worker who generally solicited clients in one of the luxurious cafés or gambling rooms of Akwa in the commercial centre of Douala. She related the 111

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yellowing of her skin to what she referred to as a nouvelle tendance (lit. new trend = global fashion). This body modification can or may be interpreted as expressing a desire by these young Doualais women to exoticize their black bodies. By exoticization, I mean here a complex operation by which an African body is aesthetically and artistically remade or refashioned to the point of taking on the form of a foreign and exotic body. Overall, this term accounts for the various techniques enabling, for example, some fashion-obsessed local women to turn their bodies into the much sought-after exotic bodies of Doualabased young Chinese sex worker migrants (locally referred to as Shanghai beauties) who embody the sexual fantasies of many local men (Ndjio 2009). To sum up, the current bobaraba phenomenon clearly indicates that African ideas and ideals of fashion and beauty greatly influence the various Chinese fashion and beauty products manufactured for African clientele and markets. This is because these items are increasingly produced or designed in line with the idealized African aesthetic of curviness.

When African fashion and elegance look East During the 2012–13 academic year, I was teaching an undergraduate course on urban culture in contemporary Africa to third-year students from the University of Douala, Cameroon. In one of the sessions, I introduced a discussion on Sino-African relations. My intention was to record the students’ own perception of the growing presence of Chinese fashion traders and retailers in the city of Douala. One female student made this memorable comment that would later prompt my research interest in Chinese fashion and consumerist culture in Central and West Africa: ‘I do not think that we should just dismiss these Chinese nationals as invaders. As far as I am concerned, I think that their contribution to African development is highly positive, because it is thanks to the Chinese that African women are now belles et coquettes.’ The student’s intervention was applauded by many of her fellow students who also supported the idea that local Chinese traders who were involved in fashion merchandizing and retailing were making a positive change in the lives of many African women. My students’ comments about Chinese attire and fashion commodities highlight the fact that in a number of cities of Central and West Africa, a woman’s body has become a significant indication of the growing influence of Chinese fashion products and cosmetic accessories on contemporary African fashion culture. Their comments also show that low-priced Chinese beauty and fashion items have contributed towards bringing glamour and chic to the world of the urban poor who had long been excluded from access to the global economy of beauty and fashion. Moreover, they recall the fact that the right to fashion and elegance is no longer an exclusive privilege of the African middle- and upper-middle classes, as used to be the case. This is because Chinese beauty and fashion products now enable many socially and economically disenfranchised Africans to partake in the global consumption of fashion as well. They also help them 112

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achieve their dreams of being well dressed and wearing fashionable clothes. For example, Chinese fancy prints (Picton 1995: 24) sold at cheaper prices at some local markets in West Africa allow many working-class women to appear well dressed as well, even when their cash-strapped husbands or partners cannot afford to offer them the very expensive western-imported textile locally called mon mari est capable (my husband is wealthy) (Sylvanus 2013; Sylvanus and Axelsson 2010). While cheap imported or manufactured Chinese garments have become an everyday wear for a good number of underprivileged city dwellers of Douala, fashionable and designer Chinese clothes tend to be worn by many local upper- and middle-class women and men who have made them conventional dress for the high society, namely the nouveaux riches. They usually wear them at special events or on formal occasions such as weddings, birthday celebrations, parties, beauty pageants, funerals and official ceremonies, which generally offer people an opportunity to dramatize their importance through fashionable and stylish dress. In their bid to distinguish themselves from the common dress style, to break with the traditional fashion tastes, some affluent Doualais eagerly seek more exotic dress styles and designs of which popular Chinese attire is now seen as the epitome. Even local celebrities are now turning to high Chinese fashion and styles, notably fashionable traditional Chinese clothes which have become an essential part of the local fashion culture. This is the case with Coco Argentée, a thirty-six-year-old popular Cameroonian female singer, who is also drawn to Chinese dress and hairstyle (Figure 6.1). The young woman who was formerly known as la go galaxy (a galaxy or global girl) because of her propensity for wearing eccentric and flashy western-style clothing during her shows is now self-identified as la go de Chine (a Chinese girl). Her conversion

Figure 6.1  Coco Argentée with Chinese look; video still from ‘Mouiller Maillot’, Yaoundé 2018. © VRJ Music.

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Figure 6.2  Coco Argentée in Chinese style; video still from ‘Mouiller Maillot’, Yaoundé 2018. © VRJ Music.

to Chinese fashion and styling reverberates even in her latest musical production, which she describes as a clin d’oeil à la Chine (wink at China). For example, for her wellacclaimed song released in 2018 under the title Mouiller Maillot (literally, to wet the jersey = to battle hard), she appeared in a video in which she exalts the elegance, beauty and sensuality of an African female body wearing both fashionable Chinese traditional and modern clothes. More importantly, the video, which dramatizes the cultural and aesthetic connections between Africa and China, shows how various Chinese clothing and attire can also be adapted to an African female body (Figure 6.2). Indeed, in the clip that has recorded over a million viewers to date, the artist appears in different Chineseinspired outfits which have been redesigned so as to accommodate her corpulent body. For instance, she alternately wears a highly sophisticated and futurist grey Chinese-style silk and a red Chinese satin embroidered jacket or coat, which have now been adopted by many local upper- and middle-class women. At times, she puts on a hat and boots to match her Chinese-inspired long gowns and headcloths, or high-heeled shoes for her shorter dresses. Furthermore, she sports either flowery and colourful round-collared robes or a short coat with a long skirt, which contribute towards dramatizing her sensuality and sex appeal. Sometimes, she appears in different types of traditional Chinese clothing, notably the famous Hanfu dress style. While her female dancers are dressed as servants of the ancient Chinese imperial court, her male performers plagiarize a shaolin monk’s dress style. Even the general décor of the clip attempts to recreate a Chinese cultural environment, as it is elaborately adorned with golden dragon and phoenix patterns.8 Yet, it is not only local celebrities and public figures who stylize their bodies with traditional Chinese costumes and outfits. There is also a growing number of upperand middle-class men and women in Douala who are attracted by some fashionable Chinese traditional attire. This is the case with the now very popular traditional Chinese woman’s dress commonly referred to as Cheongsam (Clark 2000). This very expensive body-hugging dress with distinctive Chinese features of Manchu origin is increasingly 114

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worn by wealthy and trendy Doualais women as a wedding dress. For example, in July 2017, I attended a lavish wedding ceremony in a luxurious hotel in Douala. For this event, the bride wore a high-priced Cheongsam-style attire that is now favoured by many brides at the expense of the former classical western-inspired wedding dress. In his laudatory comments, the impresario revealed to the audience that the bride’s dress was embroidered with elaborate gold and silver designs and was made by a famous Shanghaibased Chinese fashion designer whose name, however, was not disclosed. The cloth which was a gift from the bride’s parents reportedly cost over US$75,000. The groom was dressed in an elegant and refined Tang suit, also translated as Tangzhuang. Like most of the fashionable and prized traditional Chinese clothes that have been reinvented by contemporary Chinese fashion designers and tailors, and popularized worldwide by transnational Chinese fashion retailers and distributors (Clark 2000; Roberts, 1997), the Tang suit has now been adopted by many privileged Doualais men. This is the case with a friend of mine, a successful businessman from Douala, who has also given up his former western-style business suit in favour of a modern Chinese tunic suit, which is popularly known in Cameroon as style col Mao (Mao collar style, after the President Mao Zedong). The middle-aged man often travels to China to buy his favourite designer Chinese suits, which he wears on both formal and casual occasions. He often combines these costumes with a traditional Bamileke hat generally worn by high-ranking members of the Bamileke notability from the Grassfields region of Cameroon. He might not be aware of the cultural meanings of the Mao suit, whose four pockets represent the Four Virtues of Chinese culture: Propriety, Justice, Honesty and Shame, while the five buttons symbolize China’s five branches of government (Roberts 1997; Wu 2009). He might not have a fuller understanding of the creative and symbolic dimensions of this fashionable Chinese item of clothing (Chan 2000; Chew 2007; Roberts 1997). Yet, the man, who originates from a Bamileke royal family generally associates this Mao suit with noblesse, dignity and elegance.9 During an informal discussion with him, he justified his adoption of traditional Chinese clothing in these terms: ‘If I have opted for a Chinese style costume, it is because it is a highly distinctive cloth. I wear it to distinguish myself from other people who dress in classical western-style suits. Traditional Chinese clothing is an added value to my personality. Moreover, this clothing helps me construct a nouvelle identité vestimentaire (new fashion identity).’ He often referred to his Chinesestyle attire as a ‘simple and sober elegance’, which he contrasted with what he called a tape à l’oeil (flashy and extravagant) elegance embodied by the western-style dress. In more general terms, my friend connected the wearing of traditional Chinese designer outfits to what the urban popular language in Douala now refers to as a nouvelle tendance (new trend or fashion) or nouvelle élégance (new elegance). This pervasive idea of novelty or newness suggests, above all, a transition from the old trend which was initially symbolized by western-inspired fashion and elegance to a new trend which is increasingly associated with Chinese ethnic clothes. These non-western dress styles appeal to many wealthy Doualais because they are seen as new, distinctive and exotic. The above examples suggest that Chinese-inspired fashion ideas and practices are progressively supplanting the former dominant western fashion ideals which have long 115

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influenced the way fashion and elegance were perceived by the postcolonial Cameroonian middle classes. Indeed, for a number of culturally westernized Cameroonians, being aesthetically modern initially meant endorsing a western conception of beauty and elegance. It also meant consuming modern western beauty and fashion products (Burke 1996). As Francis Njamnjoh has pointed out, only the newly emerged African middle class with high incomes could gain access to these western consumer commodities (Nyamnjoh 2004), while many underprivileged Africans with limited purchasing power had to content themselves with used clothes or beauty items imported from western countries (Hansen 2000). But since the beginning of this new millennium, contemporary representation and practices of fashion and beauty have been influenced by Chinese consumer culture and fashion products which increasingly play a crucial role in the making of a new fashionable African selfhood. More importantly, the above-mentioned examples reveal how the sinonization of contemporary African fashion and beauty culture is unfolding in the city of Douala. This does not manifest itself only through the growing appreciation of both low- and high-end Chinese-inspired fashion and aesthetics by both middle- and working-class Africans. From a material point of view, the sinonization of contemporary practices and ideas of fashion is also perceptible through the growing expansion of fashion shops and stores owned either by Chinese or local merchants. These boutiques are now specialized in the commercialization, for instance, of the now popular Chinese Cheongsam/Qipao dress or Mao suit, which are in high demand in Douala where Chinese traditional clothes have become à la mode (in fashion). Initially these popular Chinese clothes catered to members of the local Chinese community who wanted to maintain cultural and symbolic ties with their home country. But, over time, they have been marketed to appeal to the fashion drives and desires of the local customers. In other respects, China’s cultural influence on the present-day representation of fashion and styling in Douala is visible through a skilful appropriation of Chinese ideals, and practices of fashion, beauty and elegance by some middle-class Doualais men and women. This means that in their search for alternative modes of elegance and stylization which are distinctive from dominant western ideals, many voluntarily opt for both traditional and modern Chinese fashion and styling. In the process, some of them do not hesitate to reinterpret Chinese practices and representation of fashion and chic from an African perspective, or to remodel them to fit local needs. This is, for instance, the case with the aforementioned Cameroonian artist Coco Argentée who has managed to Africanize the highly globalized Chinese fashion culture in her video clip, by artistically combining both elements and symbols of Bantu tradition with traditional Chinese fashion culture. Moreover, the singer has been successful in recreating a Chinese cultural and artistic environment in the forest region of Cameroon. Coco Argentée’s adaptive practices are reminiscent of the complex fashion behaviour of some young Mozambican women from Maputo, who skilfully incorporate Chinese beauty and fashion commodities into the local consumer culture. According to Johanna von Pezold, in their quest for novelty and self-expression these young trendy urban women use, for example, elements of the Chinese-inspired Qipao dress such as fabrics, 116

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patterns, motifs and designs to remodel the traditional Mozambican capulana dress (von Pezold 2019). They do it in a way that accommodates local fashion and dress norms. All this suggests that African users of Chinese fashion and sartorial products are far from being passive consumers devoid of any agency. As numerous studies have pointed out, African fashion consumers often excel in the art of appropriating, reformulating or reinventing concepts, ideals and practices of fashion and elegance originating from other cultures and traditions (Gaestel 2017; Friedman 1994; Hansen and Madison 2013).10

Conclusion One of the unexpected consequences of the increasing economic and financial connections between Cameroon and China is the unprecedented flow of Chinese fashion products and clothing styles, which are now in high demand in the city of Douala where Chinese beauty and fashion culture has been thriving since the early 2000s. Over time, these previously downgraded Chinese fashion and beauty items have become very popular with both lower-income and middle-class local women who are increasingly looking for much cheaper ways of revamping their bodies. I have used the expression ‘sinonization’ to give meaning to the growing impact of Chinese consumer and fashion culture on the practices and representation of fashion and body in Douala. The increasing influence of Chinese-manufactured fashion and cosmetic products in the local regime of fashion and clothing style has resulted in the popularization of a fashion and beauty phenomenon commonly known in Douala as bobaraba. This new fashion trend has not only changed the local representation and experience of fashion, refinement and chic that were initially inspired by the western conception of beauty and elegance. It has also substantially altered the former local mode of self-stylization that dramatized both the social distinction and class boundaries between members of the postcolonial elite classes and those from the working classes. Indeed, the Chinesemanufactured bobaraba clothing now also enables many low-income Doualais women to participate in the global fashion culture from which they were so long excluded. However, the current bobaraba vogue is not limited only to dress styles and beauty products designed or manufactured in China and shipped to Douala through transnational Chinese as well as Cameroonian commercial and trade networks. The current bobaraba trend has generated particular styles of garments and outfits with which many local women clothe their bodies or stylize themselves. It has also prompted the emergence of fashion(ized) subjects who are obsessed with a corpulent and curvy body shape culturally idealized as the ultimate expression of a woman’s beauty and elegance. This chapter looks at a striking example of the appropriation and adaptation of Chinese clothing style and fashion culture by many Doualais women as well as men whose quest for novelty and self-distinction often causes many to search for a more exotic clothing style. It has highlighted the agency as well as the creative spirit of these local fashion consumers who manage to reinvent a new fashion style that amalgamates both African beauty ideals with Chinese traditional dress styles such as the famous 117

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Cheongsam, which appears as one of the inspirational sources of much of the current bobaraba dress style. Rather than being a manifestation of ‘world fashion’ (Eicher and Sumberg 1995), the ongoing bobaraba vogue is an expression of a creole and hybrid fashion trend that merges both African and Chinese fashion cultures, thus forming a particularly striking illustration of a cross-cultural commodity11 that can be local and foreign at the same time. Notes 1. On fashionscapes, see Calefato (2019). 2. On the flows of fashion forms towards Africa, see Pinther and Weigand (2018). 3. These spaces have become a major centre for organizing the retailing and distribution of various imported Chinese fashion and beauty products into Douala and other cities of Central Africa. 4. This is epitomized by the famous young dandies from the Republic Democratic of Congo (RDC) commonly known as sapeurs. 5. An analogous popular expression is bôtchô; it also refers to women who display a curvy form. 6. A language spoken in the northern region of Ivory Coast and in many other West African countries. 7. The adoption of this look chinois by many local sex workers has made their attire become more standardized and homogenous to the point that most street prostitutes of Douala, especially those who operate in the prostitution belt of Akwa, are now almost undifferentiated. 8. See (190) Coco Argenté – Mouiller Maillot (Clip Officiel) – YouTube (accessed 8 December 2020). 9. On the connections between dress, power and prestige in contemporary Africa, see Clarke (2005). 10. For example, in her work on the sapolologie (cult of elegance and dandyism in the Congolese urban language), Kaja Erika Jorgensen shows how young Congolese sapeurs (dandy and elegant men) appropriate through the transnational movement of sape(dandyism), the French and Italian fashion ideals and practices, and reenact them in the local Congolese context. More importantly, these young dandies, who mostly originate from underprivileged social backgrounds, mobilize fashion as a means of flouting their identities or contesting their socioeconomic marginalization (Jorgensen 2014); see also Gandoulou (1989) and Gondala (1999). 11. On this concept, see Edoh (2016), Rabine (2002).

References Alden, C. (2005), ‘China in Africa’, Survival, 47 (3): 147–64. Burke, T. (1996), Lifebuoy Men, Lux Women: Commodification, Consumption and Cleanliness in Modern Zimbabwe, Durham, NC: Duke University Press.

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Looking East Calefato, P. (2019), ‘Fashionscapes’, in A. Geczy and V. Karaminas (eds), The End of Fashion: Clothing and Dress in the Age of Globalization, 31–46, Bloomington: Bloomsbury. Chan, A. H. -N. (2000), ‘Fashioning Change: Nationalism, Colonialism, and Modernity in Hong Kong’, Postcolonial Studies, 3 (3): 293–309. Chew, M. (2007), ‘Contemporary Re-Emergence of the Qipao: Political Nationalism, Cultural Production and Popular Consumption of a Traditional Chinese Dress’, The China Quarterly, 189: 144–61. Clark, H. (2000), The Cheongsam, Oxford: Oxford University Press. Clarke, C. (2005), Power Dressing: Men’s Fashion and Prestige in Africa, Newark: Newark Museum. de Boeck, F. (2011), ‘Inhabiting Ocular Ground: Kinshasa’s Future in the Light of Congo’s Spectral Urban Politics’, Cultural Anthropology, 26 (2): 263–86. de Boeck, F. and M. -F. Plissart (2004), Kinshasa: Tales of the Invisible City, Ghent: Ludion. Edoh, M. A. (2016), ‘Redrawing Power? Dutch Wax Cloth and the Politics of “Good Design”’, Journal of Design History, 29 (3): 258–72. Eicher, J. B. and B. Sumberg (1995), ‘World Fashion, Ethnic, and National Dress’, in J. B. Eicher (ed.), Dress and Ethnicity, 295–306, Oxford: Berg. Fanon, F. [1952] (1967), Black Skin, White Masks, trans. C. L. Markmann, London: Pluto Press. Friedman, J. (1994), ‘The Political Economy of Elegance: An African Cult of Beauty’, in J. Friedman (ed.), Culture and History, 120–35, Newark: Harwood Academic Publishers. Gaestel, A. (2017), ‘Versage: Following Knock-off Fashion’s Flow from Lagos to Guangzhou (and Back Again)’, Naatal, 1: 120–5. Gandoulou, J. -D. (1989), Dandies à Bacongo: Le culte de l'élégance dans la Société Congolaise Contemporaine, Paris: L’Harmattan. Gondola, C. D. (1999), ‘Dream and Drama: The Search for Elegance among Congolese Youth’, African Studies Review, 42 (1): 23–48. Hansen, K. T. (2000), Salaula: The World of Secondhand Clothing and Zambia, Chicago: University of Chicago Press. Hansen, K. T. and D. Soyini Madison, eds (2013), African Dress: Fashion, Agency, Performance, London and New York: Bloomsbury. Jorgensen, K. E. (2014), ‘Sapologie: Performing Postcolonial Identity in the Democratic Republic of Congo’, MA diss., OCAD University, Toronto. Kaplinsky, R., D. McCormick, and M. Morris (2007), The Impact of China on Sub-Saharan Africa, University of Sussex, UK: Institute of Development Studies. Konings, P. (2011), The Politics of Neoliberal Reforms in Africa: State and Civil Society in Cameroon, Bamenda and Leiden: Langaa and African Studies Centre. Ling, W. and S. Segre-Reinach, eds (2018), Fashion in Multiple Chinas: Chinese Styles in the Transglobal Landscape, London and New York: Bloomsbury. Ndjio, B. (2009), ‘Shanghai Beauties and African Desires: Migration, Trade and Chinese Prostitution in Cameroon’, European Journal of Development Research, 21 (4): 606–21. Ndjio, B. (2014), ‘“Magic Body” and “Cursed Sex”: Chinese Sex Workers as “Bitch-Witches” in Cameroon’, African Affairs, 113 (452): 370–86. Ndjio, B. (2017), ‘Sex and the Transnational City: Chinese Sex Workers in the West African City of Douala’, Urban Studies Journal, 54 (4): 999–1015. Nutall S. (2004), ‘Stylizing the Self: The Y Generation in Rosebank, Johannesburg’, Public Culture, 16 (3): 430–52. Nyamnjoh F. B. (2004), ‘Globalization, Boundaries and Livelihoods: Perspectives on Africa’, Identity, Culture and Politics, 5 (1&2): 37–59. Picton, J. (1995), ‘Technology, Tradition and Lurex: The Art of Textiles in Africa’, in J. Picton (ed.), The Art of African Textiles: Technology, Tradition and Lurex, 9–31, London: Barbican Art Gallery.

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CHAPTER 7 BETWEEN PRESENCE AND EVOCATION FASHION DESIGN, PHOTOGRAPHY AND PLACE-MAKING IN LAGOS Kerstin Pinther

Andrew Esiebo’s series ‘Highlife’ (2013–16) (Figure 7.1) is a dense and multi-layered tableau of Lagos party nights – exuberant, playful, escapist. A public performance of fashion and sartorial styles. Lavishly dressed couples dancing under glittering chandeliers – women in tight-fitting lace dresses and men in loose voluminous attire, whose opulence fully enfolds only in movement. Male performers in elegant suits and extravagant accessories. Shimmering images that capture gestures of ostentation and consumption: money scattered across the floor, bejewelled hands, lush bouquets of flowers. Lagosbased photographer Andrew Esiebo, who has been working independently as well on assignments for style magazines such as the now-defunct Arise, likewise captures moments of pause and fatigue, or the soft tensions of bodies closely moving. ‘Highlife’ comes as a burst of colours, its focus on textile matters and surfaces encourages a haptic gaze. Single images are painted with bright artificial lighting, others are bathed in cool neon tones. Photographs with sharp contrasts between light and dark foreground the sartorial choices of party people at a street corner – bright coloured slogan shirts, a blouse in glaring red, tracksuit bottoms with eye-catching shimmering patterns. Scenes in outdoor restaurants and bars are only sparsely lit; sometimes dancers are posing in the glow of their mobile phones. Girls in skin-tight apparel with blinking accessories and flashy glasses speak to the spectacle of picture-taking. Shots are nearly always taken from within the crowd or very close by, the buzz of dancing can be felt throughout. Despite its title being evocative of the golden era of the late 1950s and 1960s highlife,1 the series is unequivocally situated in the present. Esiebo focuses not only on contemporary club cultures and fashionable styles across class, gender and age. His images also testify to class consciousness and self-representation as much as they hint at hopes and aspirations; they record the spirit of affluent urban lifestyles. Unlike his simultaneously pursued photographic exploration into the urban fabric of Lagos and particularly into the abstract surface patterns of its architecture,2 the ‘Highlife’ series does not explicitly capture Nigeria’s steadily growing city or its many layers. Although connected to fashion, it is not fashion photography in the strict sense. And yet it profoundly speaks to fashion as experienced in space – an interface between the body and the environment. It is precisely in the interweaving of urban club interiors as well as outdoor spaces with fashionable and recognizable styles and textiles that his images convey a strong sense of place. The city of Lagos, albeit not in its entire and often

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Figure 7.1  Andrew Esiebo, Highlife (2013–16). © Andrew Esiebo contradictory facets, is present throughout his work. Taken as a whole, the series conveys a nuanced picture of very diverse urban styles tied to distinct urban scenes and their aesthetic choices, communities and geographies within Lagos. Esiebo’s ‘Highlife’ series allows for an immersion into Lagos’ fashion milieus with its intermingling of styles and fabrics. It artistically articulates the theme of this chapter – the blending of fashion design, sartorial styles and urban spaces and places. Whereas Lagos, as one of the fastest-growing cities on the African continent, has attracted much scholarly research (Akinsemoyin and Vaughan-Richards 1977; Aradeon 2001; Enwezor et al. 2002; Gandy 2005; Mabogunje 1968; Tejuoso and Atigbi 2005; Uduku 2016) – as has its artistic production (Ogbechie 2009; Okeke-Agulu 2015; Okoye 2008; Rice 2020) – the pairing of ‘city and fashion’ and their reciprocal relationship have not yet been studied. This, and a long-standing interest in the artistic creation and imagination of cities, is my starting point.3 My understanding of urbanity and of fashion considers both transnational and transregional threads (Amin and Thrift 2002: 3), with fashion designers rooted in and routed through a local and, at the same time, global situatedness and connectedness. By analysing the works of contemporary fashion designers and fashion media practitioners, this chapter aims to explore the interweaving of urban (architectural) spaces and fashionable styles in Lagos. On the one hand, I am following the manifold ways visual and material cultures serve as a constant source of inspiration for fashion production in Lagos, in particular for a group of conceptual designers. I strive to understand how the city’s specific histories and dynamics are inscribed into and are evoked through patterns, materials and accessories as well as through storytelling. Special attention is paid to material aspects: to their meanings, their site-specific and 122

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place-making qualities and evocative power. On the other hand, I seek to identify instances of how fashion impacts and forms certain areas of Lagos, thus contributing to a constant remaking and transformation of its real and imaginary landscapes. In addition, an important strand of argument takes up the renewed interest of many urban fashion designers in so-called ‘traditional’ fabrics and ways of dressing – an approach which often leads to a cooperation with (rural) craftspeople as well as to explorative research into textile materials and techniques. This approach, as I will show, often foregrounds fashion’s discursive and future-making potentials.

Fragments of a cartography of fashion in Lagos With an estimated population of between fifteen and twenty million people, the port city of Lagos (in Yoruba ‘Eko’) is a cosmopolitan, multi-ethnic and multi-religious metropolis and an outstanding fashion centre in Africa. With Lagos Island, the wealthy areas of Ikoyi and Victoria Island (VI), the territorium of Lagos stretches over a number of islands and peninsulas (partly with a strong Yoruba imprint) and extends far into the mainland with a newer administrative and commercial centre in Ikeja. The sprawling mainland is the place where most Lagosians live – in houses whose architectural styles testify to the many historic layers of the city, from colonial, Afro-Brazilian, tropical modernist to more recent postmodern buildings with glass and fake stucco elements. Apart from the ever-growing high-rise buildings on the islands, the city is predominantly growing on the flat – a fact that might contribute towards imagining the city from the ground rather than from a bird’seye view (Sawyer 2016: 22). Asked about distinct features of Lagos, people often mention a vibrant visual culture and a unique graphic style, manifest in the ‘barrage of posters, flyers and handbills that constantly flood every part of the city space’ (Tejuoso and Atigbi 2005: 11). Its latest additions, gigantic illuminated billboards that flank the city’s main roads create excitement and desire, calling upon the city’s (alleged) unlimited potential (Tejuoso and Atigbi, quoted in Pinther, Förster, and Hanussek 2012: 174–5). Lagos is a particularly dense node within close and far-reaching networks, flows and connections, where social, aesthetic and cultural meanings are constantly in flux. This is also manifest in its fashion topographies – a plurality of diverse, yet in many ways entangled, fashion milieus. A first and necessarily fragmented mapping of Lagos as a ‘sartorial ecumene’ (Mustafa 1998) would certainly include Victoria Island as a preeminent place of high-end fashion with retailers, elite boutiques and concept stores like Alára and Temple Muse. Many of the showrooms and some of the ateliers of well-known Nigerian fashion labels are located here, as is the case with Tiffany Amber, Deola Sagoe and IAMISIGO. Some hidden and hardly recognizable from the outside, others like Alára make a strong statement about their agenda to promote Nigerian along with African and western (fashion) designs. Its founder Reni Folawiyo commissioned the internationally acclaimed architect David Adjaye to design an iconic building. The result is an affective space that, with its red-metal outer surface, is inspired by Yoruba textiles and its inner space resembles a vertical catwalk, allowing visitors to move freely between smaller display cabins and to experience the designs’ sensual and 123

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Figure 7.2  Images from the archive of Shade Thomas-Fahm, Lagos 2018. © Kerstin Pinther. conceptual layers. Also on VI, London-trained fashion designer Shade Thomas-Fahm opened her first boutique ‘Maison Shade’ in the 1960s on the ground floor of the Federal Palace Hotel, while the production site for her garments was housed in a governmentbuilt structure in Yaba, one of the first master-planned neighbourhoods on the mainland. Overturning the repressive and negative colonial attitudes towards local textiles proclaimed ‘backwards’ (Fiofori 2009; Renne 1995), Thomas-Fahm shaped a new look based on the translation of older textiles and dress styles into new forms (Figure 7.2). In an interview, she mentioned the newly felt sensation of lighter-in-weight and ready-made garments, catering to the needs of modern urban women.4 While interlocutors in Lagos recognized her pioneering role in the adaptation of local textiles for modern design, they also mentioned her close association with elite and expatriate milieus. Some referred to the 1970s when, with the oil boom beside the lace vogue as a showcase of the new wealth (Plankensteiner and Adediran 2010), more progressive dress-cultures appeared. In particular, with the Second World Black and African Festival of Arts and Culture (FESTAC), clothing was seen not only as an expression of national identity but also as an affirmation of Afrocentric styles and belongings. A fashion show that celebrated Black culture on the occasion of the festival was put together by the Black Arts Movement member Jae Jarrell, well known for her design of the ‘Revolutionary Suit’ (Amadi 2019: n.p., Donaldsen 2019: n.p.). Similar to Thomas-Fahm in the 1960s, today’s fashion designers are connected to different parts of Lagos as well as to cities and regions throughout Nigeria through supply chains, production sites and a myriad of markets. Designers I talked to mentioned Mushin market and Tejuosho, both located on the mainland, the former to search in particular for leather and the latter with its wide range of specialized textile sellers and 124

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craftspeople. Lekki market is frequented mainly by those looking for vintage fabrics and materials.5 Outside Lagos, from the late 1950s and increasingly after independence until around 2000, large textile mills operated in Kaduna and Kano in the north of Nigeria;6 Aba in the southeast features prominently as one of the country’s most important fashion production as well as trade centres for imported fabrics and clothing from Turkey and other places, mainly in Asia. With several designers working in Lagos, sharing a renewed interest in local textile techniques and craft activities, established centres of textile processing gain momentum: among others, Ibadan and Abeokuta for the resist-dyed indigo adire (Byfield 2002) or Kano, where tanneries are located. Bubu Ogisi, founder of IAMISIGO, went as far as Bonwire outside of Kumasi, Ghana, in order to work with local weavers – not to mention the inspirations she gets from dress practices across Nigeria, with her family’s hometown Warri in the Delta region playing a special role.7 Markets that offer second-hand attire and imported garments from Europe and Asia are spread all over Lagos and are frequently visited by low- and middle-income earners. As functionally complex spaces of consumption and production, markets like Balogun on Lagos Island combine so-called bend-down-boutiques, small stalls and tiny kiosk shops with tailor ateliers. Apart from everyday clothing, the latter provide custom-made attire for family ceremonies, which are attended ‘uni-text’ – cut from the same cloth, a practice called aso ebi (Nwafor 2013, 2021). Naturally, the different fashion worlds do not exist separately from each other, but are connected through the media, in particular social media, but also in everyday encounters, no matter how volatile.8 An employee of Lagos Fashion Factory, a small boutique along one of the main roads in VI, for instance, once explained to me how preferences for ‘heavy fabrics’, like those created by Tiffany Amber, determine the demand of her less wealthy customers as well.9 Cheaper ready-made adaptations of haute couture fashion and international brand copying likewise play a vital role in Lagosian fashion milieus and are often produced in workshops around Tinubu square on Lagos Island. A recent study on spatial structures and residential areas of Lagos revealed how the city inherited a social and spatial dualism like many other former colonial capitals in (West) Africa (Sawyer 2016: 11ff.). This led to social fragmentation and vast existential gaps between different parts of the city – not only in the present. The contrast between the islands with their modernist and new high-rise buildings and paved roads, Lekki as a new affluent suburbia, and the more popular and dense neighbourhoods (on the mainland) is equally high. Architect Papa Omotayo referred to the fact that social and spatial divides are often mirrored in distinct attitudes towards stylistic and concomitant moral conventions in the respective urban areas.10

Sartorial place-making and storytelling in the fashion design of Maki Oh In her book African Fashion, Global Styles, Victoria Rovine uses the example of Amaka Osakwe’s Spring/Summer 2012 collection to make a strong point about the narrative qualities of fashion design and its capacity to blend attire with specific urban African milieus and thus to ‘subtly project place and culture’ (2015: 3). In a close reading of 125

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the collection’s garments and its promotional material, Rovine unfolds the many ‘literal’ and ‘conceptual layers’ of sartorial references that allow for the understanding of these specific garments as a ‘provocative story’ about seduction and the world of the Lagos ‘Reds’, prostitutes ‘who play their trade on the streets of Lagos’ (2015). Borrowing from Miwon Kwon’s concept of site-specific art (2004), one could think of fashion, too, as being constructed materially, physically and conceptually in its relationship to the place where it is produced. Indeed, locality – or better, ‘glocality’ considering Osakwe’s multidirectional references – has evolved into a significant factor in her designs. The overlap of fashion and city seems to be a constant in the practice of Amaka Osakwe, who is a highly esteemed and successful fashion designer, both internationally and in Nigeria. Likewise, since the founding of her label Maki Oh in Lagos in 2010 after graduating from the Arts University Bournemouth, she has always been perceived as a conceptual and highly experimental designer. Style bloggers and fashion journalists attest to her great seriousness and depth regarding her material research and the narrative accompanying each collection. The latter, one could argue, seems to be equally shaped by storytelling as a common brand strategy as by her sense of a widespread West African practice of using clothing and textiles as a means of conveying messages (Pinther 2007). ‘[T]o call Maki Oh . . . a fashion designer is somewhat simplistic’, writes Gaestel (2017a: 106): ‘She is more of a research-rooted artist whose primary medium happens to be clothing’. Cosmopolitan in outlook, Amaka Osakwe is firmly rooted in Lagos: physically, as her studio is located in VI as well as conceptually, because Nigeria’s largest city, its material and atmospheric aspects as well as its urban social milieus, are both a reference and a source of constant inspiration. As one of the first designers of her generation, she does not use ankara prints as a supposed sign of ‘Africanness’ (Picarelli 2017), but, instead, makes locally available and established materials and textile techniques suitable for today. Beside adire in various shades of blue, she also relies on the narrowwoven strips of aso oke mainly associated with the Yoruba people or the white, heavily embellished akwa ocha that stems from the Delta region (Onwuakpa 2017). Her designs are characterized by a mix of diverse fabrics and materials such as chiffon and tulle, lace and leather, jersey, velvet and silk, loofah fibres and pieces of calabash contributing to a distinctive textured and layered aesthetic, evocative of different places and cultures in Lagos and beyond. Beside a primarily ‘western silhouette’, her garments may reveal the draped appearance of sartorial practices as they prevail in the south of Nigeria; they may also adopt embroidery techniques linked to northern traditions of the Hausa and Fulani people (Picton 2010: 294–5). Beside Osakwe’s thoughtfulness and her love of constant exploration, this flexible and adaptive design approach might be linked to locally and historically situated ways of dressing that are inflected by multiple flows of forms and fabrics – impulses from near and far, so crucial in the making of an urban self in the highly cosmopolitan environments that Nigerian cities have been since the end of the nineteenth century (Plankensteiner 2010; Oyeniyi 2015). Maki Oh’s Autumn/Winter 2016 collection is particularly telling for this matching of fabrics and styles: its individual pieces oscillate between clear cuts and more playful elements such as flounces, frills and other embellishments in order to evoke and 126

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Figure 7.3  From Maki Oh’s Autumn/Winter 2016 collection. © Maki Oh. simultaneously break the body-accentuating silhouettes of the ‘classical’ Nigerian women’s wear with voluminous blouses and wrappers, locally called iro and buba (Figure 7.3). Printed and appliquéd eyes are recurrent motifs in this collection and, according to Osakwe, they are reminiscent of the well-known adire motif of the ‘inner eye’, alluding to self-reflection on the one hand, and being seen and observed on the other.11 Okeowo (2017) perceives Osakwe’s fashion design as a means to negotiate female autonomy, desire and self-expression – topics present but often unspoken in Nigerian urban society: her garments ‘are sensual and provocative’, pushing against long-standing norms. In a similar vein, Maki Oh’s Autumn/Winter 2018 line used fashion to instigate a conversation. Both garments and lookbook evoke the idea of the ‘classical’ photo-studio as a stage for ever new variations of self-making and thus to fashion’s imaginary potentials (Pinther 2007). The visuals recall self-portraits in various roles with outfits ranging from decent veiling styles to voluminous shorts with cut-outs, loose-fitting dresses with high slits to agbada-inspired pieces. With a variety of garments, it seems as if possible role models are literally being tried and tested – a playful negotiation of sartorial and gendered norms manifest in Lagos and beyond. As already clear, Maki Oh’s designs are anchored locally not only through their materialities, colours and shapes but also through subtle thematic references, taken up in the accompanying visuals, for which she often cooperates with artist friends like the architect and film-maker Papa Omotayo.12 Most of his fashion clips for Maki Oh transfer the ideas and stories behind the designs into an atmospherically dense and nuanced narration of Lagos and its specific urban milieus – visually and 127

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acoustically. ‘Omi – Water’, for example, evolved around the (urban) myth of Mami Wata.13 Omotayo placed a slide projector’s switch into the hand of the female model as if to underline that she is the one controlling her image. With unfinished houses and other non-permanent sites being used as settings, the visuals further suggest identities playfully acted out – processes of identification and self-realization. Another video plays with the variations of the word ‘ehn’, commonly heard in Lagos streets. Depending on the context and intonation, it carries different meanings, from ‘yes’, to ‘I guess’ and ‘is this how it’s going to be?’. The Lagos of Oksakwe’s collaborative design projects is very much atmospherically present with the (collective) urban imagination given space. Atmospheres, understood by Gernot Böhme (2017: 2ff.) as ‘tuned spaces’ are created by the co-presence of animated and non-animated forms that make up the mood and essence of Lagos. Probably the most emblematic of this approach is her 2017 line of clothing that was inspired by the aesthetics and the sociality of the yellow danfo minibus taxis, the ‘archetypical transport’ (Ogboh, quoted in Pinther, Förster and Hanussek 2012: 170–1). With the drivers loudly shouting out their next stops, the danfo’s verbal maps contribute to ‘Lagos Soundscapes’ (Pinther, Förster and Hanussek 2012). In particular, the danfo’s way of non-verbal communication with stickers and slogans served as a template for the Maki Oh pieces. In her collection, they are translated into various forms of painted adire and embroidery, wildly ornate and with unsewn threads. The underlying narrative is that of a seamstress who travels through Lagos at night to see her lover. Locality in this collection is produced not only materialwise but also through the embeddedness of the design and visuals in the idiosyncrasies of daily life. Nevertheless, the built environment, too, plays a defining role in situating Maki Oh’s collections: fenced apartment blocks, walled compounds, small stalls that line the streets provide the background for the visuals as well as more landmark-like concrete infrastructures such as bridges and overheads with their open spaces created underneath. One of her latest collections from Spring/Summer 2019 connects to the worlds of Lagos Buka restaurants, run mostly by women. This collection not only acknowledges the meaning of food cultures as a way of belonging and place identification. It is also her first collection that directly addresses gender fluidity (via the fashion show) and that is inspired by streetwise dressing manners. ‘Buka Special’, as the fashion show was announced, presented combinations of casual (slogan) shirts with wrappers and flat sports sandals. Silver lamé fabrics evoked the colours of the cookware; yet other colours referred to the ingredients of the dishes. Knots and grinds of the dresses alluded to the knotting and wrapping techniques used to preserve the food, minimalistic Instagram teasers captured the poetics of items associated with the Buka: ice water bags with the liquids softly sparking out, or a yellow plastic bag moving in the wind. This collection foregrounds a ‘Lagos everyday’: the city appears as a space of intrinsic, but often undocumented aesthetic and social values – a visual conversation that binds people and places. Lagos here is evoked by an intrinsic knowledge and a subjective experience that surpasses the visual perception in favour of a more nuanced sense of Lagosian urbanity. 128

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Dressed for architecture Among other aspects, Esiebo’s ‘Highlife’ series captures the power and performative capacities of fashionable clothing to assert status and wealth. An affirmative and competitive sartorial display of aso ebi is addressed in some of Osakwe’s collections as well. But instead of the mostly tailored aso ebi outfits, the models wear elegant Maki Oh dresses, whose delicate silk fabrics shine even stronger against the setting of a nocturnal spacious courtyard in one of the city’s suburbs. The lookbook images place the models against a background of chairs stacked on top of each other, indicating a larger social event for which the furniture is rented out. Lagos here is physically present, albeit often only suggestively and barely recognizable for those unfamiliar with its distinct urban features and ‘habits’. And so, the collection’s pieces – softly falling dresses, handmade from noble materials with glittering fringe applications – allude to the importance of dressing well. With the signature fabric – an adire covered all over with Maki Oh’s monogram ‘Oh’ – at least two references are called upon: international brand strategies as well as local practices of skin and cloth being incised or tattooed with signs and symbols that convey meaning and identity.14 ‘The body’, writes architect Lesley Lekko, ‘is simply another surface into which culture is carved, sculptured, cut, patterned, and tattooed’ (2018: 131–2). Against far-reaching western conceptions of surfaces lacking importance and substance, (skin) surfaces in many African cultures are considered essentially deep with memories and histories literally inscribed (Lekko 2018). In the Nigerian context, beside the Yoruba adire-traditions, ‘patterned’ identities are associated with the female practice of uli body and house paintings from the Igbo (Osayimwese 2019). They can be further discerned in analogies between decorated building facades and embroidered robes among the Hausa in northern Nigeria (Douny 2011). Without considering the notion of the ‘thick skin’, as Lekko calls this distinct surface-attachment, as solely defining Osakwe’s signature print, it might be one of the reasons for a special treatment of textile surfaces. Again, Maki Oh’s collection ‘Because of Men in Silk Shirts on Lagos Nights’ embodies this attitude. For the promotional film, director Arie Esiri bathes the nocturnal Lagosian cityscape with its futuristic-looking National Theatre in a cool blue neon light – foregrounding the luminescent blue adire silk tops. Aside from the surreal sensation of strange flashing toys, the clip literally reflects what could be called an economy of light so much present in Lagos urban life and its sartorial practices. Among Lagos-based fashion designers there are many – both internationally known as well as operating at more local levels – that have taken up a distinctive aesthetic of opulence and shininess and translated it into contemporary forms and materialities.15 Deola Sagoe, who founded her eponymous label in the late 1990s,16 Lisa Folawiyo with her brand Jewel by Lisa and Tiffany Amber (1998) are among those constantly working on the finishing of their fashion line’s fabrics. Sagoe relies on handmade and particularly strong and stiff forms of aso oke. After processing them with a hand-cut technique, which partly evokes lace-like surfaces, they are made into bespoke attire, tight-fitting silhouettes accentuating and shaping the female body. Folawiyo, on the other hand, was among the first who transformed the widely used 129

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industrially (wax) printed ankara into ‘rich’ and particularly heavy textures by ways of hand-applied glittery beadings. More recently, she explored the possibilities of combining and reframing ankara, batik and adire in order to gain ‘weight’ (Ndukwe 2020) and creating a haptic effect. Tiffany Amber, in turn, achieves a similar luxurious effect by twisting wax prints into each other and sewing them together. The result in all cases is the same heavy structure of accumulated embroidery or stiff materials that make for a voluminous appearance which is so highly esteemed and often referenced in contemporary arts. Both the late J. D. ’Okhai Ojeikere and Olu Amoda ‘documented’ the almost skeuomorphic relationship between certain forms of architecture and dress, culminating in the sculptural appearance of female head-ties called gele. Ojeikere’s black-and-white portraits capture their strong and stiff appearance. The gele in Amoda’s ‘Fashion Architectonic’ series was transformed into solid sculptures made of recuperated metal. Both bodies of work suggest a close proximity and profound conceptual affinities between architecture and fashion (Okoye 2014). In the field of (fashion) design, these proximities meet in the craft practice of Shem Ezemma, founder of Shem Paronelli Artisanal in 2011. His footwear and lately his first experiments into furniture design are both characterized by a rough aesthetic and a minimalism. Moreover, his pieces, shoes and chairs alike, bear traces of the handmade: small imperfections, surfaces still marked by their processing lines. Many of his blocky forms are inspired by Lagos’ distinct tropical-modernist architectures introduced in the late 1950s. Their repetitive screens and walls of concrete breeze blocks and cut-outs can be found on the campus of UNILAG, from where Ezemma graduated.17 In particular, its brutalist expressions with unadorned concrete finishes inspired his footwear such as the handmade dark-brown Nkwo pumps. As twins they are not completely identical, but differ in their binding. While one of them is wrapped several times with thin threads, the block heel of the other one is covered by a thick elastic band. The ‘Derby Shoes’ have a similar rough aesthetic; they only differ from their classic form with the curved side seams and open lacing in detail, namely in the use of grain stitches which are inserted into the surface of the leather as a reference to techniques commonly used in West Africa for repairing calabashes and wooden objects.18 Ezemma’s design has nothing in common with what he calls the ‘maximalism’ of more customary designs in Nigeria. As he said during our conversation, his inspirations and conceptual references are manifold and not unidirectional: notched soles are inspired mainly by brutalist architecture in Nigeria; the special materiality and the inclusion of simple materials refer to Italian Arte Povera. Local cultures of recuperation underscore his understanding of beauty as found in used and aged things – and as a matter of simplicity. To emphasize the sculptural character of his footwear, they are often presented as architectural miniatures, lately with his own mixed-media furniture (Figure 7.4). Ezemma’s design approach can be seen as a continuation of a design attitude propagated in the 1970s by the architect and designer Demas Nwoko. On the basis of locally available materials and with perfect craftsmanship, things had to be designed as an expression of a new culture. This was his dictum, articulated, among others, in the magazine New Culture which he co-established.19 At present, similar approaches can 130

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Figure 7.4  Shem Paronelli Artisanal, Nkwo Distressed Pumps, Lagos 2016. © Paul Schimweg. be found in other Lagos-based design initiatives, such as the kitchen utensils proposed by Àga Concept. Drawing on a collection of everyday objects from local cultures, the designers created their ‘Raw-Urban’ series, guided by a reduced aesthetic, for which they coined the term ‘afro-minima’ (Pinther and Weigand 2018: 46, 80). In a comparable way, but less research-driven, Ezemma’s distinct works take their starting point in hitherto neglected or overlooked architectural and aesthetic practices. Kadara Enyeasi, (fashion) photographer and trained architect, follows an individual approach to fashion photography; he often uses architecture or certain architectural designs to project new looks.20 Not only does he choose the same unusual, and in the ‘official’ discourse on architecture and urbanism, underrepresented locations to which Ezemma referred; his works like Another, 2015, also often reflect on the closely linked realms of architecture, body and fashion. They literally give impression to their agential relationship (Figure 7.5). Another [his italics] looks at new movements in Nigerian art, fashion and photography. By highlighting new forms based on design, it plays host to a new aesthetic. With fashion, it creates an alien culture: it becomes the virus. The model is infected by the virus. He mirrors the effect: the form, his gestures. The clothes become him – a second skin. (Enyeasi 2016: 44) His collages, as in his latest cooperation with Adeju Thompson of Lagos Space Programme, stress the intertwining of fashion and architecture and the latter’s influence on the body and its movements. Thompson’s latest collection was filmed in and against the background of the home of British-Nigerian architect Alan Vaughan-Richards in 131

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Figure 7.5  Kadara Enyeasi, Another, 2015. © Kadara Enyeasi. Ikoye – a house that, when it was built in the late 1970s, was outstanding and clearly ahead of its time with its experimental character. Enyeasi’s film is a subtle blending of bodies and spaces that catches the atmosphere created by the building; in his clip, fashion and architecture complement each other. Embedded memory and transcended forms in the fashion design of Gozel Green Gozel Green is a brand which also probes the relationship between body and space. Its creative compositions are informed by a tendency towards flatness, yet evoking geometric shapes and clothes’ spatial potentials. From their base in the Lekki suburbia, the sisters Sylvia Enekwe-Ojei and Olivia Enekwe-Okoji21 offer ready-to-wear pieces that are as locally sought after as they are internationally acclaimed. Gozel Green’s aesthetic idiom is one of minimalism sometimes paired with an architectural feel. Unlike many of Lagos’ conceptual designers, its focus is less on the fabrics themselves and more on the overall silhouette: abstract preferences alternately come with colour-blocking or with a monochrome and muted colour palette. The garments are marked by both construction and de-construction, evident in the processes of layering and superimposition and by panels sewn together in a clearly visible way. Although Enekwe-Okoji mentioned, among other sources, Japanese deconstructivist approaches in fashion design, Gozel Green does not come in extreme silhouettes, but proposes wearable attire, albeit 132

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Figure 7.6  Gozel Green, Summer Collection 2021. © Favour Benjamin and Gozel Green. striking and different when measured against the prevailing tight dress forms and shiny colourfulness of more mainstream fashion design. Most of their straight cuts are made from stiff polyester (crepes), sometimes mixed with organza and often embellished with tassels and pieces of fabric scraps (Figure 7.6) Apart from their distinct focus on the designs themselves, the sisters’ approach is very much informed by the notion of textiles and garments as repositories of memories and history.22 During our conversation Enekwe-Okoji emphasized the role of her and her sister’s upbringing in the southeast of Nigeria in what she described as a very artsy family – the mother being an alumna of New York’s Fashion Institute of Technology and the father, Onuora Ossie Enekwe, a well-known writer and scholar. According to her, his poems provide the starting point for each new collection – with the subject sometimes easier to grasp as in the Autumn/Winter 2017 line, where stylized masks recalled Igbo performances, and garments in knotting techniques ‘mimicked’ local dress cultures. Equally easy to grasp was the ‘Broken Pots’ Summer 2014 collection for which small pieces of calabashes were processed.23 In other cases, references are more hidden and would need further explanation – the latter being true for their collection which via a sombre colour palette and traces of repair and sticking together recalled brokenness and the painful experiences of the Biafra War.24 Fashion, besides its sensual and creative aspects, in Gozel Green’s approach helps to generate conversation and ‘inward exploration’ (Enyeasi 2016). Fashion design understood as a relevant aspect of contemporary culture and a field where significant topics and society’s relationship to the past are negotiated is evident in 133

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Gozel Green’s work for Vlisco. The firm provided them with prints associated with the Igbo region; unlike their creations to date, they designed form-fitting dresses, inspired by local cuts as well as by Victorian elements. The result was dresses and ensembles to be worn close to the body in order to recall the idea of the uli painting (Enyeasi 2016). The campaign’s photographer Yagazie Emezi likewise referred to this practice. Against the setting of a concrete backyard veranda and its forged fence, her lens captured women holding hands and applying dark paint to each other’s arms and hands. The series ‘Present and Forgotten’ (2018) highlights two, once important but, in the course of colonization and Christianization, partly oppressed, partly discouraged cultural traditions. With the models adorned with calligraphy-like patterns and signs in natural dyes, the images refer to the technique of uli: women’s art of decorating their bodies and houses. Under British colonial rule uli was considered ‘primitive’, and patterns and colours were forced to move onto fabrics or, as in the case of the Zaria Rebels as an artists’ group, onto canvas (Osayimwese 2019). Emezi’s images surpass the mere display of the garments, but, instead, focus on the relationship between the women. Thus, the second element Yagazie Emezi focused on with the models’ body language stems from the Igbo custom of same-sex marriages as they existed in precolonial society. ‘The works created are an amalgamation of Igbo culture, present and forgotten’, she writes on Instagram. ‘Before Christianity was introduced’, the post continues, ‘women were permitted to choose a wife on the death of a husband where no child was born.’25

Outlook I have chosen these works for closer examination because they follow a similar attitude insofar as they counter standard practices in (fashion) design as well as in image production.26 Hence, they open up new spaces and perspectives, adding further narrative layers to fashion design and architecture alike. It is perhaps no coincidence that in 1967 Alan Vaughan-Richards contributed an article to the Nigeria Magazine speculating on the future potential of West African building practices. He even proposed what has now partly materialized, namely the translation of established forms by digital technologies (Vaughan-Richards 1967: 112). Similar attitudes seem to be at the core of urban fashion designers’ practices expressing a strong concern not only for fashion as a form of social commentary and critique – as in the case of Osakwe’s Maki Oh – but also for design as a future-making practice. And that is true for Osakwe as well. Apart from her strong ‘ties’ to Lagos which, however, never take the form of a literal ‘depiction’, but more an interpretation and evocation, her design is shaped by the same attitude of a ‘modern craft’ that has a strong agenda towards future-building (Adamson 2007: 2ff.). Of course, this attitude is not limited to Lagos and design in Nigeria alone (Teunissen 2005: 15, Geczy and Karaminas 2017); on the contrary, it speaks to far-reaching ideas of (fashion) design instigating change. What to me seems particularly significant is the fact that the past is very much present as it is researched as a vehicle not only for the future of fashion but also as a step towards opening up new perspectives on local and sometimes sidelined 134

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or forcibly suppressed social, sartorial and aesthetic practices. This is true of Emezi’s concern with local ways of knowledge and cultural practices associated with same-sex relationships. Furthermore, this can be applied most importantly to strategies and tools fashion designers employ in order to uncover the past, to keep established skills, aesthetics and sartorial practices alive, and to update them in line with present and future needs. They rely on the narrative potentials of fabrics, cuts and colours, among others, to evoke imagery on the one hand, and on the other hand, to literally strengthen the ties between a network of cities as well as with rural areas in Nigeria.27 Thus, these attitudes can be seen as a means to (re)connect with older textile production and craft centres – not just as a form of self-assurance and/or cultural activism (de Greef 2018) – and also to suggest fashion designs and sartorial styles which are distinctly local yet globally connected. Notes 1. Highlife designates music and dance forms which, latest in the 1950s, gained popularity in Nigeria, see Oti (2009). 2. ‘Mutations’ (2015 – ongoing), see Esiebo’s homepage https://www​.andrewesiebo​.com (accessed 20 January 2021). 3. The research for this text took place within the framework of the DFG (German Research Foundation) project ‘Fashion and Styles in African Cities’. It is based on interviews with and studio visits to fashion designers, photographers and urbanists, mainly in 2017 and 2018, complemented by material and visual data I collected or researched on homepages or Instagram accounts. My study combines stylistic and iconographical analyses as it is based on conversations about formation, practices and aesthetics. In some instances, I turn to materials and interviews that stem from earlier visits to Nigeria in 2010 and 2012. 4. Interview with Shade Thomas-Fahm, Lagos, 8 October 2017 and 10 October 2018. 5. Interview with Bubu Ogisi, Lagos, 4 October 2017; with Shem Ezemma, Lagos, 11 October 2017; and with Papa Oyeyemi, Lagos, 12 October 2018. 6. Nigeria looks back onto highly developed and diverse textile traditions, with specific artisan competences scattered in various regions. They had already been rediscovered in the 1960s (de Negri 1962, 1966). De Negri also introduced fashion design courses at Yaba Tech in 1965. For an excellent study on textile industries in the north of Nigeria, see Maiwada and Renne (2013) as well as Renne and Maiwada (2020). 7. Interview with Bubu Ogisi, Lagos, 4 October 2017. 8. Gaestel (2017b) provides a brilliantly described account on the Versage aesthetics and its system of trade. 9. Interview with Lagos Fashion Factory, Lagos, 4 October 2018. 10. Interview with Papa Omotayo, Lagos, 14 October 2018. The architect is the founder of Lagos-based ‘A Whitespace Creative Agency’. Some of his fashion clips can be viewed on YouTube, https://www​.youtube​.com​/watch​?v​=uMPQb6hG5UI (accessed 5 November 2020). 11. Maki Oh, Instagram profile page. Available online: https://www​.instagram​.com​/p​/ BGMqp9YnUwe/ (accessed 5 March 2021). Until recently, there was a Maki Oh homepage on which all collections were documented with text, images and clips. 135

Fashioning the Afropolis 12. Interview with Papa Omotayo, Lagos, 14 October 2018. 13. Mami Wata refers to a notion known throughout West Africa of a mermaid who both seduces and devours. 14. Maki Oh, Instagram profile page. Available online: https://www​.instagram​.com​/maki​.oh/​?hl​ =de (accessed 5 March 2021). 15. The literature on this topic is vast; see Kastner in this volume and for the Nigerian context (Nwafor (2013). 16. Interview with Deola Sagoe, Lagos, 16 October 2018, and with her assistant Ekundayo Ajijola, Lagos, 10 October 2018. 17. See Akinsemoyin and Vaughan-Richards (1977). 18. Interview with Shem Ezemma, Lagos, 11 October 2017. 19. See his eponymous cultural journal New Culture (Pinther and Weigand 2018: 46). 20. Interview with Kadara Enyeasi, Lagos, 15 October 2018. 21. Interview with Olivia Enekwe-Okoji, Lagos, 9 October 2018. 22. Much has been written on this topic of the intimate relationship between textile memories as well as fashion and its interplay with history; for the West African context, see Renne (1995), Pinther (2007). 23. ‘Broken Pots’ is the name of a collection of poems from 1977 that also inspired the artist El Anatsui for his eponymous ceramic series that also recuperated discarded materials (Oguibe 1998). 24. Interview with Olivia Enekwe-Okoji, Lagos, 9 October 2018. 25. See https://www​.instagram​.com​/p​/BsEL83VAZIo/ (accessed 7 November 2020). Yagazie Emezi’s Instagram account suggests the importance of former or local sartorial styles as a vast archive and pool for creating a future heritage. 26. In order to contradict the clichéd image of Lagos as a colourful bustling megacity, Enyeasi often uses black-and-white photography – as did Lakin Ogunbanwo when he shot the lookbook for Buki Akib’s ‘Homecoming Collection’ at the railway compound in Ebute Metta. The rough aesthetic of the urban surroundings corresponded with the Afropunk style of the collection. 27. Furthermore, these approaches might speak to the fact that cities in Africa and, in particular, in Nigeria (Mabogunje 1968) were seen as having strong ties between the rural and the urban – even the (precolonial) notion of urbanity was shaped by this intermingling (Mabogunje 1968).

References Adamson, G. (2007), Thinking through Craft, London: Bloomsbury. Akinsemoyin, K. and A. Vaughan-Richards (1977), Building Lagos, Lagos: Pengrail. Amadi, B. (2019), ‘Fashion Trends in Africa’, in N. Edjabe and A. Adesokan (eds), Festac ’77: The 2nd World Black and African Festival of Art and Culture, Köln: Walter König. Amin, A. and N. Thrift (2002), Cities: Reimagining the Urban, Cambridge: Polity Press. Aradeon, D. (2001), ‘House. The Indifference Built’, Glendora Review, 3 (2): 57–60. Böhme, G. (2017), The Aesthetics of Atmospheres (Ambiances, Atmospheres and Sensory Experiences of Spaces), ed. Jean-Paul Thibaud, London: Routledge.

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Between Presence and Evocation Byfield, J. A. (2002), The Bluest Hands: A Social and Economic History of Women Dyers in Abeokuta (Nigeria), 1890–1940, Portsmouth, NH, Oxford: Heinemann, James Currey. De Greef, E. (2018), ‘Tracing the Quiet Cultural Activism: Laduma Ngxokolo and Black Coffee’, in K. Pinther and A. Weigand (eds), Flow of Forms / Forms of Flow: Design Histories between Africa and Europe, 170–83, Bielefeld: transcript. De Negri, E. (1962), ‘Yoruba Women’s Costume’, Nigeria Magazine, 72: 10–12. De Negri, E. (1966), ‘Nigerian Textile Industry before Independence’, Nigeria Magazine, 89: 95–101. Donaldsen, J. (2019), ‘An Account of Black American Participation in the Second World Black and African Festival of Art and Culture’, in N. Edjabe and A. Adesokan (eds), Festac ’77: The 2nd World Black and African Festival of Art and Culture, Köln: Walter König. Douny, L. (2011), ‘Silk-Embroidered Garments as Transformative Processes: Layering, Inscribing and Displaying Hausa Material Identities’, Journal of Material Culture, 16 (4): 401–15. Enwezor, O., C. Basualdo, U. M. Bauer, S. Ghez, S. Maharaj, M. Nash, and O. Zaya, eds (2002), Under Siege: Four African Cities—Freetown, Johannesburg, Kinshasa, Lagos (= Documenta 11_Platform 4), Ostfildern-Ruit: Hatje Cantz. Enyeasi, K. (2016), ‘Another, 2015’, in Bozar Books (ed.), Dey Your Lane! Lagos Variations, 44–7, Gent: Snoeck Publishers. Fiofori, T. (2009), ‘Crimes of Fashion: Gaudy “Power” Dressing may amount to Crimes in Fashion’, Next on Sunday, 23 August 2009, 37. Gaestel, A. (2017a), ‘Maki Oh, And the Art of Fashion’, IAM. Intense Art Magazine. Nigeria, 1: 106–7. Gaestel, A. (2017b), ‘Versace: Following Knock-off Fashion’s Flow from Lagos to Guangzhou (and back again)’, Naatal, 1: 120–5. Gandy, M. (2005), ‘Learning from Lagos’, New Left Review, 33: 37–53. Geczy, A. and V. Karaminas, eds (2017), Critical Fashion Practice: From Westwood to Van Beirendonck, London et al.: Bloomsbury. Kwon, M. (2004), One Place after Another: Site-Specific and Locational Identity, Cambridge, MA: MIT Press. Lekko, L. (2018), ‘In the Skin of a Lion, a Leopard . . . a Man’, in N. Axel, B. Colomina, N. Hirsch, A. Vidokle, and M. Wigley (eds), Superhumanity: Design of the Self, 127–34, Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press. Mabogunje, A. (1968), Urbanization in Nigeria, London: London University Press. Maiwada, S. and E. P. Renne (2013), ‘The Kaduna Textile Industry and the Decline of Textile Manufacturing in Northern Nigeria, 1955–2010’, Textile History, 44 (2): 171–96. Mustafa, H. N. (1998), ‘Sartorial Ecumenes: African Styles in A Social and Economic Context’, in E. Van der Plas and M. Willemsen (eds), The Art of African Fashion, 13–45, Trenton, NJ, and The Hague: Africa World Press and Prince Claus Fund. Ndukwe, I. (2020), ‘Artisan Luxury’s New Focus: Nigeria’, Vogue Business, 21 August. Available online: https://www​.voguebusiness​.com​/fashion​/artisan​-luxurys​-new​-focus​-nigeria (accessed 20 January 2021). Nwafor, O. (2013), ‘The Fabric of Friendship: Aso Ebì and the Moral Economy of Amity in Nigeria’, African Studies, 72 (1): 2–18. Nwafor, O. (2021), Aso Ebi: Dress, Fashion, Visual Culture, and Urban Cosmopolitanism in West Africa. Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press. Ogbechie, S. O. (2009), ‘More on Nationalism and Nigerian Art’, African Arts, 42 (3): 9. Oguibe, O. (1998), ‘El Anatsui: “Beyond Death and Nothingness”’, African Arts, 31 (1): 48–55, 96. Okeke-Agulu, C. (2015), Postcolonial Modernism: Art and Decolonization in Twentieth-Century Nigeria, Durham: Duke University Press. Okeowo, A. (2017), ‘West Africa’s Most Daring Designer: Is Conservative Nigeria Ready for Amaka Osakwe?’ The New Yorker, 25 September. Available online: https://www​.newyorker​ .com​/magazine​/2017​/09​/25​/the​-daring​-designs​-of​-amaka​-osakwe (accessed 15 December 2020). 137

Fashioning the Afropolis Okoye, I. S. (2008), ‘Unmapped Trajectories: Early Sculpture and Architecture of a “Nigerian” Modernity’, in K. Mercer (ed.), Exiles, Diasporas and Strangers, 28–35, Cambridge, MA: MIT Press. Okoye, I. S. (2014), ‘Ojeikere and the Architecture(s) of Photography’, in A. Seikkula and B. Silva (eds), J. D. ‘Okhai Ojeikere, 25–33, Lagos: Centre for Contemporary Art. Onwuakpa, L. E. (2017), ‘Utilizing Indigenous Elements on Akwa-Ocha for Modern Fabric Design and Garments’, International Journal of Arts and Humanities (IJAH) Ethiopoia, 6 (4): 22–36. Osayimwese, I. (2019), ‘Invisible Woman: Reclaiming Josephine Ifueko Osayimwese Omigie in the History of the Zaria Art Society and Postcolonial Modernism in Nigeria’, African Arts, 52 (2): 66–79. Oti, S. (2009), Highlife Music in West Africa: Down Memory Lane. Lagos: Malthouse Press Limited. Oyeniyi, B. A. (2015), Dress in the Making of African Identity: A Social and Cultural History of the Yoruba People, Amherst: Cambria Press. Picarelli, E. (2017), ‘Dressed in Nigerianness: Maki Oh’s Fashion and Cultural Statement’, Afrosartorialism, 3 March. Available online: https://www​.afrosartorialism​.net​/2018​/07​/01​/ focus​-month​-nigeria/ (accessed 16 December 2020). Picton, J. (2010), ‘Nigeria Overview’, in J. B. Eicher and D. H. Ross (eds), Berg Encyclopedia of World Dress and Fashion, Vol. 1 Africa, 290–6, New York: Berg. Pinther, K. (2007), ‘Textiles and Photography in West Africa’, Critical Interventions. Journal of African Art History and Visual Culture, 1 (1): 106–18. Pinther, K., L. Förster, and C. Hanussek, eds (2012), Afropolis: City, Media, Art, Johannesburg: Jacana Media. Pinther, K. and A. Weigand, eds (2018), Flow of Forms/Forms of Flow: Design Histories between Africa and Europe, Bielefeld: transcript. Plankensteiner, B. (2010), ‘Silesian Linens, English Woolens, Colourful Wax Prints: A Short History of the European Textile Trade with West Africa’, in B. Plankensteiner and N. M. Adediran (eds), African Lace: A History of Trade, Creativity and Fashion in Nigeria, 57–69, Vienna and Gent: Snoeck Publishers. Plankensteiner, B. and N. M. Adediran, eds (2010), African Lace: A History of Trade, Creativity and Fashion in Nigeria, Vienna and Gent: Snoeck Publishers. Renne, E. (1995), Cloth That Does Not Die: The Meaning of Cloth in Bùnú Social Life, Seattle and London: University of Washington Press. Renne, E. and S. Maiwada, eds (2020), Textile Ascendancies: Aesthetics, Production, and Trade in Northern Nigeria, Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press. Rice, Erin (2020), ‘The Pattern of Modernity: Textiles in Art, Fashion, and Cultural Memory in Nigeria since 1960’, PhD diss., Freie Universität, Berlin. Rovine, V. (2015), African Fashion, Global Style: Histories, Innovations, and Ideas you can Wear, Bloomington and Indianapolis: Indiana University Press. Sawyer, L. (2016), ‘PLOTTING the Prevalent but Undertheorized Residential Areas of Lagos: Conceptualising a Process of Urbanisation through Grounded Theory and Comparison’, PhD diss., ETH, Zürich. Tejuoso, K. and W. Atigbi (2005), Lagos: A City at Work, Lagos: Glendora Books. Teunissen, J. (2005), ‘Global Fashion/Local Tradition: On the Globalisation of Fashion’, in J. Brand and J. Teunissen (eds), Global Fashion/Local Tradition: On the Globalisation of Fashion, 8–23, Warnsveld: Terra. Uduku, O. (2016), ‘Lagos: A Flâneur’s View’, in Bozar Books (ed.), Dey Your Lane! Lagos Variations, 182–7, Gent: Snoeck Publishers. Vaughan-Richards, A. (1967), ‘Future Architectural Design’, Nigeria Magazine, 93: 107–114.

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rana elnemr with alaa abo el goud

1. A lyrebird. Similar to a peacock, but with a tail that resembles the musical instrument ‘lyre’. The string instrument was widely used in Ancient Egyptian rituals. The feathers still inspire eyeliner strokes and henna tattoo motifs today.

Some moments in this city cannot be fully absorbed. Trying to absorb them only creates a feeling of entanglement and immobility. There are as many mechanisms to navigate dense and complex cities as intertwined knots.

2. Staircase pattern. Monotype test on dammour (= local cotton-threaded fabric). Part of Home, 2019, a clothes and wearables design collection by aag.

The two of us, rana elnemr (ren) and alaa abo el goud (aag), approach our city knots with similar techniques: we recognize a knot, skim through random fragments of it, then we rise above the knot and float.

3, 4. Core of the fruit of Calotropis Procera. In the 20th century, the fruit of this wild tree common to the North African Desert had many uses, such as extracting glue, textile making, medicine and magic. Nowadays, the tree and its fruit are overlooked locally. ren and aag picked the fruit from various trees in New Cairo City and around the neighbourhood of Maadi.

It takes some detachment from the reality of the streets to physically walk through them, while remaining rooted inside our bodies. Our social bodies and minds build strong ties with non-human beings on the street. We subtly acknowledge their active public presence. Occasionally, we also exchange passionate messages with them. A few times we ask for help and protection, which we receive in cosmically-powered and delivered magic.

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5. Detail of silkscreen print. Dress designed and printed by aag. Cottonduck Fabric. 2018. 6, 7. Workers on a construction site in Cairo’s expanding urban settings. Contractors provide the workers with standard safety accessories. The workers improvise layers of clothes and shelter and they create a temporary sense of home in Egypt’s New Desert City.

Fashioning the Afropolis 1, 2. In-studio textile experimentations with Calotropis Procera. aag explores the texture of the fibres in the core of the fruit. A few sources indicate that they were used in the past for weaving linens of high ranking priests. Nowadays, the fibres are used in some Kenyan and Indian communities to produce vegan wool.

3–5. Experimentation to establish the general characteristics of Calotropis Procera. ren explores how the core of the fruit bonds with air and water.

6–12. Finished pieces, design illustrations and various technique tests for Home. Home is a clothes & wearables design collection by aag, 2019. 6. Hand-drawn illustration for clothes and model. 7. Detail from finished jacket. 8–10. Printing experiments in collage, monotype and embroidery. 11, 12. Key-clock pendant and the Sun-piano pendant. Material: brass. Technique: doming and enamel.

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13, con res Con bloc re-i pipe hou faci buil City

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13, 14. Temporary constructions for residents and workers. Connecting the residential block with the street, while re-installing infrastructural pipes. Sheltered doorman housing and storage facility for an office building site. New Cairo City. 2020.

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1. Calotropis Procera aesthetic observations in aag’s studio. aag’s work and living-space is where her old and new objects can be found in a fluid domain offering mixing and bonding possibilities. She sews a top with fruit peel and hanging fibre and seed balls. Fibre and seeds are also used for the necklace and brooch. At a future stage, she will explore the relationship of the fruit to temperature and its ability to transmit or protect from heat and cold. 2. Plastic bag of Baby Center. aag’s parents’ baby and children’s clothes shop in the 1980s in one of her hometowns Desouk. aag has been involved in her parents’ clothing business since she was a child. She accompanied them to clothing factories and fashion shows and she often tried out new models as the family collectively decided whether they were comfortable and sellable. aag’s old objects are all functionable elements in her studio. Her current wardrobe contains items she had as a nine-year-old child and still wears it today.

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Cairo Ascending 3. 3. Silk fabric. Brought as a fromfrom Silk fabric. Brought asgift a gift 3.Oman, Silkby fabric. Brought as a gift from Oman, aag’s latelate grandmother by aag’s grandmother Oman, by aag’s late grandmother Sabreya forfor aag’s mother, Azza. aagaag Sabreya aag’s mother, Azza. Sabreya for aag’s mother, Azza. aag recently cut the fabric in two halves recently cut the fabric in two halves and took her half to the studio for recently cut the fabric in two halves and took her half to the studio afor a new design. and took her half to the studio for a new design. new design. 4. Dress of late grandmother 4. Dress of late grandmother Sabreya hadgrandmother sewn it herself. 4.Sabreya Dresswho ofwho late had sewn it herself. aag took it to thehad studio after Sabreya sewn it her herself. aag tookwho it to the studio after her grandmother passed awayafter in 2020. aag took it to the studio her grandmother passed away in 2020. She wore it to dinner a friend in grandmother passedwith away in 2020. She wore it to dinner with a friend in aShe Cairo restaurant. wore it to dinner with a friend in a Cairo restaurant. a Cairo restaurant. 5. Temporary bridges for the 5. Temporary bridges for the residents to access their street, 5. Temporary bridges for the residents to access their street, while infrastructural being residents to accesspipes theirare street, while infrastructural pipes are being re-installed in New Cairo City, while infrastructural pipes are2020. being re-installedininNew NewCairo CairoCity, City,2020. 2020. Metaphorically, connectors may re-installed Metaphorically, connectors may widen and/or shorten the gaps Metaphorically, connectors may between a home and everything widenand/or and/or shorten thegaps gaps widen shorten the else outside. between homeand andeverything everything between aahome else outside. else outside. 6. Detail of finished dress with twirling arms. Gabardine fabricwith and Detail finished dress 6.6.Detail ofoffinished dress with laser-cut gabardine strips 2019. twirling arms.Gabardine Gabardine fabricand and twirling arms. fabric laser-cutgabardine gabardinestrips strips2019. 2019. laser-cut 7. Spinning toy from aag’s childhood. Rotating coloured Spinning toyfrom from aag’s 7.7.Spinning toy aag’s objects are an inspiration for many childhood.Rotating Rotatingcoloured coloured childhood. of aag’s designs. objectsare arean aninspiration inspirationfor formany many objects ofaag’s aag’sdesigns. designs. 8.ofGetting to know Calotropis Procera. Exploring the visual Gettingtotoknow know Calotropis 8.8.Getting characteristics, as wellCalotropis as the air, Procera. Exploring theancient visual Procera. Exploring the visual memory and aura of this characteristics, as well asthe theair, air, characteristics, as well plant. In ren’s studio with as candle memory andaura auraofofthis thisancient ancient memory and music.and plant. plant.InInren’s ren’sstudio studiowith withcandle candle and andmusic. music.

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Fashioning the Afropolis 1.Temporary pedestrian passage cutting through a construction site in Cairo’s upper-class neighbourhood Zamalek. A Duranta Erecta plant squeezes itself between the wooden boards. When running errands nearby, ren acknowledges the plant’s intervention. She wears a communicative outfit and make-up and sits underneath the branches for a while. Hair, styling and photo by aag. Eye make-up by ren. 2020.

2–5. Friends with Calotropis Procera. What starts as the process of exploring the plant’s characteristics, gradually becomes a time for the artist and the plant to get to know each other. ren is playing with the fruit in her studio. 6. ren’s eye make-up. Connecting to the plant, insects and bird feathers, through bodily non-verbal communication. 7. aag testing her walk on the counter in the studio. Catwalk or bird walk. Dress is part of Home, 2019.

rana elnemr is a visual artist based and working with Cairo’s art scene and larger urban environment. Her artistic practice moves from formalist explorations of photography as a medium to genre-bending visual essays of her surroundings in Egypt. Her practice is anchored in questioning what it means to live and experience place and time, through recording, describing and reflecting via photography, film, texts and conversations.

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ren’s artistic process incorporates formal image-making techniques with contemporary artistic practices and it strives to integrate various forms of collaboration in different constellations, such as transdisciplinary work and alternative pedagogical practices among many others. She was one of the founders of the Contemporary Image Collective (CIC) in 2004 and is currently the chair of the board and an active member.

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alaa abo el goud graduated in fashion and textile in 2019. She is alaa alaa abo abo el goud el goud graduated graduated in in passionate about contemporary, fashion fashion andand textile textile in 2019. in 2019. She She is is abstract and organic arts that inspire passionate passionate about about contemporary, contemporary, her practice. She uses diverse abstract abstract andand organic organic artsarts thatthat inspire inspire mediums like fashion design, jewellery herher practice. practice. She She uses uses diverse diverse design, styling and visual arts. She mediums mediums likelike fashion fashion design, design, jewellery jewellery believes that learning is by practising design, design, styling styling andand visual visual arts. arts. She She and collaborating. She participated believes believes thatthat learning learning is by is by practising practising in several internships, trainings and collaborating. She participated andand collaborating. She participated collective self-initiated projects during, in several in several internships, internships, trainings trainings andand and after her academic study years. collective collective self-initiated self-initiated projects projects during, during, after academic study years. andand after herher academic study years. Home, 2019, is a clothes, wearables and accessories design project Home, Home, 2019, 2019, is aisclothes, a clothes, wearables wearables and collection by alaa abo el andand accessories accessories design design project project goud. Through it she explores andand collection collection by by alaa alaa aboabo el el personal attachments and illusions. goud. goud. Through Through it she it she explores explores Based on storytelling, the fabrics, personal personal attachments attachments andand illusions. illusions. wearable pieces and illustrations Based Based on on storytelling, storytelling, thethe fabrics, fabrics, outline personal narratives that are wearable wearable pieces pieces andand illustrations illustrations symbolized by figures and numbers. outline personal narratives outline personal narratives thatthat areare Techniques: embroidery, patchwork, symbolized symbolized by by figures figures andand numbers. numbers. fabric manipulation, monotype, brass Techniques: Techniques: embroidery, embroidery, patchwork, patchwork, doming and enamel. fabric fabric manipulation, manipulation, monotype, monotype, brass brass doming doming andand enamel. enamel.

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8 8. Floating. Illustration is part of Home, 2019. 8. Floating. 8. Floating. Illustration Illustration is is partpart of Home, of Home, 2019. 2019.

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PART III BODIES AND MEDIA

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CHAPTER 8 TRANS-WORLDING FELA KUTI’S SARTORIAL REBELLION AND PAN-AFRICAN INFLUENCE Nomusa Makhubu

Fela in Versace, Mandela in a Rari The Versace burns. In Fela in Versace (2018), a music video by the South African rapper AKA (Kiernan Jarryd Forbes) and Nigerian producer Kiddominant (Ayoola Oladapo Agboola), the Versace melts like plastic in a fire (Figure 8.1). Citing the South African working-class youth dandy subculture, izikhothane, which is notorious for the flaunting and public burning of branded clothes, Fela in Versace is jarring.1 The indulgent images of flashy izikhothane burning various expensive belts, shirts and trousers while dressed in colourful Versace shirts and conspicuous jewellery, women in leotards and bikinis holding Versace shirts over a fire, and mansions with all kinds of bourgeois ephemera are indiscriminately blended with murals depicting Fela Anikulapo-Kuti and Bantu Steven Biko. Why the reference to Fela in this video? Juxtaposing anti-colonial political icons with the conspicuous consumption of global brands, Fela in Versace seems incongruent. In fact, in his response to the video, the journalist Carlos Ncube (2018) opines that ‘the reference to the progenitor of Afrobeat would have the legend rolling in his grave . . . rolling a joint that is, because Fela had more important things to get angry about than a couple of strutting frat boys’ and that ‘izikhothane, who burn designer clothes out of material infantility . . . are no longer relevant’. Indeed, Versace and Ferrari, epitomizing material wealth and accumulation, contradict the political ideals that Fela embodied. What is striking about this correlation, however, is the consistency of sartorial rebellion as a particular form of trans-worlding. By trans-worlding, I am referring to the mediation of styles to prefigure space through fashioning radical identities in the context of forced historical displacement and dispossession. Space-making, as I will argue, is central to Fela’s pan-Africanist decolonial praxis. I am interested in how Fela’s persona and music reach across the continent and historical periods. Trans-worlding is taken as a spatio-temporal concept, used here as a way of exploring the paradoxes of being Black-in-the-world.2 Jill Koyama (2020: 7) defines trans-worlding as ‘a traversing, a disruption of worlding in which the [subject] reject[s], in favor of something more fluid, more possible – a combination of the imagined, the actual . . . .’ For Koyama, worlding is normative, it is ‘the power to inscribe the world and to cover up its practices of colonizing . . . . Worlding is to appropriate and re-appropriate what is – knowledge, power, norms, common sense,

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Figure 8.1 Still from Fela in Versace, AKA ft Kiddominant, Dir. Nate Thomas, Vevo. © Okayafrica, 2018.

and nonsense’ (Koyama citing Das Gupta 2020: 7). Worlding is place-taking as opposed to space-making, which is about transforming ‘daily life into an arena of political contest’ (Koyama citing Das Gupta 2020: 6). Here I explore trans-worlding as place-transforming and space-making by analysing Fela’s sartorial repertoires and their recurrence in the arts and popular culture across the African continent. Fela, a pioneering pan-Africanist activist and composer, exemplifies fearless political resistance and the rejection of bourgeois sensibilities. It is not just in his defiant antiestablishment lyrics, agitating against colonial mentality, government corruption, rogue policing and Eurocentrism, but also in his public persona and lifestyle which popularized African styles and shunned imperialist capitalism. Fela inspired Africa-centred sartorial styles through his tight-fitting outfits with embroidered geometric designs found in agbada and aso oke attire, ankara suits, references to ori face and body painting as well as his unclothed (underpants only) public appearances. Fela’s sartorial choices are deeply tied to displacing the ‘hold’ of the European imagination on the African body and space and, as an anti-colonial gesture, rearticulating Africanisms. The dandyist is’khothane sartorial rebellion in Fela in Versace differs from Fela’s rebellion, but the spatial politics is similar in the dismantling of capitalist symbols. Although this subculture originated specifically in economically segregated Black urban townships, it aimed to reclaim space in the world for marginalized Black youth. As Koyi Mchunu (2017: 137) points out, izikhothane seek to find ‘a sense of purpose and worth in an otherwise disorienting and debilitating post-apartheid urban scape whose built form seems . . . randomly put together from heterogeneous fragments and reminders of material and mental urban elsewhere’s’. Unlike Fela, izikhothane are regarded as apolitical but, in their destruction of bourgeois trappings, perform sartorial rebellion. Unemployed and working-class izikhothane attain commodities and bourgeois lifestyles but, as I argued elsewhere, they reflect ‘the destructive nature of [global] capitalism’ and 150

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‘appropriate, in order to subvert, the propensity of the middle class and bourgeoisie for [carefree] dispensing [and disposal] of excess’ (Makhubu 2021: 288). Conversely, Fela came from a middle-class family but abjured modern governance and rejected individualist bourgeois ideals. In his own words, he asserts: ‘I didn’t participate in the madness of commercialism, I did not want to participate in gimmicks, I did not want African music to belong to the fashion where music comes and goes’ (Kuti 1988). Instead, he states: ‘what I really want to project is the happenings in the African continent itself ’ and he sought to uncover the ‘alien system that guides our minds’ (Kuti 1988). It is not so much the contrast between Fela and izikhothane, however, that is of concern. Rather, it is the transcription of Fela’s life and work onto spatio-temporal matrices of Black trans-worlding. In Fela in Versace, Fela’s life and work are transcribed onto the spatial imaginaries of contemporary urban youth. Fela’s sartorial rebellion, and that of izikhothane, converge in their quest for spatial emancipation, from confining, displacing and alienating geo-histories. Sartorial rebellion remains a visibilizing political gesture and, in the independence decades, it visually and materially expressed the anti-colonial Africanisms. For example, Nelson Rolihlahla Mandela appeared at the Pretoria Trial in 1962 wearing full Xhosa regalia, including ‘a jackal skin kaross’, which he was ordered to take off by white officials but refused to do so (Maynard 2004: 68). However, even Mandela came to be known for his loose-fitting Versace-style colourful shirts, now popularly known as ‘the Madiba shirts’. A totalitarian leader such as Mobutu Sese Seko typically wore a leopard-print fez and the ‘Mao style tunic called an abacost – short for a bas la costume, or down with the suit’ to replace the European suits which he banned as part of his retour à l’authenticité (return to authenticity) cultural reform (Ford 2021: 350). The abacost later became ‘an international symbol of the corrupt postcolonial autocrat’ (Ford 2021). These examples attest to the struggle against the hegemony of sartorial modes that represent the European world. They manifest as the double presence of external and internal colonial Europe in Africa, in the transplanting of European architecture and institutional cultures, producing geographical and cultural paradoxes and contention. Dress styles, especially those mediated through ideological antagonisms, are trans-worlding: transforming the everyday into sites of contest.

‘I Know What to Wear but My Friends Don’t Know’: Contradandyism, sartorial resistance and space-making On 15 October 2017, a date that would have marked Fela’s seventy-ninth birthday, a statue of Fela, ‘The Liberation Statue’, by the artist Abolore Sobayo was unveiled in Ikeja. It depicted only the clothes that Fela typically wore and was based on the iconic 1968 Leni Sinclair photograph of Fela, where he stood with raised fists symbolizing Black Power. Similarly, the statue emulates this radical gesture. The headless, handless statue was accepted by the Kuti family because, as his daughter Yeni Kuti put it, Fela 151

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‘hated statues’ (Johnson 2020). At the unveiling, the former governor of Lagos State, Akinwunmi Ambode, announced that the statue ‘celebrate[d] a man who voluntarily turned his back on a life of privilege, and took up his saxophone as a weapon to fight for the liberation of our people from neo-colonialism and bad governance’ (Johnson 2020). In 2020, the statue was removed from its location to make way for the reconstruction of an intersection, not far from the Kalakuta Museum, Fela’s former home. There are two notions here that are instructive. The first is the representation of Fela as his clothing and the second is the spatial metaphor of the intersection. The former is symbolic, while the latter may be incidental but helps in thinking through the spatial politics in Fela’s work. The statue presents a spatial metaphor of an intersection, of being located at the crossroads, which as Akinwumi Adesokan (2011: 10) notes ‘is the mythical home of Eshu (or Elegbara, Legba), [the trickster god in the Yoruba cosmology and] the West African spirit of chance, contingency and hermeutics’. It ‘encapsulates the philosophical and practical dynamics of cultural pluralism’ and is ‘a complex site of resistance’ (Adesokan 2011: 7, 10). In this is a subversion of hierarchy and a malleability and plurality akin to the concept of trans-worlding. Fela’s clothes are used to symbolize him not only in the statue but also at the Kalakuta Museum. Located on Gbemisola Street, not far from the intersection, the museum displays Fela’s underpants, shirts and shoes, among other paraphernalia. His outfits are iconic and although Fela was known not only for his choice of clothing but also for deliberately choosing not to wear clothing and making public appearances in his underpants. Fela’s sartorial choices also represent a transitional period in Nigeria – a temporal intersection. Finishing school in the late 1950s, he played for the band Cool Cats led by the trumpeter Victor Olaiya, who was one of the pioneers of highlife music and ‘performed for the dandy crowds’. Like Olaiya, Fela was immersed in the politics of postindependence Nigeria. Olaiya’s highlife music is said to ‘evoke memories of the fading British Empire and transition to independence, conjuring up images of afro hair combed into a dome, of middle-class Nigerians appearing overdressed in tuxedos and gowns with a cigarette neatly tucked between the fingers’ (Orijinmo 2020). In this transitional period, the local elite imbibed the class segregation of British paternalism (Oti 2009: 5) or as Mamdani (1996: 16) puts it, the bifurcation of colonial civil society. The British created what Oti calls ‘mini-apartheid’: settler publics that are distinct from indigenous publics. With the decline of the European clubs, Oti (2009: 5) notes that the local elite sought spaces that similarly offered the luxuries of British social life and ‘initiated the funding of corresponding African clubs’ but ‘serve[d] as recreation for Africans who have wished to be Europeans’ (2009). They held a ‘snobbish attitude towards early forms of highlife’ which would change as the elite gained political consciousness and highlife became a reservoir for nationalist cultural repertories and middle-class libertarian ideals (2009). Highlife musicians were critical of this, and most lyrics in highlife music are based on the politics of class and cultural assimilation. Fela, who was influenced by highlife and went on to create Afrobeat, was likewise conscious of this. The oft-cited example is captured in the lyrics of his 1973 song, Gentleman: 152

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Africa hot, I like am so I know what to wear but my friends don’t know Him put him socks, him put him shoe Him put him pant, him put him singlet Him put him trouser, him put him shirt Him put him tie, him put him coat Him come cover all with him hat Him be gentleman Him go sweat all over Him go faint right down Him go smell like shit Him go piss for body, him no go know Me I no be gentleman like that The well-dressed local ‘gentleman’ dandy fused European and local styles. Although Fela used to wear ‘gentlemen’ suits in his early 1960s performances with the Koola Lobitos band, this changed as he travelled. He criticized the postcolonial dandy and European cultural influences as retrogressive ‘colo-mentality’, as he termed it in his 1981 song, where he admonishes that ‘De ting wey black no good, Na foreign things them dey like’. Here, he points to the Fanonian complex where Black people’s acceptance of lifestyles that inferiorize Black cultures demonstrates postcolonial contradictions. Fela’s music and performances gained prominence in the historical context of wealth accumulation in Nigeria in the 1970s. Following the Nigerian-Biafran war in 1970, Nigeria formally joined the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) in 1971, paving the way to its oil boom and giving rise to the middle class. Nigeria, as Andrew Apter (2005: 2) describes it, presented ‘a spectacle of opulence . . . as a major oil producer on the international scene’. Nigeria was ‘awash with petrodollars’ (Apter 2005: 3). In this milieu were pan-African transnational festivals that centred on negritude and Black solidarity. The international event coordinated by the Nigerian government, the Second World Black and African Festival of Arts and Culture, Festac ’77, in particular, was different in that it ‘produced a Nigerian vision of the Black and African world . . . that reflected the global circuits of oil in an expansive model of racial equivalence and inclusion’ (Apter 2005: 3). Rebelling against this, Fela organized a ‘counter-Festac’ at the Afrika Shrine (Sosibo 2020). The flourishing economy engendered a cosmopolitan ‘worldliness’ of an elite that was well travelled and that mediated fashions and styles from different parts of the world. Take the work of Iké Udé who is known for his Beyond Decorum, Cover Girl series and Sartorial Anarchy, for example. Udé, whose work is characterized as cosmopolitan postdandyism (Ragusa 2016), featured in the exhibition Black President: The Art and Legacy of Fela Anikulapo-Kuti curated by Trevor Schoonmaker at the New Museum, New York, in 2003. Nigerian Vogue (1994), featured in the exhibition, depicts Udé posing next to a female collaborator, dressed in a headwrap and neckpiece, both topless, reminiscent of 153

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Fela’s shirtless stage appearances. As with classic works of Udé, this image is designed as a cover page for Vogue magazine, and bears the text: ‘Fela Anikulapo Kuti and the Enigma’. As an ideological space, the magazine cover presents the contours of global mediascapes, to cite Appadurai (1990: 9), which match the relationship between imagecentred ideals and their attainment in reality. Paying homage to Fela, however, Udé’s photograph interrupts the visual language of magazines, representing the abstract space of the marketplace, the intersection or crossroads or the abode of the trickster, where identities are fluid. Although Fela caricatured dandies, Black dandyism is considered a counterculture (Miller 2009) and the Black dandy is seen as ‘a rebel – a modern-day representation of the African trickster’ who is ‘a self-fashioned gentleman [and] intentionally coopts and then complicates classical European fashion with an African diasporan aesthetic and sensibilities’ (Lewis 2015: 55). Fela took this further in an anarchist direction and can be defined as a contra dandy who aligned himself with global Africanisms such as the Black Panther movement. In this paradoxical politicocultural matrix of dandyism, the Black contra dandy powerfully disrupts the classic subjecthood-objecthood dialectic, claiming the right to occupy space rather than being defined by it. Contra-dandyism rebels against injustice, locating race and self-presentation between tropes of humiliation or victimhood and dignity, power and powerlessness. To return to the earlier example of the South African dandy, isikhothane, who seeks dignity through expensive clothes, izikhothane were seen as ‘victims of the neo-liberal dominant culture where the accumulation [of] material wealth is the driving force’ and as ‘victims of post-modern lifestyles who are socialised under an intergenerational culture of poverty and underdevelopment’ (Tshishonga 2016: 17). Koyi Mchunu (2017: 138) argues that izikhothane ‘reflect deep-seated spiritual malaise and nihilism in South Africa that cannot be assuage [sic] by the marketplace’. The perception that izikhothane pressurize their working-class parents for money and expensive clothes which they burn was portrayed in the media, as Alice Inggs and Karl Kemp (2016) observe, to create ‘the new exotica, a hybrid of contemporary materialism and freaky Africana’. Seeking to absolve izikhothane, Inggs and Kemp (2016) argued that the negative ‘look at me, I can afford this’ culture was exaggerated in the media by feeding off the images of burning, latching onto an all-too-familiar Black township narrative. Tshepo Pitsa (also known as The Don Dada), the poster child of izikhothane, emphasized that the burning of clothes was not as widespread as it was made to seem. This dandyism was in part a portrayal of a Black world devouring itself in its aim to emulate the bourgeoisie. In this struggle over image politics, with its burden of authenticity and the colonial imagination of Africans and what they should look like, is the precarity of Black subjecthood. Fela’s sartorial resistance, with its unapologetic rejection of colonial styles, is similarly located in the politics of Black subjecthood. His contra-dandyism, garnered from a global pan-African outlook, is an example of trans-worlding, of making the space for rebellious decolonial praxis. 154

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Lady – prefigurative worlds of the Africa moderns and the retrofuturist politic In a tribute to Fela and the Kalakuta queens, the Nigeria-based musician Patoranking (Patrick Nnaemeka Okorie) created the Lenge Lenge music video (Figures 8.2 and 8.3). Wearing exquisite ankara styles, haute couture and indigenous face paint, the women who surround Patoranking represent the Kalakuta queens. Patoranking recreates photographs of Fela surrounded by the Kalakuta queens, some of which were taken by the French photographer, Bernard Matussiere. In Lenge Lenge some of the women wear red Edo coral beads. Patoranking was also dressed in clothing influenced by Fela. In the background is a collage portrait of Fela. This transposing of the images of the Kalakuta queens and Fela evokes what I have termed elsewhere as retrofuturist, ‘the idealisation of the past to articulate present and future social conditions’ – an idea which I will develop further here (Makhubu 2021: 285). Entrenched in sartorial rebellion, the retrofuturist aesthetic defines the contradictions in the recuperation of classic African styles and colonial entanglement. The inclination towards ‘traditional’ African styles, for example, can be understood in different ways. Colonial retrofuturism, central to late European modernism, is the primitivist conceptualization of Africa in a timeless past. Neocolonial retrofuturism recuperates traditional African styles to define African modernism. Like Léopold Sédar Senghor’s cultural nationalist ideology, negritude, it is typecast through geometric designs, ‘rhythm’ and the ‘dancing woman’. It was criticized for its de-politicization, romanticization and

Figure 8.2  Alexander-Julian Gibbson, Lenge Lenge. 155

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Figure 8.3  Bernard Matussiere, Fela surrounded by the Kalakuta queens, around 1982, Film Kodachrome 2, 35-millimetre camera. © Bernard Matussiere.

transmutation of colonial retrofuturism. Different kinds of retrofuturist aesthetics could be probed, although not necessarily as taxonomic but exploratory. Fela’s recuperation of African styles, aimed at critiquing the mechanisms of power, presents an anti-colonial retrofuturism. Another arises in the recuperation of modern styles into contemporary popular culture such as Fela’s sartorial styles in Fela in Versace and Lenge Lenge, as some examples among many. What becomes apparent is the gendered nature of retrofuturism. Evoking negritude’s ‘dancing woman’ in a male-steered postcolonial modernity succeeding a male-led colonialism, the interpretation of African ‘traditions’ portrays women as accessories. Both in Fela in Versace and Lenge Lenge, the Kalakuta queens are interpreted as mere gyrating bodies accessorizing the man. It is the beads, skirts, scant dresses and hairstyles that remain in the translation of women in contemporary popular culture, even though the women were otherwise vital to Fela’s career. Given the nuanced interpretations of Fela’s life and work by musicians such as Lágbájá and in some theatrical productions, this point cannot be generalized. However, it is particularly striking how gender hierarchies are cast as traditionally African. These transposed Fela-influenced contemporary visual narratives eclipsed the political work and influence of women such as Funmilayo Ransome-Kuti, Fela’s mother, a trade unionist, communist, pan-Africanist, women’s rights activist and key political figure. She formed the national Abeokuta Women’s Union in 1947 and co-founded the National Council of Nigeria and the Cameroons (NCNC). When she was expelled, she formed the Commoner’s People’s Party. Fela was deeply influenced by his mother 156

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whose political activism was inspired by nineteenth-century feminists such as Madam Efunroye Tinubu, a trader and Egba nationalist (Johnson-Odim and Mba 1997: 6). He referred to his mother as an Aje, stating: ‘In the spirit world, women are Aje [normally interpreted as “witch”]. The Aje whose physical manifestation could be womanhood is a spirit being with potentially positive and/or negative energies. . . . The Aje rules us, rules the world, even when men assume that they have the edge. My mother is Aje, and so are all our sisters and wives’ (Salami 2013). Women are central to understanding Fela’s sartorial rebellion. His ensemble was never without women dancers and backup singers whose classic African hairstyles and exuberant indigenous sartorial styles could be seen as political practice. They reinforced a bold set of sartorial repertoires for African femininities at a time when western hegemony suppressed the natural progression and development of local cultures. As Wilfred Okiche (2018) acknowledges: There is no Fela without the women. They cannot just be heard on countless recordings joyously chanting ‘open and close’. They were an intrinsic and extricable part of the artistic legacy associated with Fela. Their striking fashion statements, creative use of beads, headgear, body art and Ankara prints remain indelible in today’s culture. Their graphic representations are rendered in music videos by pop stars from Wizkid to Niniola and in glossy magazine photo spreads. But despite this rich legacy and gorgeous imagery, the stories and lives of Fela’s women have rarely been explored. Fela’s views on women are contradictory. While he was married to Remilekun Taylor, Fela also married the twenty-seven Kalakuta queens in a single ceremony in 1978. He divorced them in 1986. This undermined the Eurocentric heteronormative nuclear family as a unit for the accumulation of private property in which the wife is a possession, child bearer and domestic servant. For some, the marriage of twenty-seven women dancers ‘conferred’ upon them ‘the respectability of being married’ (Moore 2009: 5), while for others it demonstrated Fela’s sexism and misogyny (Babalola 2018). Derek Stanovsky (1998) warns, however, against seeing polygyny as misogyny. He points out that it is not the polygamy that is the source of his misogyny. This portrayal of Fela, he argues, ‘feeds the western stereotypes of Black masculinity as dangerously hyper-sexual, and provides an imagined foundation for these stereotypes in African tribal culture’ (Stanovsky 1998). The reverence for some women and the scorn show the contradictions embedded in retrofuturist aesthetics. Fela is known to have explicitly stated: ‘To call me a sexist . . . for me it’s still not a negative name. If I’m a sexist, it’s a gift. Not everybody can fuck two women every day. So if I can fuck two women every day and they don’t like it, I’m sorry for them. I just like it.’ (Salami 2013). His music also raised questions about his views on gender equality. Take, for example, the song Mattress (1975), in which Fela says, ‘Anything wey we dey sleep on top, call am for me, mattress, mattress. So, when I say woman na mattress, I no lie’ and Lady (1972). 157

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In the latter song, Fela juxtaposes the servile African woman and independent Lady. The African woman ‘go dance the fire dance’ but she also ‘know him man na master, She go cook for am, She go do anything he say’. The African woman may be fierce but she would still regard the man as a master. Lady, on the other hand, ‘She go say him equal to man, She go say him get power like man, She go say anything man do himself fit do.’ Lady will not cook for a man nor wait on him – ‘lady na master’. The songs Lady (1972) and Gentleman (1973) reflect western gender sensibilities: the ‘gentleman’, flustered in his hot European suits, and ‘lady’ smoking a cigar. They also reveal Fela’s stance towards feminism. Contrarily, feminist theorists such as Minna Salami (2013) argue that Lady (1972) is a feminist anthem since the first lines in the song (‘If you call am woman, African woman no go ‘gree, she go say, she go say, “I be lady, oh”’) implies that Lady and African woman are the same person. Highlighting Fela’s complexity, Tejumola Olaniyan (2004: 112) distinguishes ‘three hierarchical groups’ into which the women in Fela’s life can be divided. In the highest rung is Funmilayo Ransome-Kuti, his mother and major activist for women’s rights. Then there were women he regarded as his equals, for example, Remilekun Taylor and Sandra Smith Isidore, a singer and Black Panther Party member. In the third category are ‘all the other women he harboured . . . and subsequently married’, known today as the Kalakuta queens (Olaniyan 2004: 112). This understanding is deeply flawed and justifies the dismissal of the Kalakuta queens, who are often referred to collectively in relation to their singing, dancing and clothing styles. It is through rare productions such as the musical titled Fela and the Kalakuta Queens, directed by Bolanle Austin-Peters, that one learns more about the queens. Trans-worlding locates gender as fluid, unsettled and embattled in masculine historiography and its transcription over space and sovereignty. The women who were a key part of Fela’s work reflect prefigurative politics – the lived practice of changing the current world to achieve a future one.

Uniform/pluriform – trans-worlding the nation If you know dem for Alagbon/ Make you tell dem make dem hear Uniform na cloth, na tailor dey sew am/ Tailor dey sew am like your dress/ Tailor dey sew am like your dress / Nothing special about uniform In an interview, Fela Kuti (1988) posed the question: ‘What is making Africans retrogress?’ Retrogression is how he characterized the entrenchment of European ideals in neocolonial governance and violent militarism, as well as injustice. It points directly to the disregard for Black African life through state policing. Police to Fela were like zombies (Zombie, 1977) who take any command: ‘Go and kill, Go and die, Go and 158

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quench, Put ’em for reverse!’. Having suffered at the hands of the Nigerian government, enduring periodical extrajudicial beatings, raids and incarceration, Fela rejected national sovereignty. His rebellion against the Obasanjo government led to the raiding of his commune and the killing of his mother, who was thrown out of the building and later succumbed to her injuries in 1978. The military uniform which Fela desecrates in the 1974 song Alagbon Close came to symbolize state violence. Fela’s rage about the indignity he and his band members suffered at the hands of the police is projected in the album Alagbon Close, named after the street of the Lagos police headquarters, where Fela was detained without trial. Military and police uniforms feature on the album covers that were painted by the artist Lemi Ghariokwu. Faceless men in blue uniforms, carrying batons and stomping over bodies in a chaotic pursuit to ransack the Kalakuta Republic, fill the cover of the album Kalakuta Show. Uniforms in violent clashes also feature on the album covers of Zombie, Alagbon Close, Beasts of No Nation, Confusion Break Bone and Sorrow Tears and Blood. The uniform, as Fela mocks it, is nothing special, ‘uniform na cloth’, but seems to grant extrajudicial rights to those who wear it. This alludes to what Hannah Arendt (1963) termed the ‘banality of evil’, evil that defies moral judgement carried out by people who perform violence as a banal everyday activity that is part of their jobs.3 The government is represented in Fela’s music and on the album covers by Ghariokwu as inherently criminal. Fela’s albums International Thief Thief (ITT), Beasts of No Nation, Coffin for Head of State and Confusion Break Bone are some examples. The heads of political and military leaders depicted on the cover of Confusion Break Bone are dressed in suits and military garb in a big question mark: ‘which head never steal?’. There is a fleeing armed policeman and a coffin breaking open to reveal a skeletal corpse. The covers were as much a part of the art and activism as the lyrics. Take the directed rage against then-president Olusegun Obasanjo by Fela in his Coffin for Head of State, which mourns his mother and documents the demonstration that he and the Movement of the People (MOP), the political organization that Fela established in 1979, performed by taking the coffin to the Dodan military barracks. He sings: I go many places I go government places I see see see All the bad bad bad things Them they do do do Them steal all the money Them kill many students Them burn many houses Them burn my house too Them kill my mama So I carry the coffin I waka waka waka 159

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Movement of the People Them waka waka waka Young African Pioneers ... We go Obalende We go Dodan barracks We reach them gate o We put the coffin down Obasanjo dey there With him big fat stomach Yar’Adua dey there With him neck like ostrich We put the coffin down This rage is also captured in the speech Fela delivers on the occasion, emphasizing that his mother ‘fought her blood for this country on the streets!’. The cover also includes a collage of newspaper articles reporting the complicity of the Nigerian government in political scandals (Figure 8.4). Beasts of No Nation indicts Mobutu Sese Seko, Margaret Thatcher, P. W. Botha, Ronald Reagan, Muhammadu Buhari and Babatunde Idiagbon, who are all wearing devil horns and vampire fangs. The United Nations delegates are portrayed as rats. This is contrasted

Figure 8.4  Lemi Ghariokwu, Beast of No Nation, 1989. © Lemi Ghariokwu. 160

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with demonstrators who, as Ghariokwu (2013) notes, ‘wear Black Power sunglasses while their pink tracksuits pulsate with pastel against the sombre palette of their enemies. Fela’s costume is the same exuberant pink, and their gestures are echoed in his triumphant Black Power salute, as he faces them across the frame, while the offending judge cowers at his feet.’ Beasts of No Nation, which Ghariokwu (2013) explains is BONN, an acronym referring to what was ‘once [the] de facto capital city of West Germany’ between 1949 and 1990. It states: Beasts of No Nation, military British, Many leaders as you see dem Na different disguise dem dey oh Animal in human skin Animal-i put-u tie oh Animal-i wear agbada Animal-i put-u suit-u Fela characterizes the depicted presidents and prime ministers as wolves in sheep coats (animals in suits and agbadas). Fela’s work showed not only state repression but also the failure to provide basic services in health, education and sanitation, as well as the greed and rapid wealth accumulated by the elite. Take, for example, the album cover of No Buredi (No Bread) (1975), which portrays people begging and dying of starvation. A man wears a yellow T-shirt stating ‘My Brother Udoji No Reach me O!’. Another man blows bubble gum which is inscribed ‘Mr Inflation is in Town’.4 There is also a man in a white mask carrying a bucket of shit, referring to Fela’s ordeal with the police where a marijuana joint was planted at the Kalakuta Republic in a ploy to arrest him, but Fela swallowed it and was sent to Alagbon prison where he was expected to defecate so that evidence of the drug could be found. The album Expensive Shit mocks this absurdity of a repressive government. The 1980 Black President album collates work demonstrating Fela’s disdain for Nigerian heads of state. In 1979, Fela was prevented from running for president. The Kalakuta Republic, which he established in the early 1970s and declared independent, parodies the Nigerian government. Kalakuta has a double meaning. Trevor Schoonmaker (2003: online), the curator of the exhibition, Black President: The Art and Legacy of Fela Anikulapo-Kuti notes that Kalakuta is ‘Swahili for “rascal”’ but it is also a lexical cognate of ‘Calcutta’, the name of the prison cell in which Fela was incarcerated. Kalakuta became home to his family, dissidents, artists, cultural thinkers, band members and followers. This correlation of the prison cell and the nation-state is illustrated on the cover of the album Alagbon Close, where Fela is still chained to the Alagbon cell while holding the Kalakuta Republic building and beneath him is a capsized boat full of policemen being swept away by ocean waves and a whale toppling them into the sea. This traversal of spatial scale, the state prison, the compound, the nation and the diaspora, exemplifies trans-worlding. It undermines the power that circumscribes confining spaces such as a prison cell, which represent the geographical limits as well 161

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as the power but political limits of the nation-state. There is arguably juxtaposition of the nation-state as a prison cell and of the compound as a locus for transnational, transatlantic and pan-African polities. Creating a nation (the commune as a republic) within a nation is subversive but key to locating the concept of trans-worlding in Fela’s spatial politics. In an interview, Fela Kuti (1988) gives a pan-Africanist meaning to the concept of a ‘nation’. ‘To be great’, he states, ‘you have to be a great nation first. That is why I say Africa – not Nigeria, Togo or Senegal – must become a great nation for all of the peoples that live here. But in this corrupt world of ours greatness is seen as the ability to destroy.’ The colonially inscribed nation, however, was portrayed by Fela as rogue destructive governance defined by its monopoly of violence. By ‘great nation’, Fela referred to the continent and its diaspora. Fela’s music and politics were shaped by his experiences in many other countries. He studied in London, gained musical experience in Ghana. He was also influenced by the Marxist and pan-Africanist Kwame Nkrumah, the first president of Ghana after independence. In 1969 he toured the United States and met members of the Black Panther Party, and notably Sandra Smith Isidore. Fela, as a cosmopolitan icon, also attracted people from different parts of the world to the Kalakuta Republic. To define Fela’s panAfricanist, transnational reach, Olaniyan (2001: 77) calls him a ‘cosmopolitan nativist’ who ‘borrow[s] tools from wherever in defense of African ways of knowing and being conceived as embattled by Euro-American cultural imperialism’. A photograph taken by the American artist Andy Warhol in 1986, for example, pictures Fela next to the singer and model Grace Jones and artist Jean-Michel Basquiat. In many ways, transnational fluidity defines Fela’s pan-Africanism. What does it mean, therefore, to return to the earlier example of Fela in Versace, to see national flags being waved? Beneath a mural depicting Fela and another portraying Nelson Mandela, AKA wears a Nigerian flag and at other times a South African flag. The flags in this music video flow like superhero capes or cling like security blankets in the same way as the Versace foulards that are being held up like banners and flaunted. These flags are intended to symbolize African transnational collaboration between South Africa and Nigeria. In fact, political theorist Siphokazi Magadla (2019) interpreted Fela in Versace as a testament to pan-African collaboration and argues that these ‘popular cultures of survival’, represent a pan-African spirit in the absence of political collaboration. The collaborations, she explains, ‘are showing us that Africans can work together, we can play together and make bankable profits’. The flags in Fela in Versace, however, sustain the logic of the nation and boast the kind of patriotism that would undermine a pan-African ideal. Although artists like AKA and a previous collaborator, the Nigeria-based Burna Boy, ‘were pinups for [twenty-first century] pan-Africanism’ they also ‘embody its tensions and limitations’ as Refiloe Seiboko and Simon Allison (2019: 20–1) show. Burna Boy, influenced by Fela, was meant to perform in South Africa at the Africa Unity concert, but his frustrations about xenophobia expressed in social media incited jingoist responses from AKA, who declared in a tweet ‘Let NO ONE deter you from your patriotism. PROTECT your COUNTRY and its REPUTATION 162

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Figure 8.5 Still from Fela in Versace, AKA ft Kiddominant, Dir. Nate Thomas, Vevo. © Okayafrica, 2018.

at all costs . . . YOU are BLESSED to be a SOUTH AFRICAN’. Fela’s question ‘what is making Africans retrogress?’ now seems more pertinent than ever (Figure 8.5). The faltering Pan-Africanism with a capital ‘P’, represented by a male elite and institutions such as New Partnership for Africa’s Development (NEPAD) and the African Union with their focus on economic relations, has not healed the scars of the nineteenthcentury scramble for Africa (Nzewi 2015). Magadla (2019) aptly points out that ‘the difficult task of African nationalism and Pan-Africanism is to transform the logic of the state that was designed to serve the minority colonial rulers to change it to serve the interests of the African majority’. The Versace and flag may be worn with a sense of pride but while the Versace burns, the flag never does.

Trans-ing As I close this chapter, not to conclude but to open more avenues in an attempt to understand Fela’s sartorial rebellion, I turn my focus to the prefix ‘trans’ in transworlding. ‘Trans’ connotes fluidity and rebellion to transcend the social habitus. Drawn from Marquis Bey’s (2019: 55) ‘traniflesh’ as Black fugitivity and the ‘refusal to be the way we are said to be’, trans-worlding is the creation of alternative possibilities. It is ‘an inhabitation that would lead to a transed subjectivity, a non-normative way of living in, or even beside, oneself ’ (Bey 2019: 57). It is, as Fela’s sartorial rebellion does, to free oneself from social categories, from one’s own legible body in the struggle for space and belonging. Fela once asked: ‘Do I want to leave an imprint in the world? No. Not at all. You know what I want? I want the world to change. I don’t want to be remembered. I just want to 163

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do my part and leave.’ (Olaniyan 2004: 190). Fela’s pan-African legacy is therefore not towards the single man’s narrative, but to the fluid, intersecting, contradictory, queer and trans narratives against the clutch of racialized imperialisms. The sartorial rebellion of Fela and the Kalakuta queens, as tricksters, is a politics of space-making and pre-figuring worlds emancipated from violent alienating geo-histories.

Notes 1. Isikhothane is an isiZulu word meaning ‘those who lick each other’ or ‘lick their fingers to count money’. In the chapter, the word ‘isikhothane’ is singular while ‘izikhothane’ is plural. I also use ‘is’khothane’ which is a contraction of ‘skhothane’ and is more popularly used. 2. Black is capitalized to refer inclusively to those who have been oppressed on the basis of not being white. It is used here as a political identity. 3. Arendt referred to Adolf Eichmann, a lieutenant colonel in Nazi Germany, whose trial in 1961 she watched, and wrote about the ‘ordinariness’, rather than monstrosity, that predisposed him to carry out sanctioned violence. 4. The 1972 Udoji Public Service Review Commission was a review of the public service structure named after Chief Jerome Udoji which saw wage increases for civil servants. The Udoji awards increased inflation, adversely affecting the working class and unemployed (Johnson 1974: 13).

References Adesokan, A. (2011), Postcolonial Artists and Global Aesthetics, Bloomington: Indiana University Press. Appadurai, A. (1990), ‘Disjuncture and Difference in the Global Cultural Economy’, Theory Culture Society, 7 (2): 295–310. Apter, A. (2005), The Pan-African Nation: Oil and the Spectacle of Culture in Nigeria, Chicago and London: University of Chicago Press. Arendt, H. (1963), Eichmann in Jerusalem: A Report on the Banality of Evil, New York: Penguin Random House. Babalola, A. O. (2018), ‘Overlooking Misogyny: A Critical Examination of Fela Anikulapo-Kuti’s Music, Lifestyle and Legacy’, MA diss., Texas A&M University, Corpus Christi. Bey, M. (2019), ‘Black Fugitivity Un/Gendered’, The Black Scholar: Black Queer and Trans Aesthetics, 49 (1): 55–62. Ford, R. T. (2021), Dress Codes: How the Laws of Fashion Made History, New York: Simon and Schuster. Ghariokwu, L. (2013), ‘A Dynasty of Album Cover Art’, Granta, 4 October. Available online: https://granta​.com​/a​-dynasty​-of​-album​-cover​-art/ (accessed 7 January 2021). Inggs, A. and K. Kemp (2016), ‘Exploring the Demise of Skhothane, the Controversial Subculture Destroyed by the Media’, Vice, 5 January. Available online: https://www​.vice​.com​/en​/article​/ vdx8m4​/skhothane​-south​-africa​-karl​-kemp​-992 (accessed 12 October 2020). Johnson, T. A. (1974), ‘Nigerians Awaiting a Pay-Rise Decision’, New York Times, 22 December. Available online: https://www​.nytimes​.com​/1974​/12​/22​/archives​/nigerians​-awaiting​-a​-payrise​ -decision​.html (accessed 15 January 2022). 164

Trans-Worlding Johnson, V. (2020), ‘Why Fela’s Statue At Allen Roundabout Was Pulled Down’, The Guardian, 15 January. Available online: https://guardian​.ng​/life​/why​-felas​-statue​-at​-allen​-roundabout​-was​ -pulled​-down/ (accessed 8 April 2021). Johnson-Odim, C. and N. E. Mba (1997), For Women and the Nation: Funmilayo Ransome-Kuti of Nigeria, Urbana and Chicago: University of Illinois Press. Koyama, J. (2020), ‘Transworlding: Navigating Spaces and Negotiating the Self in Online Schooling’, Educação & Realidade, 45 (2): 1–19. Kuti, F. (1988), ‘Fela Kuti – Interview’, Reeling in the Years Archive, 4 November 1988, [video], YouTube, 7 July 2018. Available online: https://www​.youtube​.com​/watch​?v​=QtiAnjtYdwo (accessed 16 December 2020). Lewis, S. P. (2015), ‘Fashioning Black Masculinity: The Origins of the Dandy Lion Project’, NKA, 37: 54–61. Magadla, S. (2019), ‘Fela in Versace: How Popular Culture is Driving 21st Century PanAfricanism’, Mail and Guardian, 25 May. Available online: https://mg​.co​.za​/article​/2019​-05​-25​ -00​-fela​-in​-versace​-how​-popular​-culture​-is​-driving​-21st​-century​-pan​-africanism/ (accessed 12 October 2020). Makhubu, N. (2021), ‘Capturing Nature: Eco-Justice in African Art’, in T. J. Demos, E. E. Scott and S. Banerjee (eds), The Routledge Companion to Contemporary Art, Visual Culture and Climate Change, 283–94, New York and London: Routledge. Mamdani, M. (1996), Citizen and Subject: Contemporary Africa and the Legacy of Late Colonialism, Princeton and Oxford: Princeton University Press. Maynard, M. (2004), Dress and Globalisation, Manchester and New York: Manchester University Press. Mchunu, K. (2017), ‘Izikhothane Youth Phenomenon: The Janus Face of Contemporary Culture in South Africa’, African Identities, 15 (2): 132–42. Miller, M. (2009), Slaves to Fashion: Black Dandyism and the Styling of Black Diasporic Identity, Durham and London: Duke University Press. Moore, C. (2009), Fela: This Bitch of a Life, London and New York: Omnibus Press. Ncube, C. (2018), ‘AKA’s Flop in Versace’, Music in Africa, 17 September. Available online: https:// www​.musicinafrica​.net​/magazine​/akas​-flop​-versace (accessed 12 October 2020). Nzewi, U-S. (2013), “Performing Pan-Africanism: The Pan-African Circle of Artists’ Overcoming Maps, 2001-Present,” conference paper, ASA 2013 Annual Meeting. Okiche, W. (2018), ‘Nigeria is Sadly Still Closer to Fela’s Anti-feminism than to Wakanda’s Women’, African Arguments, 8 March. Available online: https://africanarguments​.org​/2018​/03​ /nigeria​-gender​-is​-sadly​-closer​-to​-felas​-anti​-feminism​-than​-wakandas​-women​-international​ -womens​-day/ (accessed 25 February 2021). Olaniyan, T. (2001), ‘The Cosmopolitan Nativist: Fela Anikulapo-Kuti and the Antinomies of Postcolonial Modernity’, Research in African Literatures, 32 (2): 76–89. Olaniyan, T. (2004), Arrest the Music!: Fela and His Rebel Art and Politics, Bloomington: Indiana University Press. Orijinmo, N. (2020), ‘Victor Olaiya: Nigeria’s ‘Evil Genius’ Trumpeter who Influenced Fela Kuti’, BBC News, 21 March. Available online: https://www​.bbc​.com​/news​/world​-africa​-51633610 (accessed 2 January 2021). Oti, S. (2009), Highlife Music in West Africa: Down Memory Lane, Lagos: Malthouse Press Limited. Ragusa, S. (2016), ‘A Book, An Exhibition and A Docufilm about Nollywood’, Vogue, 1 December. Available online: https://www​.vogue​.it​/en​/news​/vogue​-arts​/2016​/12​/01​/nollywood​ -africa​-ike​-ude​-docufilm​-book/ (accessed 10 February 2021). Salami, M. (2013), ‘An African Feminist Analysis of Fela’s ‘Lady,’” MsAfropolitan, 2 August. Available online: https://www​.msafropolitan​.com​/2013​/08​/african​-feminist​-analysis​-fela​-lady​ .html (accessed 8 February 2021).

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Fashioning the Afropolis Schoonmaker, T. (2003), ‘Black President: The Art and Legacy of Fela Anikulapo-Kuti’, New Museum. Available online: https://archive​.newmuseum​.org​/exhibitions​/403 (accessed 4 March 2021). Seiboko, R. and S. Allison (2019), ‘AKA, Burna Boy and the African Unity Concert that Wasn’t’, Mail and Guardian, 22–28 November, 20–21. Sosibo, K. (2020), ‘Reproducing Festac ’77: A Secret Among a Family of Millions’, Mail and Guardian, 27 May. Available online: https://mg​.co​.za​/friday​/2020​-05​-27​-reproducing​-festac​ -77​-a​-secret​-among​-a​-family​-of​-millions/ (accessed 8 February 2021). Stanovsky, D. (1998), ‘Fela and His Wives: The Import of a Postcolonial Masculinity’, Jouvert: A Journal of Postcolonial Studies, 2 (1): n.p. Tshishonga, N. (2016), ‘The Socio-Economic and Cultural Implications of Skhothane on Youth’s (Under)Development at Ekurhuleni’s Townships of South Africa’, Commonwealth Youth and Development, 13 (2): 1–19.

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CHAPTER 9 OUR TRIBE THE SARTISTS’ PORTRAYAL OF POSTSUBCULTURE IN JOHANNESBURG Cher Potter

Introduction An outfit is meticulously arranged on a rug, perhaps as part of a morning ritual of preparing for work. A pair of feet enters the lower right of the frame – a man about to put on his attire and begin his day. From his perspective, we see a pair of Adidas trainers; a Stüssy sports cap, T-shirt and pair of isiquaza ear plugs; a knobkerrie staff and a Chokwe ceremonial mask. Who is this person? Why has he selected this combination of garments? And what environment is he dressing for? (Figure 9.1) The image was created in 2017 as part of a series titled Our Tribe by the Johannesburgbased design collective known as the Sartists. The multidisciplinary group includes fashion designers Wanda Lephoto and Kabelo Kungwane, art director Ricky Kunene (aka Xzavier Zulu) and photographer Andile Buka. Our Tribe was designed and produced as an unofficial collaboration with the international sportswear label Stüssy and circulated via Instagram using the hashtags #sartists and #stussy. On a commercial level, it operates as an audacious online pitch for brand partnership. On an artistic level, the series is a self-portrait of South African youth born after the end of apartheid in 1994. In the words of Kunene, Our Tribe is a statement on ‘living between our western and African cultures, between our parents’ memories and our own potential’ (Ricky Kunene, 8 March 2018, Johannesburg). The campaign expresses the complex and sometimes conflicting social attachments of this so-called Born-Free Generation living in South Africa’s largest city, Johannesburg. It does so by displaying a range of sartorial ‘looks’ – each composed of clothing articles that communicate multiple present-day understandings of the concept of ‘tribe’. As proposed by sociologists Brady Robards and Andy Bennett (​2011: 313), ‘belonging to multiple categories is a clear demonstration of a post-subcultural trend emerging in the reflexive construction of identity among young people’. The Sartists’ depiction of belonging in contemporary Johannesburg resonates strongly with Robards and Bennett’s iteration of ‘neo-tribes’ theory. However, it is not sufficiently described by it. The Our Tribe campaign shows a synthesis of this youth studies framework with the notion of ‘Zuluness’ (​Sithole 2008: xii). The Sartists thereby offer us a hybrid tribal–neo-tribal construct for millennial identity in an African megacity. In doing so, their campaign actively unravels imperial distinctions between fashion and so-called traditional dress,

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Figure 9.1  Our Tribe title image, 2017, digital photograph. © 2017, the Sartists and Hanro Havenga. All rights reserved. Original digital print included, courtesy of the Sartists.

advancing critical initiatives by fashion theorists such as Jennifer ​Craik (1993) and Victoria L. ​Rovine (2009). To contextualize the above argument historically, the first part of this chapter provides an overview of iconic twentieth-century-style subcultures within Johannesburg. This draws on archival research and literature from a range of South African visual cultures scholars. The second part of the chapter describes how the Sartists reenact and reimagine these style histories in line with the neo-tribes framework outlined by Robards and Bennett (​2011: 314). Interviews with a popular culture authority, as well as relevant journalese and Instagram analyses, support this portrayal. Finally, through a close examination of the Our Tribe title image, the essay argues that the Sartists not only reflect but also advance Robards and Bennett’s theory of neo-tribes. They do so by placing the long-term proposition of Zuluness at the centre of their own neo-tribes construct. Interviews with the Sartists themselves are foundational to this assertion. The chapter builds on pioneering initiatives by academics, popular culture authorities and designers engaged in the study of South Africa’s Black style subcultures and neotribes. Sartorial histories, largely unrecorded by archives during the apartheid era, have only recently been brought into focus by scholars including Sarah Nuttall, Bhekizizwe Peterson, Alice Inggs, Leora Farber, Nkosikhona Ngcobo and others. A further insight into Johannesburg’s inner-city popular culture was kindly offered by Jamal Nxedlana, creative director at bubblegumclub​.co​.​za/ ,1 a cultural intelligence agency in Johannesburg. He describes his own practice across arts, research and digital media 168

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as ‘drawing upon the surrounding environment of contemporary, post-post-colonial2 South Africa – a place of cultural, commercial and technological super-hybridity . . . haunted by the uncertainties of both the past and the present’ (​This Art Fair 2020). My own analysis of the Sartists’ work is based on three-hour-long interviews generously provided by two members of the Sartists, Ricky Kunene and Wanda Lephoto.

Twentieth-century-style subcultures within Johannesburg Johannesburg-based visual identities scholar Leora Farber argues that the Sartists’ practice is one of ‘reappropriating, reintegrating . . . conjoining and interfacing’ with the styles of twentieth-century South African subcultures to express shifting notions of identity within the city (​Farber 2015: 111). Johannesburg street style in the last century was arguably dominated by two groups – the ‘dandified Swenkas’ and the ‘Converseand-overall-sporting Pantsulas’ (​Inggs 2017: 91). Farber refers to both of these groups as ‘subcultures’ – employing the term as it was conceived by cultural theorists Stuart Hall and Tony Jefferson (1976) and later by sociologist Dick ​Hebdige (1979). She proposes that the distinctive clothing styles of both the Swenkas and Pantsulas signified a counterhegemonic struggle by Black labouring classes against the dominant political realities of racial segregation and apartheid in South Africa (​Farber 2015: 114). Today, the dress codes of these subcultures are deployed by the Sartists – and Johannesburg’s wider fashion-conscious community – as an act of remembrance. The Swenkas emerged in the 1930s in mine-labourers’ lodgings such as Jeppe hostel in Johannesburg (​Ngcobo 2016: 30). Influenced by the sounds and sentiments of jazz and swing events held in backyard shebeens3 and music halls (​Ansell 2019: 130), they donned wide ties, trilby hats and high-waisted three-piece suits. Swenkas – largely Zulu men – showed off these tailored ensembles at dance competitions and elaborate fashion pageants. Their public performances became known as swenking and involved a series of elaborate choreographed movements designed to flaunt highly polished leather shoes, finely woven socks, flamboyant jacket linings and the precise shaping of brimmed hats. Early Swenkas were less concerned with brand names than with overall appearance and attitude. Their fashion code was accompanied by principles of grooming, dignity and non-criminality, ‘a code that was accepted and practiced by a broad community of men aligning themselves with the Swenka identity’ (​Ngcobo 2016: 31). Arguably, the Swenkas deployed style not only as non-confrontational protest but also as a way of preserving masculine Zulu pride away from the social structures into which they were born (​Picarelli 2015). By the 1940s, studio photography became available in and around Johannesburg, allowing city workers to send black-and-white pictures home to their families. Images of the time show the Swenkas’ style modified to include Zulu beadwork and accessories as a message that the homestead traditions had not been forgotten (​Rankin-Smith 2008: 410). The young man in Figure 9.2 (whose name is unrecorded) was photographed at Abies Barber and Photography Studio in Marabastad, a culturally diverse area of 169

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Figure 9.2  Studio photography, c. 1945, printed photograph, WITS Art Museum collection.

Plate 4 in Rankin-Smith, F. (232008), ‘Beauty in the Hard Journey’, in B. Carton, J. Laband, and J Sithole (eds), Zulu Identities: Being Zulu, Past and Present, 409–13, Scottsville: University of KwaZulu-Natal Press. Original print no longer in existence. Image copy included, courtesy of Benedict Carton, Fiona Rankin-Smith and Angus Gibson.

Pretoria to the north of Johannesburg.4 He wears ankle-length wide-fitting trousers with a central crease and turn-ups, characteristic of early-twentieth-century jazz-era menswear fashions. An expensive, waist-slimming leather belt is shown off by the way it is placed above his shirt. This is combined with polished black round-toed brogues and a felt fedora. The city suit arguably typified ideas of the urban gentleman, social success and economic attainment (​Farber 2015: 117). A Zulu beaded choker (Ungquphansi)5 and rope necklaces (Imiqulu) are worn around his neck and across his torso. An additional beaded belt (Ibhande) sits low on his hips. The colours and patterning of these are unclear and, as such, their exact meaning cannot be ascertained. However, since the turn of the twentieth century, glass beads such as these had conveyed a man’s status and his availability to marry within Zulu culture (​Boram-Hays 2000: 74). In the 1940s, married migrant workers also began to document themselves wearing beaded gifts from their wives as a message of continued commitment (​Mthethwa 1988: 30). These dress codes attest to a Zulu cosmopolitanism rooted in continued allegiance to homestead traditions and an embrace of the transatlantic jazz fashions encountered within Johannesburg (in many cases, associated notions of racial liberalism). Here, technology was used as a bridge between these worlds (​Figure 9.2). 170

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A more profound modification of the Swenkas’ style occurred in the 1950s with the emergence of the Pantsulas. This more activist subculture developed under a formalized apartheid government (1948–91).6 It was also informed by jazz styles, but took its cues from the ‘structural organization of American gangster culture’, its street battles and public competitions (​VIAD 2015: 3 in ​Inggs, 2017: 91). The Pantsulas abandoned the gentlemanly ethos of the Swenkas and, instead, came to be known as the ‘bad boys’ of Sophiatown (​Nuttall 2009: 117). They donned lace-up Oxfords along with plaid trousers, Argyle sweaters and newsboy caps (​Evans 2018). Their members were characterized as ‘walking with a particular swagger and looking at others with a “signature look”’ (​ Ngcobo 2016: 39). In the wake of forced removals from Sophiatown and increased civil unrest under the 1970s apartheid government, the Pantsulas adopted a frenetic and codified Mapantsula dance as an expression of resistance (​Thoka 1986: 18, ​Gerry 2001: 53, ​Evans 2018). These dancers had diverse tribal affiliations and adopted the massproduced uniforms of the mines as a symbol of a consolidated Black working class in protest against the South African late apartheid system. They combined these uniforms with Converse high-topped sneakers and cotton bucket hats called ‘sporties’. A rotated sportie was the code for ‘trouble’, a partly flipped brim ‘double trouble’ and a fully flipped brim ‘disaster’ (​Relic 2013). Following the inauguration of Nelson Mandela in 1994, Pantsula became an increasingly stylized sartorial statement associated with post-apartheid youth expressions of performance, dance and dress (​Ngcobo 2016: 40). Today, it is characterized by the wearing of ‘Converse All-Stars, Dickies-branded khaki, Pringle jerseys and Dajicorp bucket hats’ (​Ngcobo 2016: 38). This is not to disregard that, for many, its political signification remains meaningful. The Swenkas, on the other hand, continue as a notable subculture in Johannesburg townships. They were internationally documented as such by Danish film-maker Jeppe Rønde in his award-winning film The Swenkas (2004) as well as by American curator Shantrelle P. Lewis in her groundbreaking exhibition Dandy Lion: (Re)Articulating Black Masculine Identity (2015) at Chicago’s Museum of Contemporary Photography. As the scholar Bhekizizwe Peterson reminds us, initiatives produced by Black South African youth entailed multifarious creative communities, paradoxes and complexities that are all too often presented as ‘flattened versions’ of popular culture (​Peterson 2003: 212). While the narrative presented within this chapter is truncated, it offers a crucial Johannesburg perspective on the post-subcultural framework within which the Sartists operate. These seminal style movements, each in its own way, created particular images of Black identity in apartheid and post-apartheid South Africa (​Kuta 2015) – images which remain foundational to South African street-style culture today.

Current style post-subcultures in Johannesburg In 2012 – the year that Lephoto and Kungwane formally launched the Sartists – the subculture of the Swenkas was reappropriated as part of a tailored street-style youth 171

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movement in the Johannesburg Metropolitan area. Young fashion and design collectives such as the Sartists as well as Khumbula (which translates as ‘to remember’ from isiZulu), I See a Different You and Boys of Soweto wore three-piece suits, highly polished brogues and fedora hats. These collectives replaced the Swenkas’ proclivity for local tailoring with the act of thrifting – that is, hunting for rare vintage garments in central Johannesburg’s vast imported second-hand clothing markets.7 The performance of swenking itself was supplanted by the millennial occupation of posting – that is, publishing photographic self-documentation online. As Kunene recalls, ‘We met regularly in central Johannesburg – thrifting, talking and all the time shooting images on our phones, then connecting to stolen Wi-Fi and posting’ (Ricky Kunene, Johannesburg, 8 March 2018). This coincided with the rapid adoption of the Instagram photo-sharing service by creative communities across Johannesburg. Through Instagram, these collectives circulated images of their self-fashioning for the entertainment of friends and followers, while also providing international visual testimony to the township style histories of the Swenkas and others.8 The same year, the hashtag #umswenko appeared on Instagram posted by @1phiko – a handle belonging to Phiko Mditshwa, a Johannesburg street culture authority. It was accompanied by an image of Siyabonga Ngwekazi aka Scoop Makhathini, the ‘high priest of South African street culture’ (​Nxedlana 2015; ​Vale 2016). Ngwekazi was – and remains – an advocate for the observance and re-representation of Black twentiethcentury style cultures as an act of remembrance and contemporary self-definition (Ricky Kunene, 8 March 2018, Johannesburg). #umswenko was circulated by Johannesburg youth displaying both local and international streetwear ensembles that reflected various distinctive dress codes of the Johannesburg townships. In his essay ‘UMSWENKO: Johannesburg’s Post Sub-cultural movement’, Nxedlana explains: Everything from footwear, to clothes, rings, bags, watches, hair, the body, ‘combos’, dance, music, alcohol, cars, electronics, events and even work, have been hash tagged UMSWENKO . . . in what seems to be the embrace of a post-subcultural approach to the creation of youth cultural identity in South Africa’s emerging black middle-class. (Jamal Nxedlana, Johannesburg, 5 October 2020) Engagement with hashtags such as #umswenko – as well as #mswenkofontein, #internationalpantsula, and others – did not require the strict dress codes or class-based strategies of resistance that characterized the original subcultures of the Swenkas and Pantsulas. This new kind of post-subcultural formation seemed, instead, to reflect the late twentieth-century theory of urban neo-tribes, by which groups gather sporadically around a succession of ever-changing ‘lifestyles choices and consumer brand names’ (​ Maffesoli 1996: 139). Robards and Bennett have revised this theory to reflect twentyfirst-century developments – including virtual communities linked through social media activity; and recognizing more stable self-selected (online and offline) social attachments built around aesthetic, political or cultural lifestyles (Robards and Bennet​ 2011: 314). Their revision supports a reading of #umswenko as constituting more than fleeting consumer-led social groupings. Rather, the hashtag can be understood as having 172

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created meaningful configurations of like-minded individuals across Johannesburg’s often-disconnected geographies. Its members, connected through a deep familiarity with Johannesburg’s Black subcultures, were able to decode and enact the umswenko microtrend. Young people including the Sartists, used these micro-trends to try on or test the styles and attitudes of the Swenkas and Pantsulas. This formed part of an interrogation into the largely undocumented histories that underpin their generational identity. Apartheid caused the loss of some of our cultural practices. We are trying to remember why these things existed and if it is important that they continue to exist. We try to take what serves us and to combine this with aspects of western Modernity to establish our own styles, images, voices and perspectives. (Wanda Lephoto, Johannesburg, 1 October 2020) Since the formation of the Sartists, the collective has produced and circulated images that revive and reimagine the untold stories of Black South African style. These captivating images frequently intersect international streetwear with the iconic dress codes of the Pantsulas and Swenkas. In 2015, after attracting the attention of Adidas’ creative team on Instagram, the Sartists were commissioned to produce a South African campaign for Adidas’ Supershell Superstars. This collaboration later resulted in Ricky Kunene accepting a permanent role to manage menswear for Adidas in South Africa. The 2017 Our Tribe campaign, circulated on Instagram with a #stussy tag is a strategic attempt to establish a similar collaborative relationship with the Stüssy brand. Where hashtags such as #umswenko facilitate more permanent neo-tribes within Johannesburg, the Sartists and others also deploy social media as a means of ‘crystalizing’ relationships across vast distances (​Robards and Bennett 2011: 314). This bears out Robards and Bennett’s contention that social media allows for ‘like-minded individuals to . . . find each other’ (​Robards and Bennett 2011). Indeed, Instagram was integral to the formation of the Sartists’ collective itself. The members – living across Alexandra and Orange Farm townships, inner-city Hillbrow and Johannesburg’s suburbs – met in part by following each other’s Instagram posts. The Sartists do indeed seem to operate in relation to the neo-tribes theory, in the revised sense outlined by Robards and Bennett. However, according to the Sartists Kunene and Lephoto, the sites for negotiating identity as illustrated within their work are not limited to urban and online spheres. ‘Our work addresses the challenges for young people trying to maintain both their online lives and their tribal origins within the city of Jo’burg’ (Ricky Kunene, Johannesburg, 8 March 2018). The Sartists therefore propose a third primary site for contemporary identity alongside their physical urban environment and online networks – that is, the existential realm of ‘being Zulu’ (​Robards and Bennett 2011). Our Tribe: Case study This focus on twenty-first-century tribal belonging is part of a wider initiative in contemporary South African identity studies. The authors of ‘Zulu Identities: Being Zulu, 173

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Past and Present’ (2008) propose that tribal belonging be at the very centre of discourses around identity within post-apartheid South Africa. According to co-editor Jabulani Sithole, ethnic tribal experience is still frequently misunderstood within the country. He argues that it is not a historical pre-imperial category that was followed by industrial modernization and then globalization – to be Zulu has always been contemporary, dynamic and plural – a ‘lived’ experience that is under constant negotiation (​Sithole 2008: xvii, ​Nxumalo 1992: 33 in ​Sithole 2008: xiii). Sithole’s concept of ‘Zuluness’ (​Sithole 2008: xii) is interpreted by the cultural theorist Nhamo Anthony Mhiripiri in such a way as to resonate with the theory of neo-tribes. For Mhiripiri, Zuluness can manifest beyond essentialist parameters of biological or genetic classification. ‘It is a feeling and a consciousness of being Zulu, if not for a fleeting moment as one emulates certain Zulu-associated attributes and then incorporates these into one’s own existential practices’ (​Mhiripiri 2009: 224). Zuluness is employed in both senses within the Our Tribe campaign. Kunene and Lephoto explore their familial Zulu heritage. Kungwane and Buka, despite their ties to Xhosa and Ndebele culture, join this exploration as part of a collective generational enquiry. In discussing Our Tribe, Kunene places Zuluness at the centre of the Sartists’ artistic process. He describes the concept development of the campaign as originating from ‘an intense dream I had about uniting tribes as King Shaka had done – merging the International Stüssy Tribe with our own Zulu, Xhosa and Ndebele tribes, and our online tribes’ (Ricky Kunene, Johannesburg, 8 March 2018). At the same time, the campaign de-essentializes tribal belonging. It presents tribal and neo-tribal connections to Zulu culture alongside tribal affiliations that operate across a range of cultural, commercial and technological spheres. The careful arrangement of items within the title image (​Figure 9.1) alludes not only to ideas of Zulu nationhood and the International Stüssy Tribe. References are also made to the style tribe of the Pantsulas, the Johannesburg-based umswenko community and the Hypebeast global digital tribe. Each of these represents a distinct form of social affiliation. Collectively, they offer a portrait of the ‘complex, multifaceted and fluctuating patterns of contemporary Zuluness’ as experienced collectively by the Sartists (​Mhiripiri 2009). The flat-lay9 design of the Our Tribe title image mimics the leading streetwear magazine Hypebeast’s10 online Essentials series.11 This invites distinguished creatives and sports stars to exhibit an array of their most essential streetwear items as an exercise in personal and brand storytelling. The Sartists borrow this highly recognizable online visual trope to illustrate their membership of an international streetwear community, and to convey the narrative purpose of the image. Along the central axis of the photograph, a limited-edition IDEA x Stüssy cap (2017) and the Stüssy ‘World Tour’ T-shirt (2012) forge association with the Stüssy streetwear brand and, more specifically, its International Stüssy Tribe. This style tribe was initiated in California in 1980 as a subcultural collective associated with Punk and Californian surf tribalism (​Warnett 2015). As its selective membership grew, it connected with New York’s hip-hop subculture, London’s jungle music scene and Tokyo’s Uru-Harajuku underground skate movement, among others (​Warnett 2015). Arguably, the Our Tribe 174

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campaign presents twenty-first-century conceptions of Pantsula and umswenko as a unique contribution to this global subcultural style network. Lephoto describes the connection between the Sartists’ and Stüssy’s tribal ethos as follows: ‘Both are based on family; both look for identity and belonging in dispersed, migrating groups’ (Wanda Lephoto, 1 October 2020, Johannesburg). This narrative of Zulu migration is expressed more directly through the pair of iziquaza ear plugs placed below the Stüssy cap. Ear plugs had been used since the mid-nineteenth century to signify that a young Zulu woman or man had become ‘a full member of the community’ (​Jolles 1997: 49). Early patterning had reflected particular tribal landscapes. However, with large-scale migration to Johannesburg in the 1920s, patterned iziquaza began to reflect a revised attachment to the city’s urban environment, portraying traffic signs and, later, political party symbols (​Jolles 1997: 54, 58). Within the Our Tribe image, the earplugs show a hand-drawn Stüssy logo. This modification implies an extension of the Sartists’ own tribal attachment towards a consumer lifestyle brand, and their ambition to become full members of the Stüssy community. The hand-carved Angolan Chokwe mask (date unknown – estimated at late 1900s or early 2000s) is placed at the top right of the image alongside a pair of Kunene’s own Adidas Stan Smith trainers (2016). The mask, with its associated spiritual and ritualistic meaning, might be considered an anomaly in this setting, given that the Sartists have no obvious connection to the people or design traditions of the Xassenge region. The wider campaign includes masks from a range of different regions across the African continent. Masks such as these are widely available across Johannesburg at touristic African craft markets. The Sartists aim to reclaim their value within the city’s everyday urban realities – the latter constituted by migrants from across the African continent. As Lephoto explains, the Sartists did not understand the exact function of this mask; however, they perceived it in terms of a broader notion of African spirituality. ‘By wearing the African mask, you intentionally walk with ancestors and spirits that guide you. We wanted to connect with this idea’ (Wanda Lephoto, Johannesburg, 1 October 2020). It could be argued that, with the inclusion of these masks, a tension emerges between the valorizing of a cultural idea on the one hand, and the appropriating of it on the other. A knobkerrie staff (date unknown) serves to underline the ensemble. At the turn of the eighteenth century, staffs such as this were used as swagger sticks by Zulu and Ndebele men (​Spring 1993: 128). In the final years of apartheid, they were redefined as ‘cultural weapons’ by Zulu Chief Mangosuthu Buthelezi  and carried by protestors at mass demonstrations (SAHO ​1992). Today, the iconic knobkerrie is depicted lying down as a representation of peace on South Africa’s post-apartheid coat of arms. Its various forms therefore convey complex meanings associated with status and Black comradeship. Within Our Tribe, it represents a new era of Johannesburg street swagger that carries with it the memories of an older generation’s struggle: As part of the Born-Free Generation, we carry the responsibility to learn from the struggles of our parents’ generation, and to communicate this to the next 175

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Figure 9.3  Our Tribe campaign images, 2017, digital photographs. © 2017, the Sartists and Hanro Havenga. All rights reserved. Original digital prints included, courtesy of the Sartists.

generation. We do this in our own way, through the medium of fashion and design. (Ricky Kunene, Johannesburg, 8 March 2018) The items within the title image are styled across the wider campaign (Figures 9.3–9.5) with additional sportswear pieces, beaded necklaces and belts, insignia bucket hats and a selection of masks. Worn together, the ensembles evoke South Africa’s twentieth-century Swenka cosmopolitanism and Pantsula activism, as well as twenty-first-century notions of African spiritual performance and international streetwear styles. Within the Our Tribe campaign, Zuluness is cast as both a neo-tribal and a tribal category – a feeling to be explored, as well as a group identity with a dynamic but distinct political, social and cultural history. Both readings are employed by the Sartists in an act of collective selfdefinition. Where Robards and Bennett argue that the fluid attachments of neo-tribes may settle into more fixed groupings, the Sartists also suggest the contrary: that fixed groupings may manifest through an array of fluid and temporary attachments. In the case of Our Tribe, Zuluness as a long-term proposition also manifests as sets of variables that include consumer brand names, online platforms and social media hashtags. As Lephoto describes: I am Zulu by virtue of my surname, the language I speak, the foods I might eat, my spiritual practices, things that I do as a man – through this, I recognize my tribal 176

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Figure 9.4  Our Tribe campaign images, 2017, digital photographs. © 2017, the Sartists and Hanro Havenga. All rights reserved. Original digital prints included, courtesy of the Sartists.

Figure 9.5  Our Tribe campaign images, 2017, digital photographs. © 2017, the Sartists and Hanro Havenga. All rights reserved. Original digital prints included, courtesy of the Sartists.

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home. With that same mentality, I might temporarily find myself within @juun_j, dressing in Jo’burg in the same way a kid in Japan would dress, sharing a love of the same anime; or within @Stussy sharing an attachment to the same style and music. (Wanda Lephoto, Johannesburg, 1 October 2020)

Conclusion In conclusion, the Our Tribe campaign synthesizes a neo-tribes framework with notions of Zuluness, thus offering a hybrid tribal–neo-tribal construct for millennial identity in the African megacity of Johannesburg. This post-subcultural model proposed by the Sartists is underpinned by the city’s own subcultural heritage, characterized by groups such as the Pantsulas and Swenkas. Today these subcultures have been reappropriated and reinvented by the Sartists and other fashion-conscious groups that connect not only within the city but also online – bearing out Robards and Bennett’s twenty-first-century revision of the neo-tribes theory. Within their Our Tribe campaign, the Sartists offer an addition to Robards and Bennett’s construct. They do so by incorporating notions of ‘Zuluness’ as defined by Sithole (​2008: xii) and interpreted by Mhiripiri (​2009: 224). This enables the neo-tribes model to be applied to youth groups concerned with redefining twenty-first-century ethnic tribal belonging – a youth prerogative that extends far beyond the borders of South Africa. This revision has important implications for the study of fashion within contexts such as Johannesburg. Our Tribe accommodates and intersects a heterogeneity of wearable forms, drawn from different contemporary and historical universes. By bringing these together, the campaign challenges the existing schism between fashion and so-called traditional dress, long contested by fashion scholars such as Jennifer Craik and Victoria L. Rovine. According to Rovine, these Eurocentric categories – by which fashion is contemporary and so-called traditional or tribal dress premodern – are not inherent, but ‘politically determined, a function of power relations’ (​Rovine 2009: 46). The Sartists reconfigure these categories on their own terms. Rather than attempting to equate all of the constituent garments and accessories under the banner of fashion, the Our Tribe campaign casts each item as a distinct example of contemporary tribal dress. Returning to the opening questions posed in relation to the Our Tribe title image, who is this person? Why has he selected this combination of garments? And what environment is he dressing for? The chapter suggests that he represents a new generation of youth in Johannesburg that is engaged both in acts of remembrance and acts of brazen cultural redefinition. This reflects the unique character of the city itself. In Johannesburg’s centre, one side of the street wants to be New York; while on the other side African healers perform medicinal practices that stem from many generations back. The city is a fair blend of many worlds and many value systems meeting in one place. It is a constant conversation about a future once had, and a future still coming. (Wanda Lephoto, Johannesburg, 1 October 2020) 178

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Acknowledgements This chapter has been directly informed by a number of people who very generously lent their time and expertise to the research, including Wanda Lephoto, Kabelo Kungwane, Ricky Kunene, Andile Buka, Jamal Nxedlana, Fiona Rankin-Smith, Luleka Jakeni, Dr Claire O’Mahony and Dr Finola Kerrigan.

Notes 1. https://bubblegumclub​.co​.za/ (accessed 11 May 2020). 2. Nxedlana uses the term ‘post-post-colonial’ not to imply that we are in a period after post-colonialism, but, rather, to suggest a contemporaneous relationship with theories of transnationalism, cosmopolitanism and super-hybridity. 3. A shebeen refers to the informal licensed drinking places in South African townships. 4. This information was kindly provided by curator Fiona Rankin-Smith, WITS Arts Museum, Johannesburg, and film-maker Angus Gibson, Johannesburg, by way of personal communication, October 2020. 5. Beadwork descriptions were kindly advised by museologist Luleka Jakeni, Campbell Collections, University of KwaZulu-Natal. 6. While legislation that institutionalized racial segregation was abolished in 1991, the first multiracial elections were held in 1994. 7. Traders around De Villiers Street sort and sell bales of second-hand clothing imported from Italy, America, Canada and Germany as part of Johannesburg’s vast informal economy. These markets are locally referred to as ‘The Piles’ or Kwa Dunusa (the latter translates from isiZulu as ‘to bend over’). 8. Lephoto explains how the Sartists sought out historical images not only of the Swenkas, but also Black people and families that preceded them – those who adopted western dress not as a subcultural act, but under colonial coercion. Their archival research encompassed the Barnett Collection, Duggin-Cronin Collection and Santu Mofekeng’s collection of private and published photographs, among others. 9. A flat-lay is a photographic description for a careful arrangement of objects on a flat surface shot from above. 10. The title of the magazine and online platform makes reference to Hypebeasts, a recognized streetwear tribe characterized by tenacious hunters of limited-edition items by brands including Stüssy, Supreme and Adidas (​Ferrier 2018). 11. https://hypebeast​.com​/tags​/essentials (accessed 11 May 2020).

References Ansell, G. (2019), ‘Placed: Dis/Placed – The Journeys of Jazz Across Johannesburg’, in B. Lashua, S. Wagg, K. Spracklen and M. S. Yavuz (eds), Sounds and the City, 123–49, London: Palgrave Macmillan. 179

Fashioning the Afropolis Boram-Hays, C. S. (2000), ‘A History of Zulu Beadwork 1890–1997: Its Types, Forms and Functions’, PhD diss., Ohio State University, Columbus. Craik, J. (1993), The Face of Fashion: Cultural Studies in Fashion, London: Routledge. Evans, J. (2018), ‘The Deeper Meaning Behind the Dress Codes of Johannesburg’s Pantsula Dancers’, Esquire, 25 September [online]. Available at: https://www​.esquire​.com​/style​/mens​ -fashion​/a22804470​/johannesburg​-pantsula​-dancers​-style​-fashion​-clothing (accessed 20 October 2020). Farber, L. (2015), ‘Hypersampling Black Masculinities, Jozi Style’, Image & Text: A Journal for Design, 26 (1): 111–36. Ferrier, M. (2018), ‘Streetwear Tribes: From Hypebeasts to Fun Dads’, Mr Porter, 15 March. Available online: https://www​.mrporter​.com​/en​-us​/journal​/fashion​/streetwear​-tribes​-from​ -hypebeasts​-to​-fun​-dads​-518748 (accessed 12 June 2020). Gerry, S. (2001), ‘Shifts in Pantsula in a Performance Context in KwaZulu-Natal: A Case Study of Pearl Ndaba’s Golden Dancers Between 1998–2001’, in K. Vedel and J. Wateran, (eds), Footsteps Across the Landscape of Dance in South Africa: Dance History Research Skills Development Project Workshop Proceedings, Articles and Working Papers, December 2001– August 2002, 53–8. Hall, S. and Jefferson, T. (1976), Resistance Through Rituals: Youth Subcultures in Post-War Britain, London: Harper Collins Academic. Hebdige, D. (1979), Subculture: The Meaning of Style, London: Routledge. Inggs, A. (2017), ‘The Suit Is Mine: Skhothane and the Aesthetic of the African Modern’, Critical Arts, 31 (3): 90–105. Jolles, F. (1997), ‘Zulu Earplugs: A Study in Transformation’, African Arts, 30 (2): 46–59. Kuta, P. (2015), ‘Hypersampling Identities Exhibition’, Unlabelled. Available online: https://www​ .unlabelledmagazine​.com​/single​-post​/2015​/09​/30​/Hypersampling​-Identities​-Exhibition​ -Interview​-with​-Teboho​-from​-Intellectuals​-Pantsula (accessed 1 March 2018). Maffesoli, M. (1996), The Time of the Tribes: The Decline of Individualism in Mass Society, trans. D. Smith, London: Sage Publications. Mhiripiri, N. A. (2009), ‘Zulu Identities and Contemporary Zuluness’, Critical Arts: A Journal of South-North Cultural Studies, 23 (2): 224–32. Mthethwa, B. N. (1988), ‘Decoding Zulu Beadwork’, in E. R. Sienaert and A. N. Bell (eds), Catching Winged Words: Oral Traditions and Education, 34–42, Durban: University of Natal Oral Documentation and Research Center. Ngcobo, N. B. (2016), ‘S’khothane: Representation in and Influence on Contemporary Visual Arts Practices’, MA diss., University of South Africa (UNISA), Johannesburg. Nuttall, S. (2009), ‘Self-styling’, in Nuttall, S. (ed.), Entanglements: Literary and Cultural Reflections on Post-Apartheid, 108–31, Johannesburg: Wits University Press. Nxedlana, J. (2015), ‘UMSWENKO: Johannesburg’s Post Sub-cultural movement’, Bubblegum Club. Available online: https://bubblegumclub​.co​.za​/features​/johannesburgs​-post​-sub​ -cultural​-movement (accessed 16 February 2021). Nxumalo, J. (1992), ‘The National Question in the Writing of South African History: A critical survey of some major tendencies’, Working Paper, Development Policy and Practice Research Group, Open University, London. Peterson, B. (2003), ‘Kwaito, ‘Dawgs’ and the Antimonies of Hustling’, African Identities, 1 (2): 197–213. Picarelli, E. (2015), ‘Problematic Black Iconicity: The Swenkas’, Afrosartorialism. Available online: https://afrosartorialism​.wordpress​.com​/2016​/04​/13​/problematic​-black​-iconicity​-the​ -swenkas/ (accessed 1 March 2018). Rankin-Smith, F. (2008), ‘Beauty in the Hard Journey’, in B. Carton, J. Laband, and J. Sithole (eds), Zulu Identities: Being Zulu, Past and Present, 409–13, Scottsville: University of KwaZulu-Natal Press. 180

The Sartists: Johannesburg Post-subculture Relic, P. (2013), ‘The History of the Bucket Hat’, Complex, 9 May. Available online: https://www​ .complex​.com​/style​/2013​/05​/a​-history​-of​-the​-bucket​-hat/ (accessed 26 October 2020). Robards, B. and A. Bennett (2011), ‘MyTribe: Post-subcultural Manifestations of Belonging on Social Network Sites’, Sociology, 45 (2): 303–17. Rovine, V. L. (2009), ‘Colonialism’s Clothing: Africa, France, and the Deployment of Fashion’, Design Issues, 25 (3): 44–61. SAHO – South African History Online (1992), ‘Buthelezi Says Zulus Would Continue Carrying Cultural Weapons’, South African History Online. Available online: https://www​.sahistory​.org​ .za​/dated​-event​/buthelezi​-says​-zulus​-would​-continue​-carrying​-cultural​-weapons (accessed 2 August 2020). Sithole, J. (2008), ‘Zuluness in South Africa’s Great Debate and Greater Transformation’, in B. Carton, J. Laband and J. Sithole (eds), Zulu Identities: Being Zulu, Past and Present, xii–xx, Pietermaritzburg: University of KwaZulu-Natal Press. Spring, C. (1993), African Arms and Armour. London: British Museum Press. This Art Fair. (2020), ‘Jamal Nxedlana’, This Art Fair. Available online: https://thisartfair​.com​/ artist​/jamal​-nxedlana (accessed 14 August 2020). Thoka, T. (1986), ‘Soweto Is Where it’s at’, English Usage in Southern Africa, 17 (2): 16–21. #umswenko (2018), Instagram. Available online: https://www​.instagram​.com​/explore​/tags​/ umswenko/​?hl​=en (accessed 15 March 2018). Vale, B. (2016), ‘The Creative Self, According to Scoop Makhathini’, Bubblegum Club. Available online: https://bubblegumclub​.co​.za​/features​/creative​-self​-according​-scoop​-makhathini/ (accessed 24 November 2020). VIAD (2015), ‘Hypersampling Identities, Jozi Style’, Exhibition framing document, University of Johannesburg. Available online: https://www​.viad​.co​.za​/hypersampling​-identities (accessed 26 May 2020). Warnett, G. (2015), ‘Stüssy: The Tribute’, Mr Porter, 15 July. Available online: https://www​ .mrporter​.com​/journal​/the​-tribute​/stssy​/416 (accessed 10 March 2018).

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CHAPTER 10 AFRICANFUTURIST DAKAR IN SELLY RABY KANE’S DESIGNS Enrica Picarelli

Selly Raby Kane is a Senegalese polymath and community activist tackling social fragmentation in her home town of Dakar. She is also, and foremost, an accomplished fashion designer who upholds the global relevance of the African heritage worldwide. Her label SRK casts the West African sartorial tradition in a futuristic light for a consumer base of ‘young afropolitans’ who identify as ‘free-spirited and sophisticated’ (Selly Raby Kane Official Website). A cosmopolitan African,1 Kane crafts styles that combine her primary focus on Dakar with a vantage on metropolitan experiences worldwide, articulating ideas of individualism, multiculturalism and mobility with a local and global relevance. This chapter discusses a selection of Kane’s works that shows her use of design as a critical tool to generate collective engagement with the urban context. It focuses on the fashion show ‘Alien Cartoon’ and the futurist photographs that she posts on Instagram. These case studies exemplify Kane’s use of a multimodal aesthetic of radical alterity, which she devises to trigger engagement with the African metropolitan milieu.

Claiming space for positive self-expression in Dakar Kane claims that her artistic practice highlights the connections between geographies, cultures and multi-sited imaginaries that make African culture a world culture. In an interview with the magazine OkayAfrica, she says: ‘Each of us bears a part of someone else’s culture and that is the very beauty of humanity’ (2012). Sustaining this vision is an acknowledgement of the history of transoceanic encounters and the inequalities spurred by western exploitation. Dakar, Kane’s home city, is enmeshed in this centuries-long system of economic, social and cultural inequality, showing also internal divisions that further fragment its social fabric. To the artist, this accounts for the feeling of a city ‘too caught up in its reality’ (Kane 2016) – a metropolis whose multiple identities determine continuous regeneration, in turn leading her to craft representations of West African urban life that eschew negative stereotypes about it. The designer builds her practice on the two themes of hybridity and design, as an artistic practice and mode of self-making, prioritizing collage as a tool of critical enquiry. Kane creates works of fashion and art that probe real and imagined relationships between bodies and spaces in Senegal. In

Africanfuturist Dakar in Selly Raby Kane’s Designs

particular, she focuses on the temporal aspects of this production of place, understood as the sum of the affects and collective life rhythms, and of the human and nonhuman forces that make up the atmosphere of her city. Kane belongs to the international movement of creatives who pursue collective authority for Africa (Klanten and Le Fort 2016; Rovine 2015). Since launching her label SRK in 2012,2 she has acquired a solid international reputation, regularly participating in fashion events worldwide, selling goods in several countries, and speaking internationally as a cultural critic. In the process, she has developed an aesthetic approach that blends fashion and art-making, emphasizing futurist themes and a West African vantage. More specifically, the framework that Kane applies to her work is inspired by Africanfuturism: the movement that ‘restructur[es] experiences of the African present through the imaging of new African futures’ (Sunstrum 2013: 113). Writer Nnedi Okorafor, who coined the neologism in 2019, describes it thus: ‘Africanfuturism is concerned with visions of the future, is interested in technology [and] is centered on and predominantly written by people of African descent (black people) and it is rooted first and foremost in Africa’ (2019). This centring of the African experience and emphasis on the present/ future are the main differences between this movement and Afrofuturism, with which it is often conflated. The latter emerged in the United States in the 1990s as a cultural practice that re-visions the history of Black presence in that country based on the experience of slavery. Afrofuturism rewrites the genealogy of western modernity by creating ‘countermemories’ (Eshun 2003: 288), crafting empowering visions of Black technoculture and identity for a predominantly African-American audience. Africanfuturism, instead, ‘imagin[es] Africas-to-come’ (Bould 2013: 13) through forms of ‘destabilization and decentralization’ (Bristow 2012: n.p.) rooted in innovative approaches to technology and culture and aimed at inciting social reorientation on the continent (Bristow 2012). With the American phenomenon Africanfuturism shares the goal of placing the Black subject at its centre, exploring forms of self-stylization and aestheticization of the self that show the body as a site of positive transformation. Global acclaim helped Kane to take the Africanfuturist imaging of empowerment beyond the confines of her country, bringing a specifically West African perspective to the current debate on Black liberation. For the purposes of this chapter, Africanfuturism introduces a situated perspective that envisages radical alternatives to achieve, through art-making, Black potential in the interconnected world. It can, therefore, be regarded as a cultural practice of Black – that is, African and Black diaspora – global empowerment that is rooted in the continent, its histories, and forms of contemporary modernity. These alternatives may take the form of performances and other actions created to trigger new connections between people, and between persons and places, generating fresh strategies of community building. Kane likes to describe herself as a storyteller who uses a plurality of styles to ‘create a harmonious space, where [each work] becomes a document, a piece of information and an element of strange beauty’ specific to her surroundings (BellaNaija 2019). A member of Dakar’s alternative scene, she projects a multimodal narrative that blends fashion design, art-making and community activism. The outcome is a complex artistic practice 183

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Figure 10.1  Surrealist collage posted 21 June 2017, on Instagram. © Selly Raby Kane. comprising lines of garments, movies, installations, artistic performances, immersive events, digital designs and poetry (Figure 10.1). In the spirit of Africanfuturism, she defines art-making as a way of colonizing physical and imaginary spaces with propositions of change based in an Afrocentric imagination of the present/future. Her works collate elements derived from multiple sources, footprints of a multicultural universe that brings together Senegal and Japan, technogenesis3 and Sufi mysticism, hiphop, science fiction and entomology.4 These works feature a recursive cast of visual signs that include diamonds, doves, hummingbirds, fans and shrimps, which Kane reuses in multiple works to lend coherence and continuity to her vision. The signs are embroidered on garments, plastered on the walls of her atelier, overlaid on promotional photographs and insinuated in art performances. They draw a phantasmagoric cartography that spins a web of semiotic references projecting a vision of Dakar as an alien site. This is not an escapist exercise. Rather, by dislocating signs from their original matrix of meaning and re-situating them within an emergent imaginary, the artist wants to expose the generative power of hybridization. These works are her way of commenting on the connections that she practises and sees happening around her, but that have not been reclaimed for their radical potential. Inspired by her personal experience working in multiple art collectives, Kane believes that collective action is paramount to her goal of building bridges between Dakar’s communities and minorities. The goal of opening up to the outside and remaking community in plural terms inspires works of visual storytelling that situate Dakar onto a parallel spatio-temporal plane. This is a world where past, present and future overlap, and races and species 184

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commingle. These encounters create a futuristic phantasmagoria that depicts this African metropolis as a place that is at once familiar and unknown, where hybrid contaminations can yield what Kane calls ‘liberation’ (2017), a process that empowers the local youth to forge reality beyond preformed expectations and parameters. In this respect, the phantasmagoria functions as a critical tool to claim representational sovereignty, asserting African and, more specifically, Senegalese self-definition according to one’s own terms and ambitions. By mobilizing new localities of production, Kane pursues her goal of ‘rebrand[ing]’ an ‘understated city’ (The Other Dakar 2017) and broadcasting ‘the image that needs to be seen of our country’ (Afripedia: Senegal 2014).5

The sentient city To understand Kane’s practice, we must begin with her positioning. Kane states that she makes art to ‘document [her] city’ (Africa’s Creative Renaissance 2019), which she describes as an ecosystem that generates, and at the same time is inflected by multiple flows and circulations. She describes this plural nature as follows: ‘Dakar is a blend of conformity underlined by a heritage of cyclic rebellion and transgression. Streets illustrate the city’s internal doubts, oscillating between uniformity and irregular patterns, uniqueness and mimicry, ignorance of the poorest while seeking their contribution to the equilibrium’ (SRK 17 Rue Jules Ferry Autumn/Winter 2017). The Senegalese capital is the catalyst of all of her works. It inspired the 2015 collection entitled ‘Dakar City of Birds’ (SRK 2015) that consolidated her Africanfuturist signature style (Picarelli 2015). It was the setting of the fashion clip ‘Inner Cruise’ directed by Tom Escarmelle (2013), which she styled in 2013. It also strongly influenced ‘The Other Dakar’ (2017), a virtual reality film that she shot in Dakar in 2017. These works reveal little-known aspects of the Senegalese capital, sometimes even the local population. They expose layers of meaning and inner landscapes, interconnecting spaces and times that produce a dense configuration of parallel, self-contained worlds, existing side by side across vast urban expanses and just as vast existential distances. Most of all, the artist is fascinated by the ways in which the city balances selfdetermination and inscription with globalization. Her creative process begins with an exercise akin to flaneurism.6 Kane scans her surroundings for signs and symbols that distil Dakar’s matrix of connections. The skin of the city, its outer layer, becomes her object of research. Like a cartographer, she navigates the vernacular marks that stretch across the urban epidermis – graffiti, hand-painted shop signs, murals, leaflets and posters, as well as the animated tapestry of markets and busy crossroads – and logs them in the sensible atlas of her designs. This magnetic landscape, dominated by intense visual traffic, influences her model of style and glamour. The hastened handwriting of a sketch scribbled on a wall inspires a piece from the ‘Pichkari’ collection (SRK 2018) (Figure 10.2) that has four squares of fabric arranged to seemingly compose the writing ‘Made in Dakar’ stitched across the front of its skirt. The vibrant decorations of a car rapide return in a blue-and-yellow dress included in ‘17 Rue Jules Ferry’ (SRK 2017), featuring 185

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Figure 10.2  SRK, ‘Young Fresh’ lookbook Spring/Summer 2018 collection, ‘Pichkari’, Dakar 2018. © Young Fresh/Collection Pichkari; Model: Cods Olivia.

graphic elements that replicate the visual syncopation and naïve style of this iconic means of transportation. Art scholars Leslie Rabine (2014) and Joanna Grabski (2007, 2009a, 2009b, 2010) trace Dakar’s abundant visual culture to the ‘endless mutability’ of a globally inflected metropolis (Grabski 2009a: 219). Others similarly describe the city as a contingent site, perpetually-in-the-making. For the Congolese director Mweze Ngangura, Dakar is ‘a site governed by constant change that makes individual status instable’ (quoted in Pfaff 2008: 173), whereas the Senegalese scholar Felwine Sarr sees Dakar as the quintessential Afropolis, an unfinished project with a stratified configuration and unlimited potential: a city in motion that grows anarchically, incongruously, but also dynamically (2020). Finally, anthropologist Hudita Nura Mustafa envisages it as ‘a late modern space of saturation by connections and strategies. . . . Dakar is perhaps too many places to too many people, heavily weighted with images, hopes and opportunities not easily available in Africa’ (2001: 44). Kane creates designs that link Dakar’s continuous regeneration to its history. ‘17 Rue Jules Ferry’ (SRK 2017) is the collection that most explicitly reflects her goal of fostering Africanfuturist urban narratives that incorporate the past into new temporalities of the present. The collection takes its name from the address of the atelier of the late artist Ramangelissa Samb.7 Also known as Joe Ouakam, Samb was a leader of Senegal’s countercultural scene from the 1970s through to his death in 2017. The curator Clémentine Deliss describes him as an ‘agitator’, who ‘intercepted and mediated the changing moods in the 186

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polis’ (2014: 11). Samb and his collaborators rejected the state art of negritude, which they deemed out of touch with the daily reality of Dakar, experimenting with art forms that reflected the complexities of this reality and held an aesthetic-social value.8 Veronika Schmidt-Linsenhoff writes that Samb and his group embraced a ‘creativity of chance’ that presented an ‘emancipative dimension beyond political iconography’ (SchmidtLinsenhoff 2014: 271, 275). Kane’s designs are informed by the visual dramaturgy of these efforts and the synesthetic and processual relationship binding the art-space to its urban frame, which Deliss variously calls Afronautical, alchemical, startling, biting (Deliss 2014). ‘17 Rue Jules Ferry’ is a tribute to Samb’s situationist beliefs, which led him, in 1974, to found Laboratoire Agit’Art. Although the art-space was demolished, it has survived in the imagination of Kane’s generation as a topos – the physical ruin of a place, and the idea of it, which coagulated the future-forward energy of ‘transgressive creative processes and cross-disciplinary vision’ (SRK 2017). ‘17 Rue Jules Ferry’ recaptures this atmosphere. A series of bold creations, featuring a palette of contrasting hues, maximalist adornments, intricate quilting techniques, and abrupt shapes render the courtyard’s ‘sensitive fluctuations of moods . . . bright, cheerful transparency and . . . unpredictable multiple viewing perspectives’ (Schmidt-Linsenhoff 2014: 283). The garments’ look and feel deliver a romanticized view of the Laboratoire’s freedom of the 1970–1990s and its rejection of essentialism. Individual styles align this ambition with Kane’s predecessors’ search for fresh perspectives to capture the unique alchemy of their surroundings. As a way to further claim the Laboratoire’s legacy, the young designer embroiders a large portrait of the director Djibril Diop Mambéty (Figure 10.3) on the back of an oversize quilted bazin blazer in maroon, bazin being a shiny damask cotton cloth largely used in Senegalese dress, paired with purple knee-high velvet boots and a black midi-skirt embellished with appliqués.9 Mambéty, who co-founded the Laboratoire, also produced works that commented on the urban experience in Senegal. His films exposed, without trying to resolve, the intricacies of the postcolonial condition. They drew from the impressionistic character of the urban landscape and its human geography, attempting a visual anthropology of Dakar, which the director represented as a splintered global city on the receiving end of top-down policies of development, where rapid modernization triggered new discourses and forms of self-determination (Pfaff 2008). In this respect, Mambéty fashioned a visual poetics of the entanglements of history, geography and identity in West Africa that anticipated A. M. Simone’s theory of ‘worlding’ (2001). Worlding offers a conceptual lens on the affective undertones of the African geography of dispossession. It describes the feeling of ‘being “cast out” into the world’ (Simone 2001: 17) that follows the implosion of territorial frameworks and the disruption of social territories – a displacement that affects orientations and sensibilities at the collective level, ‘keep[ing] residents in an almost permanent state of changing gears and focus’ (Simone 2001: 18). This atmosphere of ‘preparedness’ (Simone 2001) reflects the way in which African cities come together not so much as fixed localities – self-referential and delimited by clear-cut borders – but as territories crossed by flows that retain the thrust and imprint of transience. Looking at Dakar as a worlded living system embedded in a larger system entails adopting a perspective where its affective configuration – the temporality 187

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Figure 10.3  SRK, detail of quilted coat Fall/Winter 2017 collection, ‘17 Rue Jules Ferry’, Dakar 2017. © Jean-Baptiste Joire.

of preparedness – exceeds human intention. Kane’s vision reflects the intricacies of this condition, presenting Dakar as a metropolis – or better, Afropolis – in a perpetual state of self-redefinition that exceeds western ideas of the African city and often also some African ideas of what it should or could be. She speaks about Dakar’s ‘crazy energy’ as a momentum triggered by a combination of forces that art can absorb and redistribute to serve the needs of the community (Kane 2017). Through the lens of worlding and of the artist’s observations, Dakar’s atmosphere seems to produce a realm where subjective agency enters movements and flows that have no definable origin and boundaries. Nigel Thrift calls this responsive site a ‘sentient city’ driven by forces that ‘constantly shift orientation and composition but still retain a kind of coeval force through their collocation and overlap’ (2014: 3). The vision of a pulsating urban milieu inspires Kane’s immersive fashion shows, which she designs as occasions to catalyze a positive synergy between people and urban sites and a new idea of the city as a space of collective co-creation.

‘Alien Cartoon’: Managing time to build communities Echoes of the sentient city seem to animate Kane’s speculative text ‘Agit’Art “La cloche de fourmis”’, where she situates the work of her art collective ‘Muus du Tux’10 within a responsive post-human ecology. 188

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We are inside. We swarm. We take care of a space that constantly invites you to connect re-readings with each other. That of our cities first, that we no longer see, superimpositions of realities, hyper-positions of our expectations and our actions that obscure most of our time by their density and multiplicity. Make this ultraspace sacred at the dawn of an era where we seek to restore certain historical truths and part of its heritage to Africa, the urban decadent in which we launch our calls erects heavenly barricades made of mysticism and technology, art and citizenship, deep impulses and frustrations that the daily mask of his indifference. (Selly Raby Kane Official Website: n.p.) The text is, at the same time, an Africanfuturist statement that tackles the mythology of modernity – symbolized by the augmented hyper-real features of the city – and a call to social responsibility, inviting readers to rethink socialization. We are confronted with the artist’s goal of putting her work at the service of her community and of generating positive change. Kane and her fellow artists from Muus du Tux perceive the urban decadent as a site of openness, where the modes with which bodies claim spaces to live and be together acquire a new density. We have seen that she is fascinated by ideas of unmaking, contamination and becoming. For Africanfuturists, these terms connect with the project of racial liberation, in that they specifically upset the conception of time informing western rationality. Time, as theorized in the Enlightenment, begets sovereign subjectivity. The American scholar Damien Sojoyner calls it the ‘ubiquitous linchpin of western civilization: the marker of difference’ (2017: n.p.). He argues that time manifests selfgovernance, as individual autonomy is predicated by the white man’s ability to manage and control time.11 Power can thus be described as the ability to ‘regulate the quality and quantity of life’ (Sojoyner 2017), and racial difference as a temporal scale marking access, or lack thereof, to freedom and, therefore, self-determination. Reinforcing time, the white man disciplines subjectivation and racial difference: ‘the manifestation of such difference is understood within the context of how time is applied and to whom’ (Sojoyner 2017, his italics). Sojoyner concludes that, in order to enforce Black emancipation, a new management of time is needed, based on ideas of ‘collectivity’ and ‘love of community’ (Sojoyner 2017). Kane operates within this framework of enacting radical Black freedom (The Assembly 2020), envisaging emancipation as a manipulation of time, spent collectively to achieve a better quality of life in Senegal. Her fashion shows are exemplary in this regard. They are immersive events that ‘materialize’ the themes of the collections in artistic and expressive ways (Afripedia: Senegal 2014). In 2014, for the launch of the ‘Alien Cartoon’ line (SRK 2014), Kane held a show inside Dakar’s old train station – a dilapidated site that has symbolic value as an architectural cue of colonial history. The theme of the event was alien invasion, and the venue was refitted to transport the visitors into a different universe. The station was transformed into an alien city, strewn with futuristic artworks that Kane’s fellow artists built with salvaged materials.12 The soundtrack, a collaboration between the designer and Dakar’s ‘sonic poet’ Ibaaku,13 189

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added acoustic impressions of the alter-world to the performance, featuring synths, percussions and the drone of swarming insects. The models, who ambled amidst background actors masked and costumed like extraterrestrials, sported Kane’s new pieces: a range of ‘Afro-surrealistic and cartoony’ styles (SRK 2014) that interpreted the imagination of post-human evolution in playful ways via aesthetic choices that included a palette alternating pastel and metallic hues, and urban silhouettes incorporating staples of pop-cultural futurism like luminescent outfits, transparent cut-outs of PVC and appliqués. ‘Alien Cartoon’ (Figure 10.4) was created to stage a full-bodied immersion into an alternate realm, but was also full of references to the local reality. The spectacle of shapeshifters trading human semblances for alien bodies fed back and into Dakar’s collective past, conjuring up the memories held inside the walls of the dismissed station. These memories emanated from the countless journeys of departure and arrival that link Dakar to the world and with the changes undergone and brought about by those who made them. They were superimposed on the ghosts of the dismissed tracks leaving from the platforms, those of other lines of flight – the temporalities of the metropolis’ present existential landscape, dreams, expectations, fantasies and delusions of its peripatetic inhabitants – engineering a temporal dislocation that transformed the movements/ flights of the past into the present and recharging it for future evolution. Far from operating as a nostalgic remembrance of time past, the immersive event transforms Dakar’s ongoing history into a site of encounter and commingling between local and

Figure 10.4  ‘Alien Cartoon’ prototype. © Alioune Badara Samb/Collection Alien Cartoon. 190

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foreign agents, as the hub of the endless hybridization spawned by the ‘intimacies’ of colonial history (Lowe 2015). Jessica FitzPatrick describes the ‘Alien Cartoon’ show as a moment of ‘speculative instigation’ (2020: 73) that enacted spatial transformation to reinscribe bodies and venue into a new configuration. In this space of ‘third contact’ (FitzPatrick 2020), the physical environment of the train station becomes a conduit to express something akin to Sojoyner’s radical idea of time-capture that demands collective action by local, previously alienated, communities. Using fashion, music and scenography, the station becomes an electric milieu, where new connections between self and place are formed. In this respect, Kane’s work presents elements that perform the practice of ‘building communities-inplace’ proposed by Dylis Williams (2018). According to Williams, the fashion designer has the role of instigating new connections between peoples and places and fostering ways of regulating public access to ‘values, culture, aesthetics, knowledge, and exhibition’ (2018: 79). This is a practice of cultural sustainability enacted via processes that ‘visualize and build community through a spectacle of place-based participation that is recognized both inside and beyond the community itself ’ (2018: 83). In this way, design actions like Kane’s event have the potential to mould time affectively to serve collective needs. They ‘re-connect’ pieces and places, calling the attendees to participate in activities that form, or redefine, their bond to specific sites and locations (2018: 87). In place of the self-enclosed environments that, according to Kane, determine Dakar’s social fragmentation, the transtemporal framework of the ‘Alien Cartoon’ show creates the occasion ‘to open, and to create bridges between many communities’ (Kane 2016), enabling a futuristic weaving together of people in places that intends to positively affect local forms of self-determination.

Africanfuturist atmospheres on Instagram The ‘Alien Cartoon’ fashion show deploys garments, props, sound and scenography to initiate modes of inhabiting and experiencing space, symbolizing Kane’s idea of radical alterity as a shared project of unbinding prescribed spatio-temporal frameworks. Her Africanfuturist activism incites socialization around a shared, multimodal experience of defamiliarization. She believes in art’s capacity to form self-determined subjectivities and in the powers of artifice to design alternative African futures. And thus she employs her art accordingly, to speculate on the present and to dissect the conditions that have defined the African condition negatively. This project also extends to the digital space of social media, where she curates an Africanfuturist stream of visuals that crafts digital atmospheres of hybridization in the service of self-determination. On Instagram, the third contact that Kane summoned in the old train station inspires instances of visual communication that add a further layer to her idea of Dakar as a place where ‘different temporalities co-exist’ (Alexandre 2018). Kane’s official Instagram profile is part lookbook, part art gallery, displaying images that assimilate her aesthetic to that of other Africanfuturist fashion creatives active on social media. Kane’s Africanfuturist 191

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pictures record the activities taking place in her art-space/atelier, where she hosts events inspired by Agit’Art and Senegalese folk tales and mysticism. The photographs seem to have been taken to capture performances of hybridization. We see the designer and her partners posing indoors, against neutral backgrounds or outdoors in gardens, backyards and on the beach. They are photographed mostly in frontal or lateral poses, garbed in full futurist regalia, and sporting an assortment of heavy and bulky accessories that include masks, platform shoes, belts, spiky goggles, headdresses, jewellery and so on. The ample garments enfolding the bodies, their shiny fabrics and clashes of vibrant colours, and the mixed materials used for the accessories create a style that recalls the theatrical costuming of African-American icons such as the jazz musician Sun Ra, the foremost representative of Afrofuturism. Denenge Duyst-Akpem recalls how Sun Ra and other African-American artists employed costume as a ‘mystical’ element that operated as a ‘second skin and metaphor’ for racial emancipation (2012: n.p.). In these examples, the dressed body itself appears like the object of a ‘worlding’ that casts it out of its human mould. By styling herself in futuristic costumes, Kane echoes artists who deploy the dressed body to fuel an Afrocentric conversation on African future imaginaries. Other examples include the members of the South African Art Collective ‘Dear Ribane’, and the Nigerian stylist/director/photographer Daniel Obasi. These artists promote a sociocultural awakening on the continent with dress performances and visual works that envisage emancipation as an alien condition. For example, in the performance piece ‘Humanoids Transcending Cosmic Frequency’ (2018), the three members of ‘Dear Ribane’ morph into android-alien beings, occupying a cosmic space with their creation for the benefit of formerly segregated South Africans. The performance uses garments and music to express the artists’ idea that manipulation of one’s appearance affects positive transformations, ultimately heralding the coming of ‘a new world, Altered State of Mind’ (Ribane 2018). In lookbooks, shootings and public appearances, they wear transformable clothes of their own design and sportswear with voluminous headgear in colour-block combinations that often incorporate silver and gold. A concern with design informs this manipulation of appearance by way of carefully chosen standout elements, textures and structures, especially the layering of materials, preferably leather, satin, velvet and polyester. Visor-like eye bands are the most symbolic item of the blurring of organic and inorganic dimensions purported by the collective. These sartorial choices approach the body as an unfamiliar space. Appearances are manipulated to draw attention to the body’s self-manipulating abilities. The effect of these efforts is an alien iconography that recombines the known and the unknown into ever-changing designs that invite us to expect ever more and different manifestations of future-forward identity politics on the continent.14 In her series of futuristic photographs on Instagram, Kane similarly dresses up to become a vessel for post-human change. Replicating the cyberpunk performances of other notable icons of Afrofuturism, Janelle Monáe and Grace Jones, her dressed body conjures up embodied knowledge, ‘work[ing] it in the service of revising oppressive histories and creative alternative futures’ (Miller 2015: 64–5). Kane envisages change as a function of the synergy connecting body and costume, happening at the material intersection of skin 192

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and fabric. The regalia wrap her in new layers that redouble the charge of her black skin, enacting a form of shape-shifting sparked by the catalytic reaction between these sensible surfaces. Garments and accoutrements are re-engineered performatively to emphasize their role of tools of authority, their baroque combination referring to the very act of selfmaking that Kane claims to antagonize negative views of the continent and monocultural ideas of globalization. Her style choices are particularly telling in this regard, as, in the Instagram photos, she often dons items that recall the sculptural creations of the Kenyan artist Cyrus Kabiru, and the futurist styles of Senegal’s matriarch designer Oumou Sy. Kabiru repurposes e-waste into iconic wearables that quite literally manifest positive ideas of regeneration, engineering a temporal short circuit that, in Annalisa Oboe’s words, is ‘in part a reclamation of buried histories and in part a creation of forwardlooking stories’ (2019: 35). Since the 1990s, Oumou Sy has been among the pioneers of a sort of mixed-media approach to fashion design, often integrating technology into her garments in the form of material appendages and appliqués, as well as promoting digital literacy initiatives in Dakar. Mustafa comments on Sy’s creative approach, noting that her mix of art, spectacle and social space intervenes with the collisions of old and new forms of modernity and colonialism in Senegal, generating strategies that ‘make globalization deliver to Africa what Africa needs without surrendering to its logic and hegemonies’ (2001: 46). In the case of both these artists and, more recently, Kane, the futuristic, photographed performance of style calls attention to the very act of making, or assembling, the look and to its outcomes. The layout of the pictures adds a further layer to the representation. In some of the pictures, the artist overlays digital elements from her bestiary of futurist signs – the shapes of little astronauts, birds or flames, to the real-life subjects – creating digital collages that blur the line between fantasy and reality. These representations further enact the Africanfuturist ontology of being-as-becoming, producing visual effects that mobilize digital technology as facilitator, ‘connec[ting] to life as a process of composing/ compositing the self ’ (Munster 2005). They evidence Kane’s use of design as a tool of spatio-temporal manipulation that opens new perspectives on physical realities via configurations of forms and material conditions. As Tegan Bristow observes, African futurists re-explore ‘the mechanisms of remix and the hybrid . . . as new intentions and outcomes’ (2012: 28). The visuals on Instagram capture the idea of Dakar as a sentient city that ‘worlds’ bodies, making its presence felt in the digital space. In this respect, they quite literally apply the theatrical practice of making atmospheres. According to German philosopher Gernot Böhme, scenography, as stage design that uses light, sound and geometry, creates ‘tuned’ spaces that elicit an emotional response from the audience (Böhme 2016: n.p.). This is, in effect, a technology of impressions that mobilizes design to modulate our engagement with an artwork, triggering affective reactions to staged or spontaneous ecologies. Lev Manovich (2017) applies a similar reading to the aesthetic of social media feeds, in particular to the Instagram grid. Manovich observes that Instagram has produced a new visual cultural form that he describes as a blend of photography, cinematography and design. This media form delivers a specific kind of content that expresses ‘sensibility’, ‘attitude’, and ‘tonality’ (2017: n.p.), alternative 193

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words for atmosphere. Indeed, ‘Instagrammism’ practises what he calls ‘poetic design’: ‘a construction of scenes and images that are atmospheric, visually perfect, emotional without being aggressive, and subtle as opposed to dramatic’ (Manovich 2017: n.p.). These images do not deliver a narrative, as much as draw us to the flow of experience of the user, his/her inner world of sensations and pure emotivity. There is a shift from semiotics to soliciting experiences that enhances the socializing function of the medium. According to Manovich, the fundamental feature of this practice is that it is programmed to capture and make meaningful the subtle variations and differences that characterize contemporary cultural identity. This means that Instagrammism maps the processes of hybridization that define cultural production and identity performance in the twenty-first century, providing users with the tools to develop a visual presence that is unique enough to stand apart from common types. Kane is a master manipulator of aesthetic elements and conjurer of atmospheres, and her digital persona reflects these abilities. Moreover, her work is designed to converse with an audience that can recognize the subtle referencing and reimagining that inspire her practice and give instant feedback. This is the global audience that Marleen de Witte argues has been feeding an imagebased cultural traffic around a type of Black style that incorporates multiple African references since at least the turn of the millennium (2014). De Witte remarks that ‘Afroiconographies’ articulate and promote “Afro-cool” as a global marker of identity – an aesthetic language ‘oriented towards the future’ (2014: 286) that does not resurrect the past, but shifts the focus onto the processes of making and remaking identities in the present. Design as a tool of self-making and authority. But, while de Witte calls Afro-cool a ‘lifestyle trend . . . lack[ing] historical weight’ (2014: 286), and Manovich expounds on the visual taxonomy of cultural nuances, Kane’s Africanfuturist colonization of the visual conversation on the West African fashionscape has meaning exactly because it details site-specific features linked to experiencing the Senegalese reality firsthand and abstracts them until they are meaningful to a larger collectivity. Her form of instant communication is predicated on reciprocity and a collective effort to participate, expand and enhance the atmospheres captured by her Instagram grid, crafting a space where affects circulate while (multiple) meanings are made. Disseminating her futuristic self-designs in the digital space in the form of sci-fi-inspired style vignettes, she feeds flows and dynamics of African self-ascription that have been in the making for decades across the whole spectrum of the creative industry on the African continent. These multilocal, synchronic and diachronic processes incorporate consumerist and capitalist-driven approaches, while conceptualizing and practicing new identity constructions claiming agency over one’s self-representation (Farber 2015). This intersubjective dimension is what makes Kane’s artistic practice decidedly atmospheric. Her theatrical experiments with design, be they a fashion collection, a show, the way she creates a digital persona, or arranges images in her feed and grid, relate objects and bodies to produce a certain mood that feeds back to and into an ongoing conversation with her followers. This mood is, in Böhme’s definition of an atmosphere, ‘the experience of the presence of the represented . . . a theory of perception . . . in which [the latter] is understood as the experience of persons, objects, and environments’ (2016: n.p.). 194

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Conclusion Across multiple media and modes of expression, Kane’s Africanfuturist actions explore the reciprocal relationship between bodies and spaces and between bodies and times, offering imaginative channels of engagement and re-engagement with the West African metropolitan milieu. Her works recast the African modernity into a value system rooted in local cultures and onto-mythologies that are in conversation with those stemming from a multiplicity of real and imagined ‘elsewheres’. In this respect, she could be said to enact the ‘aftermodern’ paradigm theorized by the late critic Okwui Enwezor (2010: 610). In the essay ‘Modernity and Postcolonial Ambivalence’ (2010), Enwezor looks at Africa as the locale of a ‘provincialization’ and, indeed, rejection of the European notion of modernity that ‘disarms and dispossesses the colonial inheritance’ (2010: 616). Reclaiming the right to elaborate self-representations presenting Africa in general, and Senegal in particular, as spaces of possibility, Kane offers a vision of the open Afropolis that images Enwezor’s empowering concept of an African ‘tabula rasa’ that does not mourn the loss of the past, but prepares for ‘future compositions’ (2010: 616).

Notes 1. ‘Born and raised in Dakar then studying fashion in France, then coming to the United States, then traveling in Africa, made me build a cosmopolitan conception of fashion. I don’t think of where I come from when I design clothes; it just comes from who I am and where I’ve been’ (OkayAfrica 2012). 2. SRK was unofficially launched in 2008 under the name ‘Seraka’. 3. Katherine Hayles describes technogenesis as ‘the dynamic transformations taking place between humans and technics’ (2012: 81). 4. She describes her designs as ‘naïve juxtapositions of things’ (Kane 2017). Digital collages, which Kane posts online and uses as a backdrop during her public speeches, are representative of her aesthetic. They might include baseball caps sprouting from the branches of baobab trees, electronic chips and space stations floating in the same space with parrots and ossified saplings, and garments growing eyes and mouths. For a discussion of Kane’s brand of ‘Afro-fusion’, see Picarelli (2019). 5. Kane states that Africa must ‘create a new identity [for itself] that doesn’t imitate the West but respects its heritage and is at the same time resolutely modern’ (Seneplus 2019: n.p., translation by the author). 6. Kane says: ‘I wander in the streets of Dakar or explore urban settings around the world when I travel. I also visit artist studios in Dakar, a conversation always starts that triggers a piece, a project or a collaboration’ (BellaNaija 2019). 7. Samb was also an art critic, a curator, performer, and poet. 8. Deliss quotes passages of a text that she and Samb composed and read at the conference ‘Mediums of Change’ held in London in 1995. ‘The visual arts of Senegal are searching in the luminous outline of the mornings of market days. There one discovers that the museums store only one kind of knowledge, whose colours can only be grasped through an apparent immobility. At least in Senegal, the country I come from, one exists in the movement of 195

Fashioning the Afropolis colour at all moments of the day. In any case, in this country, painting could not be a goal in itself but simply a means to knowledge and therefore to transformation. If the dream is important, the real, the experienced is at stake’ (Deliss 2014: 12). 9. See the contribution by Kristin Kastner in this book. 10. ‘Muus du Tux’ is Wolof for ‘cats don’t smoke’ – an expression capturing the philosophy of social criticism and heritage recuperation practiced by the multidisciplinary collective of which Kane is a member. 11. ‘[T]ime in the context of whiteness is fuelled by notions of “inventible” and “unbounded” development and progress. . . . Time in this sense is something that can be controlled and manipulated in order to provide meaning to that which defies both history and logical explanation. As in the case of manifest destiny, the possession of time provides the binary (and necessary) opposite of time’s punitive nature in relation to Blackness’ (Sojoyner 2017: n.p.). 12. The appreciation and respect for these materials shown in the ‘récup’art’ (art of reuse) created for the show recalls Samb’s own approach to second-hand materials that SchmidtLinsenhoff describes as an ‘affectionate care in the process of appropriation’ (2014: 282). See also Elizabeth Harney (2004) and Pinther and Nzewi (2015). 13. Ibaaku is the moniker of Stephen Bassene. 14. However, they reject the label ‘afrofuturist’ in favor of a postracial vision of the future. In an interview the author conducted online with the Ribanes, they said: ‘We believe in Futuristic world but not a world with borders. When you put Afro in-front of Futurism then we start creating a limitation towards our audiences and world beyond. Our work speaks to every racial human’ (Ribane 2018).

References ‘Africa’s Creative Renaissance’ (2019), [Video], YouTube, 25 June. Available online: https://www​ .youtube​.com​/watch​?v​=lwOaWodxlRM​&feature​=emb​_title (accessed 23 February 2020). Afripedia: Senegal (2014), [Film] Dir. Senay Berhe, Teddy Goitom, Benjamin Taft, Sweden: Stocktown Films. Alexandre, L. (2018), ‘Selly Raby Kane, styliste du futur’, Demain Dakar, 9 July. Available online: http://www​.ipj​.news​/demain​-dakar​/2018​/07​/09​/selly​-raby​-kane​-styliste​-du​-futur/ (accessed 15 January 2019). Böhme, G. (2016), The Aesthetics of Atmospheres, Oxon and New York: Routledge. Bould, M. (2013), ‘Africa SF: Introduction’, Paradoxa, 25: 7–16. Bristow, T. (2012), ‘We Want the Funk: What is Afrofuturism to the Situation of Digital Arts in Africa?’ Technoetic Arts, 10 (1): 25–32. de Witte, M. (2014), ‘Heritage, Blackness and Afro-cool: Styling Africanness in Amsterdam’, African Diaspora, 7 (2): 260–89. Deliss, C. (2014), ‘Brothers in Arms: Laboratoire AGIT’art and Tenq in Dakar in the 1990s’, Afterall: A Journal of Art, Context and Enquiry, 36: 4–19. Duyst-Akpem, D. (2012), ‘Constructing Future Forms: Afro-Futurism and Fashion in Chicago, Part I’, Chicago Art Magazine, 1 February. Available online: http://chicagoartmagazine​.com​ /2012​/02​/constructing​-future​-forms​-afro​-futurism​-and​-fashion​-in​-chicago​-part​-i/ (accessed 26 May 2020). Enwezor, O. (2010), ‘Modernity and Postcolonial Ambivalence’, South Atlantic Quarterly, 109 (3): 595–620. 196

Africanfuturist Dakar in Selly Raby Kane’s Designs Eshun, K. (2003), ‘Further Considerations on Afrofuturism’, CR: The New Centennial Review, 3 (2): 287–302. Farber, L. (2015), ‘Hypersampling Black Masculinities, Jozi style’, Image & Text, 26 (1): 111–35. FitzPatrick, J. (2020), ‘Shifting to the Space of Third Contact’, Extrapolation, 61 (1/2): 69–90. Grabski, J. (2007), ‘Introduction to Special Issue: Visual Experience in Urban Africa’, Africa Today, 54 (2): vii–xii. Grabski, J. (2009a), ‘Making Fashion in the City: A Case Study of Tailors and Designers in Dakar, Senegal’, Fashion Theory, 13 (2): 215–42. Grabski, J. (2009b), ‘Urban Claims and Visual Sources in the Making of Dakar’s Art World City’, Art Journal, 68 (1): 6–23. Grabski, J. (2010), ‘The Visual City: Tailors, Creativity, and Urban Life in Dakar, Senegal’, in S. Gott and K. Loughran (eds), Contemporary African Fashion, 29–36, Bloomington: Indiana University Press. Harney, E. (2004), In Senghor’s Shadow: Art, Politics, and the Avant-garde in Senegal, 1960–1995, Durham: Duke University Press. Hayles, K. N. (2012), How We Think: Digital Media and Contemporary Technogenesis, Chicago: University of Chicago Press. Inner Cruise (2013), [Fashion Film] Dir. Tom Escarmelle, USA: White Owl Prod. Available online: https://www​.youtube​.com​/watch​?v​=2yws511nCj0 (accessed 12 March 2020). Klanten, R. and Clara Le Fort, eds (2016), Africa Rising: Fashion, Design and Lifestyle from Africa, Berlin: Die Gestalten Verlag. ‘Les Paradoxes de la Mode Africaine’ (2019), Seneplus, 8 April. Available online: https://www​ .seneplus​.com​/economie​/les​-paradoxes​-de​-la​-mode​-africaine (accessed 20 May 2020). Lowe, L. (2015), The Intimacies of Four Continents, Durham: Duke University Press. Manovich, L. (2017), ‘Notes on Instagrammism and Mechanisms of Contemporary Cultural Identity (and also Photography, Design, Kinfolk, K-pop, Hashtags, mise-en-scène, and cостояние)’, Cultural Analytics Lab, 2017. Available online: http://manovich​.net​/index​.php​/ projects​/instagram​-and​-contemporary​-image (accessed 20 May 2020). Miller, M. (2015), ‘All Hail the Q.U.E.E.N.: Janelle Monáe and a Tale of the Tux’, Nka: Journal of Contemporary African Art, 37: 62–9. Munster, A. (2005), ‘Digitality: Approximate Aesthetics’, ctheory, March 2001. Available online: http://www​.ctheory​.net​/text​_file​?pick​=290 (accessed 22 May 2020). Mustafa, H. N. (2001), ‘Oumou Sy: The African Place, Dakar, Senegal’, Nka: Journal of Contemporary African Art, 15 (1): 44–6. Oboe, A. (2019), ‘Sculptural Eyewear and Cyberfemmes: Afrofuturist Arts’, From the European South, 4: 31–44. OkayAfrica in Conversation with Selly Raby Kane (2012), ‘Prêt-À-Poundo: Have You Heard of Seraka?’ OkayAfrica, 2 November. Available online: https://www​.okayafrica​.com​/seraka​-selly​ -raby​-kane​-pret​-a​-poundo/ (accessed 17 May 2020). Okorafor, N. (2019), ‘Africanfuturism Defined’, Nnedi’s Wahala Zone Blog, 19 October. Available online: http://nnedi​.blogspot​.com​/2019​/10​/africanfuturism​-defined​.html (accessed 19 May 2020). Pfaff, F. (2008), ‘Dakar in Djibril Diop Mambety’s “Contras” City,’ CLA Journal, 52 (2): 170–86. Picarelli, E. (2015), ‘The Wearable Afro-Cosmology of Selly Raby Kane’, Black(s) to the Future. Available online: http://blackstothefuture​.com​/en​/the​-wearable​-afro​-cosmology​-of​-selly​-raby​ -kane/ (accessed 23 May 2020). Picarelli, E. (2019), ‘Selly Raby Kane: Surrealist Designer and Social Innovator’, Fashion Studies, 2 (1): 1–31. Available online: https://www​.fashionstudies​.ca​/selly​-raby​-kane (accessed 26 May 2020). Pinther, K. and U. -S. C. Nzewi (2015), ‘On Building New Spaces for Negotiating Art (And) Histories in Africa: An Introduction’, in K. Pinther, B. Fischer, and U. -S. C. Nzewi (eds), New Spaces for Negotiating Art (and) Histories in Africa. Vol. 2, 6–20, Münster: LIT Verlag.

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Fashioning the Afropolis Rabine, L. W. (2014), ‘‘These Walls Belong to Everybody,’ The Graffiti Art Movement in Dakar’, African Studies Quarterly, 14 (3): 89–112. Ribane, M. (2018), Email to author, 5 May 2018. Rovine, V. L. (2015), African Fashion, Global Style: Histories, Innovations, and Ideas You Can Wear, Bloomington and Indianapolis: Indiana University Press. Sarr, F. (2020), Afrotopia, trans. D. S. Burk, Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press. Schmidt-Linsenhoff, V. (2014), ‘The Court in Dakar: Political Aesthetics in the Post-Colony’, in G. Genge and A. Stercken (eds), Art History and Fetishism Abroad: Global Shiftings in Media and Methods Vol. 54, 271–88, Bielefeld: transcript. ‘Selly Raby Kane’ (n.d.), SRK Official Website. Available online: https://sellyrabykane​.com​/about​ -2/ (accessed 15 May 2020). ‘Selly Raby Kane is the Senegalese Fashion Brand That Calls Erykah Badu and Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie as Fans’ (2019), BellaNaija, 24 September 2019. Available online: https://www​ .bellanaija​.com​/2019​/09​/selly​-raby​-kane​-erykah​-badu​-chimamanda​-adichie/ (accessed 23 May 2020). ‘Selly Raby Kane on Otherworldly Fashion in Dakar’ (2016), [Video], YouTube, 16 May 2016. Available online: https://www​.youtube​.com​/watch​?v​=or4VysCFbuY (accessed 1 March 2020). ‘Selly Raby Kane – What Design Can Do 2016’ (2017), [Video], YouTube, 17 May 2017. Available online: https://www​.youtube​.com​/watch​?v​=Ocpz​_5OEel0 (accessed 14 May 2020). Simone, A. (2001), ‘On the Worlding of African Cities’, African Studies Review, 44 (2): 15–41. Sojoyner, D. M. (2017), ‘Dissonance in Time: (Un)Making and (Re)Mapping of Blackness’, in G. T. Johnson and A. Lubin (eds), Futures of Black Radicalism, London and New York: Verso. SRK (2014), Alien Cartoon Autumn/Winter Collection 2014. SRK (2015), Dakar City of Birds Autumn/Winter Collection 2015. SRK (2017), 17 Rue Jules Ferry Autumn/Winter Collection 2017. SRK (2018), Pichkari Spring/Summer Collection 2018. Sunstrum, P. P. (2013), ‘Afro-mythology and African Futurism: The Politics of Imagining and Methodologies for Contemporary Creative Research Practices’, Paradoxa, 25: 113–30. The Assembly (2020), ‘How I Got Started: Adebayo Oke-Lawal in Fashversation with Selly Raby Kane’, IG TV, 15 May 2020. The Other Dakar (2017), [Film] Dir. Selly Raby Kane, South Africa: Electric South. The Other Dakar (2017), Information Kit. Thrift, N. (2014), ‘The “Sentient City” and What it May Portend’, Big Data & Society, 1 (1): 1–21. Williams, D. (2018), ‘Fashion Design as a Means to Recognize and Build Communities-In-Place’, She Ji: The Journal of Design, Economics, and Innovation, 4 (1): 75–90.

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Fashioning the Afropolis It is common for western charities to collect used clothes and ship them to Africa as aid. But these goods, discarded by well-intentioned Americans and Europeans, are rarely given to the end-users as charity; instead, the donations are mostly sold to exporters who make huge profits selling second-hand goods in markets all over the continent. In Togo the second-hand clothing industry – worth an estimated US$54 million – is booming. Amah Ayivi is a Togolese designer and stylist living in Paris and the founder of Marché Noir (Black Market), a cult pop-up boutique and fashion brand that encapsulates the afropolitan aesthetic. After painstakingly selecting the items that reflect his personal style from the huge 45-kilogram bales that fill warehouses in and around Hédzranawoé Market, Ayivi takes the second-hand clothes that originally come from Europe and North America as charity and ships them to Paris where he curates and sells them as chic vintage clothing at a considerable profit. Ayivi’s subversive business model repackages western cast-offs as desirable items of value back in the West. Marché Noir also provides the perfect example of the potential of the circular economy to curb the excesses of fast-fashion and empower African entrepreneurs in the Global North.

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CHAPTER 11 EPILOGUE AFRICAN FASHION, CITIES AND THE MODERNITY OF TRADITION Victoria L. Rovine

The diverse and deeply researched chapters in this volume pose a challenge to the author of its afterword: What can one contribute to further elucidate the subject of this collection? Each chapter offers a richly detailed exploration of the intersections of Africa, fashion, and cities. Together, they reinforce the conviction that has long motivated my own research: that fashion is a cultural keystone that yields insights far beyond aesthetic systems and structures of social class—the elements of analysis that are conventionally addressed in the study of fashion. Through their discussion of the work of formal and informal designers, as well as the wearers who lend clothing lived social meanings, these case studies expand and deepen previous scholarship on fashion and dress in Africa. They also contribute to the scholarship on African cities, whose status as commercial, political, and cultural hubs creates a fertile ecosystem for fashion. In a 2016 essay, Kenyan writer and activist Binyavanga Wainaina described a sartorial fantasy that only slightly exaggerates the vitality of the urban centres in these pages, bringing into a single site fashion from each city’s many markets: ‘Accra, Lagos, Dakar and Abidjan will build giant workshops near their airports where hundreds of amazingly trained tailors work and where you can arrive, buy fabric, and order clothes. Imagine in these same spaces, hundreds of young designers retailing ready-to-wear lines and bespoke consultancies’ (2016: 13). Rather than a single, giant workshop, fashion courses through these and other African cities, inspired by and manifested in teeming streets and empty lots, mass entertainment and social media, national histories and personal memories, political activism and commercial ventures. Taken as a whole, this collection implements an expansive definition of African fashion, encompassing auteur-style, highly conceptual designs like a body-obscuring, yarn dress and mask ensemble by the Lagos-based brand IAMISIGO, as well as quotidian attire that reflects broad shifts across cultures or subcultures such as the Chinese stylings of Cameroonian women in Douala. The contributors address men’s and women’s fashions, as well as gender-neutral clothing that disregards or subverts gender constructions. The nine chapters and three visual essays span the continent’s urban centres from Cairo to Johannesburg, with particular attention to Lagos, Dakar and Douala. They describe these cityscapes as sources of design inspiration. As important as the cities where fashion flourishes are the networks, intra-African and beyond, by which people, clothing, and inspirations flow. The fashion that emerges from these cities and global arteries is manifested on

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runways, lookbooks, and Instagram feeds, but also in family photographs, at political protests, royal courts, and on the very surfaces of the textiles that are fashion’s primary medium. In addition to place, the chapters address temporality, a defining element of fashion. They describe designers who imbue their garments with meaning through references to historical dress, and others whose designs project forward to create, in the words of Papa Oyeyemi of Maxivive, ‘things that you would think about wearing in the future.’1 The scale of fashion production represented here also spans a wide range, from design houses whose work is presented at major international events to individual practitioners of dress trends, from handcrafted garments to mass-produced attire. These latter may be transformed by designers who remake or rebrand them, creating fashion that retains garments’ histories even as their presents and futures are reimagined. In short, these chapters and visual essays demonstrate that the fashions of the Afropolis have the potential to elucidate an array of aesthetic systems, urban cultures, international networks, personal styles, and global trends. This potential motivated my own research on African fashion design, which I have maintained over the course of nearly three decades. Fashion was not, however, the topic I planned to pursue when I embarked on doctoral research in the early 1990s. Indeed, African fashion design had yet to be recognized as a productive topic for art historical or other academic research, despite the percolating fashion scenes in cities across the continent. Instead, I had secured funding for a year’s research on the contemporary studio art market in Bamako. I honed my research focus to a single medium that was then gaining prominence among studio artists as an alternative to conventional, western-derived painting media: bogolanfini, a textile associated with rural Bamana communities where women employ its distinctive dyes and iconography to create ritually protective garments. At the time, bogolanfini was newly prominent, particularly in Bamako, as a symbol of national pride in the aftermath of a popular uprising that led to democratic elections. Bogolanfini-inspired paintings by the country’s leading artists hung on the walls of the city’s galleries and museums, and the medium was added to the curriculum of the Institut National des Arts. The most prominent name in this artistic movement was not an artist but the fashion designer Chris Seydou, who had been in the vanguard of the professionalization of fashion design in Africa. Seydou was the first to bring together bogolanfini and the tailored dress styles worn by most urban Malians. Indeed, this tailored attire was the most visible and widely recognized manifestation of this distinctively Malian artistic movement. I documented bogolanfini garments worn by urban Malians of all ages and genders, who might purchase them from exclusive boutiques and designers like Seydou, commission them from neighbourhood tailors, or acquire them in tourist markets (another important venue for bogolanfini’s late-twentieth-century revival). This textile’s transformations in the realm of dress provided rich insights into the shifting manifestations of the traditional in urban Mali’s visual cultures, a classification shaped by both internal and external forces, and one that bore great weight at a moment of national reimagining. 209

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Since that now long-ago research, the study of African fashion design has come into its own as a subfield of African material culture and art historical studies. Kerstin Pinther and Kristin Kastner’s introduction situates the study of African fashion, clothing, textiles, and the material cultures of African cities within the fields of African art history and related disciplines. They note that while western bias has long shaped the study – even the recognition – of fashion in Africa, the twenty-first century has seen a dramatic expansion of fashion industries in Africa, and an attendant increase in scholarship. This volume represents an important addition to this corpus, for it provides the first focused attention to Africa’s cities as sites of and inspirations for fashion production, past and present. The chapters are structured around three broad themes, all essential elements of the cultures of dress in African cities: histories, materialities, and bodies. I suggest a fourth thematic through line to further illuminate the fashions of African cities: tradition. Appearing in many incarnations and overlapping with the three other themes, references to tradition weave in and out of the chapters, sometimes emerging as a primary motif and often present in the ‘ground weave’ of these sartorial narratives. The terms ‘tradition’ and ‘traditional’ appear here (as in Africanist scholarship more broadly) both with and without quotation marks, or ‘scare quotes’.2 This punctuation reflects the complications of tradition in African expressive cultures, the result of a long history of predominantly western characterization of the continent as traditional. Thus, the term bears the inflection of western objectification of Africa and Africans as otherthan-modern, bound to their pasts in a state of vague timelessness. Fashion, defined by change, may appear to be tradition’s opposite, yet this volume is replete with designers who harness the concept and its material incarnations to their own ends. This operationalization of tradition has long preoccupied my own work – little wonder that I find myself following its diverse incarnations in these essays. My interest is in the impact of popular and/or academic associations of specific forms with tradition; in my work, these forms include textiles, garments, technologies, and iconography. As I have noted elsewhere, because I conceive of tradition as ‘a cultural force rather than an attribute of people, things, and practices, I seek to emphasize its flexible and potentially productive nature’ (Rovine 2019: 107). Tradition, then, is contingent, reflective of and available in the present despite its frequent association with the past. How, then, might tradition function in the fashion Afropolis? My exploration of this question begins at the beginning: the first page of this volume’s introduction. Pinther and Kastner open with the work of Nigerian designer Adeju Thompson, whose brand Lagos Space Programme is addressed by Alexandra Weigand in a chapter on conceptual fashion design in Lagos. Like them, I take this brand as my starting point, focusing on the evocative garments in its 2018 inaugural collection, which Thompson conceptualized as workwear for diviners (in Yoruba, babaláwo). Africanist art historians are well familiar with attire associated with Yoruba diviners who practice Ifá, a complex, ancient divination system. This form of divination has exceptionally elaborate artistic manifestations, expressed in literary, musical, sculptural, and sartorial media. This last category includes an array of sumptuously beaded body adornments and accessories (necklaces, bracelets, sashes, 210

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Figure 11.1 Necklace (Odigba Ifa), late nineteenth/early twentieth century. Yoruba. Glass beads, cloth, and leather. Gift of Deborah Stokes and Jeffrey Hammer, 1994. © The Art Institute of Chicago/Art Resource, NY.

bags) as well as garments (such as flowing white gowns, often embroidered with dense designs), all made in a wide variety of styles.3 These accessories may signal the diviner’s affiliation with a specific orisha (deity) by incorporating beads in the deity’s preferred colours. More broadly, multistranded ornaments and richly embroidered garments attest to the babaláwo’s success in serving his clients and, in turn, to his spiritual power (Figure 11.1). Despite the immense variety within each of these genres – reflective of regional styles, individual artists’ hands, and the preferences of clientele – these garments and accessories are not categorized as fashion. Whether in popular conceptions of fashion in Nigeria or in the plentiful scholarship on Yoruba arts, the regalia of diviners, like other forms characterized as traditional, lie outside conventional conceptions of fashion. A single notable exception to these classifications clarifies their arbitrary nature and profound impact. In 2005, several beaded panels in the style of Ifá divination accessories were featured on a prominent fashion runway in Paris. That year, one of the most dramatic garments presented in French mega-designer Jean-Paul Gaultier’s SpringSummer Haute Couture line was an elaborately beaded dress that combined several genres of African ornaments, transposing its components from northern Cameroon, the Sahel region of Mali and Niger, as well as Nigeria.4 Gaultier’s presentation erased these sources, melding the direct ‘quotations’ – without attribution – into a retrograde vision of a vague, invented ‘Africa’. The beaded panels are each adorned with a face in brilliant colours, a common motif in Ifá-related beadwork. The panels appear on the back of the dress, on both sides of the bag the model carried in the Paris show, and most prominently, on the bodice of the dress. The face on the bodice, rendered in yellow beads, is the sole 211

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figurative element visible on the riotously patterned garment, unmistakably Yoruba in style despite its absorption into a wholly different context. The Yoruba beadwork’s appearance as haute couture was hardly a call for the recognition of African dress practices as fashion. Instead, this and many other western designers’ Africanisms only reinforced the association of tradition with cultural stasis and nonmodernity, for the forms were stripped of context and blended into incoherence. The Gaultier dress exemplifies the Eurocentric structure of fashion markets and imaginaries, a structure that Thompson and other African designers discussed in this volume work within and against. In contrast, Thompson’s workwear for diviners bears no resemblance to the forms that have been exhibited and studied as canonical arts of Ifá divination, including divination trays and bowls as well as beaded adornments. The Lagos Space Programme garments are minimalist and monochromatic, achieving a dramatic subtlety – the very antithesis of the aesthetic of profusion that characterizes beaded symbols of status. In addition, Thompson’s designs are ungendered; the flowing tunics, pleated gowns, widelegged pants, and other garments evade the gendered associations of colour, patterns, and garment styles. The workwear of a babaláwo might conventionally be expected to express the male identity of the profession, for Ifá divination is the province of men. Thus, Thompson wholly transforms the diviners through garments, imagining their spiritual power as ungendered, not bound to the canonical iconography of Ifá, and transcultural in style. As Weigand notes, Thompson’s designs were informed by his study of Yoruba religion, which enabled him to reimagine this emblematically traditional element of Yoruba culture with an appreciation for its potential for transformation rather than freezing it in place. By creating workwear for a babaláwo that bears no formal resemblance to the attire already associated with diviners, Lagos Space Programme rejects the false dichotomy between tradition and modernity. This insight is facilitated by a consideration of the intersection of tradition and fashion in urban African settings. Throughout this volume, tradition appears in a host of fashion-related incarnations, each of them operationalizing this concept differently. We learn of the inception of traditional African dress practices, the reimagining of their histories to create new narratives, and the borrowing of traditions across cultures and continents. I highlight here just some of these elucidations of tradition as an element of urban African fashion narratives: In her chapter, Marie Grace Brown describes how the tobe, a white cotton women’s garment from Sudan, came to be an emblem of traditional culture and national identity. She begins in the present, with a viral image of a tobe-clad protestor during the 2019 demonstrations that ended the rule of President al-Bashir. The garment was a key element of this image, making it a galvanizing depiction of all Sudanese women. Brown traces the history of Sudanese women’s strategic use of this garment’s status as traditional to navigate the politics of gender and authenticity in Khartoum. The ndop cloth, documented in Michaela Oberhofer’s visual essay, offers an emblematic instance of the historical specificity of forms associated with tradition, which may be adapted to new markets and new cultural contexts through the work of 212

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individual innovators. King Njoya’s early-twentieth-century recognition of the cloth’s value helped to cement its status. Contemporary fashion designers continue to modify the cloth as they celebrate it as an element of Cameroonian heritage. Basile Ndjio’s contribution on the sinonization of dress in Douala exemplifies the complexities of networks of dress traditions across cultures. With the recent rise of China’s influence as an economic and political force in Africa, its cultural influence has grown apace. Ndjio describes men’s and women’s adoption of dress forms associated with Chinese attire, like the Cheongsam or Qipao for women, and the ‘Mao suit’ for men. These forms represent Chinese traditional culture for urban Cameroonian audiences, whose emulation of China represents a pivot away from the western influences that had been predominant. Fascinatingly, however, these now characteristically Chinese garments were themselves the products of western influence (Clark 2000: 8; Steele and Major 1999: 55). Thus, Cameroonian adaptations of Chinese style are the products of long histories of transcultural fertilization. Yet, the Mao Suits and other garments still serve Douala’s residents as uncomplicatedly, traditionally Chinese. Tradition is central to the work of the Sartists, as described by Cher Potter. Indeed, this South African design collective finds inspiration in a multiplicity of traditional dress practices. Unlike the Chinese styles of Douala (or Gaultier’s wholesale copying of African beadwork), the multiple inspirations for the Sartists’ designs reflect the layers of their personal identities as residents of Johannesburg, as Zulu, as South African, as African, and as Black. They incorporate Zulu beadwork associated with rural homesteads, jazzinflected hostel cultures of the Swenkas and later the Pantsulas, and global hip-hop subcultures: all of these come to represent tradition, as new generations look back to draw on their cultural power. These are not the only incarnations of tradition and traditional dress in these pages – one could address the Yoruba textile adire that appears in the work of so many designers, the brilliantly dyed bazin or cuup of Dakar’s tailor shops and fashion runways, or the Brazilian and Cuban forms that were transformed into Yoruba dress by late nineteenth century’s returnees to Lagos. All of these and many other revivals, reimaginings, and creations of traditional dress remind us that fashion is, indeed, a cultural keystone, and the transcultural networks fostered by cities are its greatest incubator.

Notes 1. See the interview with Papa Oyeyemi in the contribution by Alexandra Weigand. 2. In a 2004 essay, Steiner noted that the use of scare quotes around the terms ‘tradition’ and ‘traditional’, a discipline-wide convention, obscures ‘traditional or conservative practices and visual expressions in Africa that derive significance and meaning because of their real and immutable qualities’. (2004: 96). 3. For analysis of the material cultures of divination in Yoruba cultures, see Drewal and Mason (1996) and Olupona and Abiodun (2016). 213

Fashioning the Afropolis 4. I describe this garment in greater detail in African Fashion, Global Style (2015): 13–14, 102–3. Gaultier’s entire line of haute couture designs that season were inspired by Africa; many of the garments used feathers, beads, and painted bodies to evoke stereotypical visions of ‘exotic’ Africa. The beaded dress was the only garment that directly incorporated African forms.

References Clark, H. (2000), The Cheongsam, New York: Oxford University Press. Drewal, H. J. and J. Mason (1996), Beads, Body and Soul: Art and Life in the Yorùbá Universe, Los Angeles: UCLA Fowler Museum of Cultural History. Olupona, J. K. and R. O. Abiodun, eds (2016), Ifá Divination, Knowledge, Power, and Performance, Bloomington: Indiana University Press. Rovine, V. L. (2019), ‘African Fashion Design and the Mobilization of Tradition’, in A. Massey (ed.), A Companion to Contemporary Design Since 1945, 91–110. West Sussex, UK: Wiley Blackwell. Rovine, V. L. (2015), African Fashion, Global Style: Histories, Innovations, and Ideas You Can Wear, Bloomington: Indiana University Press. Steele, V. and J. S. Major (1999), China Chic: East Meets West, New Haven: Yale University Press. Steiner, C. B. (2004), ‘The Tradition of African Art: Reflections on the Social Life of a Subject’, in M. S. Phillips and G. Schochet (eds), Questions of Tradition, 88–109. Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 96. Wainaina, B. (2016), ‘Navigating the Fashion Cities of Africa: Notes from a Flâneur’, in H. A. Pool (ed.), Fashion Cities Africa, 12–3. Chicago: Intellect.

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INDEX

Note: Page numbers followed with “n” refer to endnotes abacost  151 Aba-Yazid, M.  36 Abusharaf, R.  41 activism  33–4 fashion and  32–7 new accessory for  41–3 Ade Bakare  65 Adeola, Mammy  52–3 Adeola Holloway. See Adeola, Mammy Adesokan, A.  152 Adidas  173 adire  1, 14, 60, 63, 64, 213 eleko  64 Adjaye, D.  123 aesthetic(s)  16, 51, 55, 70–3 body modification  109, 111–12 Chinese-inspired fashion and  116 handmade  67 politics  61, 68, 69, 73 retrofuturist  155–7 of shininess  93, 96 African cities, fashion and  6–8 style  8–14 clothing  31 diaspora  183 nationalism  163 African fashion  112–17, 208 Chinese-inspired  112–17 from cities  208–10 element of  209 research  209 rise of  3 study of  210 tradition and  210, 212–13 Africanfuturism  183–6, 189, 191–4 Africanfuturist colonization  194 Africanisms  154, 212 Afrobeat  149, 152 Afro-Brazilian Bumba Meu Boi Festival  55–6 Lagos architecture in  46–8 family photo albums  55 fashion in  55–7 “Afro-cool”  194

Afro-iconographies  194 ‘afro-minima’  131 Afropolis  3–4, 7, 16, 188, 195, 209 Àga Concept  131 agbádá  51, 56, 63, 64 Agboola, A. O.  149 AKA. See Forbes, K. J. Akib, B.  13 akwa ocha  126 al-Bashir, O.  29, 43 n.1, 212 public order laws  35–6 Allison, S.  162 Allman, J.  31 Ambode, A.  152 Amoda, O.  130 Angolan Chokwe mask  175 Anikulapo-Kuti, F.  13, 149–51 and Alagbon cell  161–2 Alagbon Close (1984)  159, 161 Beasts of No Nation (1989)  159–61 Black President (1980)  161 Coffin for Head of State  159–60 Confusion Break Bone  159 as ‘cosmopolitan nativist’  162 Gentleman (1973)  153, 158 International Thief Thief (ITT)  159 Kalakuta Show  159 Lady (1972)  157–8 Mattress (1975)  157 music and politics  162 No Buredi (No Bread) (1975)  161 Pan-Africanism  18, 162–4 retrofuturist politic  155–8 sartorial rebellion  18, 149–51, 157, 159, 163–4 sartorial resistance  151–4 sexism and misogyny  157 Sorrow Tears and Blood  159 trans-worlding the nation  158–63 women and  157–8 Zombie (1977)  158, 159 ‘Animal Welfare’  67 ankara  14 annual Dakar Fashion Week  11 ‘Another, 2015’  131–2 apartheid  169, 171, 173 Appaduraian ‘scapes’  4, 61, 154

Index appliquéing technique  99 Apter, A.  153 Arab world  41 archetypical transport  128 archives cultural  62–5 family photo album and  51–2, 55–7 fashion and  51–2 as social constructs  51 Arendt, H.  159, 164 n.3 Argentée, C.  113–14, 116 ‘art world city’  7 Asantewaa, Y.  69 aso ebi  129 aso oke (top cloth)  14, 51, 126 aso olona  67–8 Assmann, A.  64 Austin-Peters, B., Fela and the Kalakuta Queens  155–8, 164 authenticity  29, 39–41 politics of  30–2 Awoulaba  20 n.7 Ayissi, I.  80, 97 Ayivi, A.  19, 202 Azikiwe, N.  13 babalawo  1, 60, 62, 63, 65, 212 Badri, H. K.  33, 35 Bahian dress  50, 54–6 Bamum region  80–2, 84 Barandun, C.  16 Barracks, D.  159 batakari  69 batik  80, 82, 83, 87, 100 Baye Fall  101–3 beaded panels  211 beauty and rightness  40 ‘Because of Men in Silk Shirts on Lagos Nights’  129 Behen, P.  12 Bennett, A.  167, 168, 172, 173, 176, 178 Bey, T.  163 biennale Dak’art  11 Bight of Benin  49 Biko, B. S.  149 bingo  60, 74 n.3 BINGO magazine  10 Biya, P.  12 Black dandyism  152–4 diaspora  183 emancipation  189 Black History Studies  57 n.4 Black Panther movement  154 ‘bling-bling’ aesthetics  96 bobaraba  17, 20 n.7, 108–12, 117–18

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Boddy, J.  38 bodily belonging  37–40 bodily pain  38–9 body adornments and accessories  210–11 building  109 clothed  61 fashion and  17–18, 37, 39, 41 as medium of memory  64 modification  109, 111–12 rites/rituals  37–8, 40, 41 scars and tattoo culture  38 sensuous traditions  38 bogolanfini  209 Böhme, G.  128, 193, 194 ‘boubou en itinerance’  98–9 Boy, B.  162 Bramble, J.  94 Brazilian Descendants Association  55, 56 Breward, C.  7 brightness  96 brilliance  96, 104 n.9 Bristow, T.  72, 193 ‘Broken Pots’  133, 136 n.23 bùbá  63, 127 Buka, A.  167, 174 ‘Buka Special’  128 Bu ken lab  101, 102 Bull doff  101 Bumba Meu Boi Festival  55–6 Afro-Brazilian women at  53–4 Buthelezi, M.  175 Calefato, P.  4, 31, 42 Calotropis Procera  139, 140, 142, 144 Cameroon  11–12, 80, 81, 84, 86, 111, 115–17, 211 Chalayan, H.  61 Cheongsam  110, 114–17, 213 Chinese beauty  107–8, 110–13, 116–17 bobaraba  17, 109–12, 117 economic migration  107 fashion  113–18 products  112–13, 116 fashionscapes  108–9, 111 traditional clothes  113–15 traditional culture  213 Choumali, J.  20 n.7 Christol, F.  85 circumcision  38 cities African fashion in  6–14 fashion and  1–2, 6–8 clothing  61 collective memory  51, 55, 56 ‘colo-mentality’  153

Index colonial retrofuturism  155, 156 Comme des Garçons  61, 64, 75 n.18 conceptual fashion design IAMISIGO  60–1, 65–9, 71–3 Lagos Space Programme  60, 62–5, 71–3 Maxivive  60, 61, 69–73 contra-dandyism  153, 154 Cook, T.  51 cosmopolitan post-dandyism  153 Craik, J.  168, 178 The Criminal Act 1991: Art. 145–58  35 cross-dressing  39 cultural archive/memory  62–5 cultural authenticity  29, 32 cuup Facebook  101, 103 cuup malien  95 defined  104 n.5 cuup palman  95 cuup takk  95 cuup VIP  95 cuup WhatsApp  101, 103 cyberspace  42 da Costa, George S. A.  51 Dakar  91, 103, 182, 184, 185, 189–90, 193 atmosphere of ‘preparedness’  187 as crazy energy  188 dirriankhé  98 dyers’ workshops  94–6 fashion and styles  9–11, 92–3 fashion designers’ workshops  99–103 as the quintessential Afropolis  186 récupération practice  100 as sentient city  188 tailor shops  96–9 urban space  92–3 walking in  93 damask  91, 94, 95 Da Rocha, C.  48, 50 da Rocha, L. A. N.  50, 57 n.4 ‘Dear Ribane’  192 de Boeck, F.  8, 109 débrouillards  12 décapage de la peau  111 December 2018 Revolution  29, 31–3, 35–6, 41, 43 n.1, 212 de Certeau, M., walking theory  93 De Greef, E.  8 Deliss, C.  186–7, 195 n.8 denim  11, 100, 102 ‘Derby Shoes’  130 de Souza, R. N. F.  47 de Witte, M.  194 dhoti  68 Dione, A.  94 Diop, D.  2

dirriankhé  98 Di Summa, L. T.  55 Douala  107, 213 bobaraba  17, 108–12, 117 fashion and styles  9, 11–13 Dumas, L.  12, 87 Duranta Erecta  144 dyers’ workshops  94–6 Ebenema, C.  67 Edwards, S.  53, 54 Eicher, J. B.  49 el Amin, N. A.  34 elegance  112, 114–17 eleko  64, 75 n.20 ‘Elephant House’  48, 57 n.3 El Goud, A. A.  17, 139–40, 142–5 Elnemr, R.  139–40, 144 ‘emancipados’  47 embedded memory, in fashion design of Gozel Green  132–4 embodied identities  55 embroidery  81, 83, 99 Emezi, Y.  134, 135, 136 n.25 Enekwe-Ojei, S.  132–3 Enekwe-Okoji, O.  132–3 ennobling  94–6 Enwezor, O.  195 Enyeasi, K.  1, 131–2, 136 n.26 equity  31, 33 Escarmelle, T., ‘Inner Cruise’ (2013)  185 Esiebo, A., Highlife (2013–16)  121–2, 129, 135 n.1 Esiri, A.  129 Essentials series  174 Ezemma, S.  130–1 Facebook  97, 101 family photo albums  49 and archive  15, 55–7 sartorial practices in  52–5 fashion and  51, 55–6 Farber, L.  8, 168–70 fashion  49–50 and activism  32–7 aesthetics  70–3 African (see African fashion) Afro-Brazilian  54–7 and body  17–18, 37, 41, 109 Chinese  113–18 and cities  1–2, 6–8 and cloth/dress  1–2 cultures of dress  8 in Dakar  92–3 design  3, 6–7 of Gozel Green  17, 132–4 of Maki Oh  125–8

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Index in Douala  108 and family photo albums  15, 51, 55–6 and identity  55 labels  101 in Lagos, cartography of  123–5 Nigeria’s  71–2 photography  121–2 and sartorial styles  2–4, 6, 7 street  91–3, 99–102 and style  4–5 in African cities  8–14 ‘subaltern powers’  72 superficialities  1–2 and textile (research)  5–7 weeks  3 fashionability  5 ‘Fashion Architectonic’ series  130 fashion designers’ workshops  99–103 fashioning  5 fegg ak jay (‘shake and sell’)  100 feminism  40, 158 Ferrari  149 fila  51 FitzPatrick, J.  191 Folawiyo, L.  129–30 Folawiyo, R.  123 Forbes, K. J., Fela in Versace (2018)  149–51, 156, 162–3 Freeman, H. S.  51 future memory  62–5 Gadamer, H.-G., The Relevance of the Beautiful  55–6 Gaestel, A.  71, 126, 135 n.8 Gandhi, M. K.  68 gara cloth  54 Garber, M.  39 Gaugele, E.  61, 76 Gaultier, J.-P.  211–13 Gbadegesin, O. A.  56 Gebauer, P.  84 Gemmeke, A.  104 n.3 gender equity  31, 33 norms  72 Gengenbach, H.  38 Ghariokwu, L.  161 Gibbson, A. -J., Lenge Lenge  155, 156 glistening  70, 71 Godart, F.  51 Gozel Green, fashion design of  17, 132–4 Grabski, J.  7, 100, 186 grand boubou  95, 98, 102 Gueye, L.  98 Hale, S.  32 Hall, S.  169

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handmade materials  68–9 Hansen, K. T.  5 Haroun, L.  29, 42, 43 Heath, D.  10 Hebdige, D.  169 hijab  40 hip-hop  100, 174, 214 ‘Home, 2019’  17, 140, 145 ‘How to Marry a Billionaire’ (2018)  70–3 ‘Humanoids Transcending Cosmic Frequency’ (2018)  192 Hypebeast  174, 179 n.10 IAMISIGO  60–1, 65–9, 71–3 Ibrahim, F. A.  39–40 IDEA x Stüssy cap (2014)  174 identity  5–6, 10, 12, 14, 20 n.4, 55–6, 167, 169, 171 black  8 national  14, 29, 35, 38, 124 South African  173–6, 178 Ifá  1, 60, 64, 65, 210–12 Igbo  133–4 indigo  16, 34, 62, 75 n.22, 80, 85, 86 Inggs, A.  154, 168 Instagram  18, 97, 101, 167, 168, 172, 173 Africanfuturist atmospheres on  191–4 Instagrammism  194 #internationalpantsula  172 International Stüssy Tribe  174 ìró  68, 127 Ìsàlẹ̀ Èko  47 Isidore, S. S.  158, 162 Islam  32, 41 Islamic law  30 Islamic world  41 izikhothane  18, 149–51, 154, 164 n.1 iziquaza ear plugs  175 Jarrell, J.  124 jaunissement de la peau  111 jazz  170–1, 213 Jefferson, T.  169 Joe Ouakam. See Samb, I. Johannesburg current style post-subcultures in  171–3 studio photography  170 twentieth-century-style subcultures  169–71 Young fashion  171–2 Jones, G.  192 Jorgensen, K. E.  118 n.10 kabas  54 kabba  12, 110 Kabiru, C.  193 Kalakuta Museum  152

Index kandakas  29, 32, 37 Kane  3, 11 Kane, S. R., fashion design  18–19, 102 Africanfuturism  183–6, 189, 195 on Instagram  191–4 ‘Agit’Art “La cloche de fourmis”’  188–9 ‘Alien Cartoon’ show (2014)  188–91 artistic practice  182–5 ‘Dakar City of Birds’ (2015)  185 futuristic photographs  192–3 futuristic self-designs  194 ‘Muus du Tux’  188–9, 196 n.10 ‘The Other Dakar’ (2017)  185 ‘Pichkari’ (2018)  185–6 ‘Rue Jules Ferry 17’ (2017)  102, 185–8 Kane Lo, A.  98 Kano  66–7 Karamina, V.  4 Kemp, K.  154 kente  66, 69 Khartoum  15, 32–4, 41, 212 Kinshasa  8 knobkerrie staff  175 knock-off fashion  71 Koyama, J.  149 Kunene, R.  167, 169, 172–6 Kungwane, K.  167, 171, 174 Kwon, M.  126 lace  14, 70–2 Lagos  46, 121–2, 127, 128 Afro-Brazilian architecture and material culture in  46–8 Afro-Brazilian fashion in  55–7 cartography of fashion in  123–5 family photo albums and archive, sartorial practices in  52–5 fashion and styles  9, 13–14 fashion designers  17, 126, 129 Maki Oh in  17, 126 spatial structures and residential areas  125 textile market  125 ‘Lagos everyday’  128 Lagos Fashion Week 2018  60, 62, 63, 66 ‘Lagos Soundscapes’  128 Lagos Space Programme  1–2, 60, 62–5, 71–3, 210, 213 Laotan, A. B.  47, 48, 57 n.1 Lekko, L.  129 Lephoto, W.  167, 169, 171, 173–6, 178, 179 n.8 ‘The Liberation Statue’  151–2 #localattitude  11 Looku (2021)  5, 9 Loxion Kulcha  8 luminosity  96

lurex  93 Lyndersay, D.  51, 58 n.8 Macaulay, H.  13 Mchunu, K.  150 McLaughlin, F.  92 #madeinsenegal  11 ‘the Madiba shirts’  151 Magadla, S.  162, 163 Mahdi  30 Maison Martin Margiela  61, 62, 64, 70, 75 n.18 ‘Maison Shade’  124 fashion design of  17, 125–8 Maki Oh  65, 129, 134 Makki, H.  37, 42 Malians  209 Mamattah, A.  51 Mambéty, D. D.  102, 187 Mamdani, M.  152 Mandela, N. R.  151, 171 Manovich, L.  193, 194 Mao suit  115, 116, 213 Marchand, T.  74 n.2 material aesthetics  16, 68 material culture in Lagos  46–8 Matussiere, B.  155 Maxivive  60, 61, 69–73, 209 Mbembe, A.  3 Mditshwa, P.  172 memory(ies)  49, 51, 55 body as a medium of  64 cultural  64 future  62–5 métissage  92 Mhiripiri, N. A.  174, 178 Miller, D.  1–2, 5, 91, 103 ‘mini-apartheid’  152 mobile phones  43–4 Mobutu Sese Seko  151 Monáe, J.  192 MOP. See Movement of the People (MOP) Mourid brotherhood  92, 101, 102 Moussa, A.  13 Movement of the People (MOP)  159 #mswenkofontein  172 Mustafa, H. N.  10, 186, 193 Mustafa, M.  93 Ncube, C.  149 Ndebele culture  174 ndop fabric  12, 212–13 brief history of  80–7 production of  80–2, 86–7 role of  82, 84–6 transformation to contemporary urban fashion  16, 80–7

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Index Neo-Baroque style  48 neocolonial retrofuturism  155 neologism  183 ‘neo-tribes’ theory  167, 168, 172–4, 176, 178 Ngangura, M.  186 Ngcobo, N.  168 Ngwekazi aka Scoop Makhathini, S.  172 Niawal (‘Sew!’)  101 Nigeria  14, 124–5, 133–5 n.6, 153, 211 fashion  71–2 textile industry  66–7 Nigerian flag  162 Nimeiry, G.  39–40 Njamnjoh, F.  116 Njoya, Ibrahim  16, 81–5, 213 Njoya, Idrissou  85 Nkrumah, K.  162 nouvelle élégance  115 nouvelle tendance  115 Nuttall, S.  3, 7, 108, 168 Nwoko, D.  130 Nxedlana, J.  168, 172, 179 n.2

Pan-Africanism  18, 162–4 pano da costa (cloth from the coast)  50 Pantsulas  18, 169, 171–6, 178, 213 Paris, A.  3, 11, 99 Pearse, S.  52 Pearse, S. H.  48, 52–3, 57 n.3 Pearse, S. H. Jr.  52 peau de papaye  111 Peterson, B.  168, 171 phantasmagoric cartography  184, 185 photography  49 Picton, J.  8 Pitsa, T.  154 Polhemus, T.  1 politics of authenticity  30–2 Pool, H. A., Fashion Cities Africa  20 n.4 popular haute couture  4 ‘post-adire’  65 post-apartheid South Africa  171, 174 power  189 prefigurative politics  155–8 ‘Project 3.1 Awo-Workwear’ (2018)  60, 63, 65 public order laws  35–6

Obasanjo, O.  159 Obasi, D.  192 Oberhofer, M.  13 Oboe, A.  193 Ochonogor, G.  3 October Revolution of 1964  39 Ogboni  68 Ogisi, B.  3, 65–9, 125 ‘Gods of the Wilderness’ (2019)  60, 66–8 ‘Modern Hunters’ (2016)  69 Ogundipe, A., Èṣù Ẹlégbára, the Yoruba God of Chance and Uncertainty: A Study in Yoruba Mythology  75 n.14 Ojeikere, J. D. ‘Okhai  130 Okeowo, A.  127 Okiche, W.  157 Okorafor, N.  183 Okorie, P. N.  155 Olaiya, V.  152 Olaniyan, T.  158, 162 Omdurman Girls’ Secondary School  35 ‘Omi - Water’  128 Omotayo, P.  125, 127–8 onyonyo  54 Orange Culture  65 Osakwe, A.  3, 125–9, 134 Oshugbo  68 Oti, S.  152 Our Tribe campaign  167–8, 173 Ousmane, S.  2 Oyediran, A. Y.  53–4 Oyeyemi, P.  3, 69–70, 72, 209

Qipao  116, 213

220

Ra, S.  192 Rabine, L.  6, 186 racial difference  189 racial liberation  189 racial segregation  169 radical Black freedom  189 Ramangelissa Samb. See Samb, I. Ransome-Kuti, F.  13, 156–60 rap  100 ‘Raw-Urban’ series  131 récup-batik  102 recuperation  91, 100, 156 refurbishing  94–6 remaking  100 Renne, E.  71 Republican Sisters  33 retrofuturist aesthetic  155–7 Richards, T.  51 rituals of body  37–8, 41 Roach-Higgins, M. E.  49 Robards, B.  167, 168, 172, 173, 176, 178 robe bloc  10 Rockson, E.  51 Ross, D.  69 Rovine, V. L.  6, 61, 81, 125–6, 168, 178 Sagoe, D.  123, 129 Salah, A.  15, 29, 30, 35–7, 41–3 Salami, M.  158 Salib, H.  34–5

Index Samb, I.  102, 186, 187 Sandbye, M.  51 sañse  10 Sarr, F.  186 Sartists  8, 18, 167–9, 171–6, 178 sartorial code-mixing  92 sartorial place-making  125–8 sartorial practices in family photo albums and archive  52–5 sartorial rebellion  18, 149–51, 157 sartorial resistance  151–4 scars culture  38 Schmidt-Linsenhoff, V.  187 Schoonmaker, T., Black President: The Art and Legacy of Fela Anikulapo-Kuti  153, 161 Schwartz, J. M.  51 second-hand goods/industry  19, 202 Seiboko, R.  162 Senegal  9–11, 16 Sufi Islam  92 textile surfaces  16–17 depth-ontology of  91, 103 urban spaces and fashion  92–4 Senghor, L. S.  10, 155 Set Setal movement  11, 100, 105 n.14 Seydou, C.  209 Shaka (King)  174 shariah law  40 Shawki, F.  34 shebeens  169, 179 n.3 shillukh  38 shininess, aesthetic of  93, 96 Sikainga, A.  33 Simone, A. M.  187 sinonization  16, 108, 116, 117, 213 Sithole, J., Zuluness concept  174, 178 Sobayo, A.  151 Sobrado  48 social media  18, 97, 101, 173, 193. See also Facebook; Instagram social norms  72 Sojoyner, D.  189 ṣòkòtò  63 sokoto trousers  51 South African flag  162 identity  173–6, 178 Sow, C. A.  93 space-making  149–50, 152, 154 spatial politics  152 spatial turn  6 Spring-Summer Haute Couture line  211 Stanovsky, D.  157 Stoned Cherrie  3, 8 storytelling in fashion design of Maki Oh  125–8 Stranger (2013–18)  62

street fashion  91–3, 99–102 streetwear  172–4, 176 Strickrodt, S.  47 studio photography  169–70 #stussy  167, 173 Stüssy’s tribal  174–5 Stüssy ‘World Tour’ T-shirt (2012)  174 style peau de banana  111 ‘subaltern powers’ of fashion  72 subcultures  178, 213 Johannesburg  18, 169–73 Sudanese women  29, 31–3, 35–43, 212 equity  31, 33 nineteenth and twentieth centuries  37 sociopolitical rights  39 violence on  36 Sudanese Women’s Union (SWU)  34, 39–40 Sufi Islam  92 Sun Goddess  3, 8 superficial  91, 103 surfaces of textiles, depth-ontology of  91, 103 Swenkas  18, 169, 171–3, 178, 213 SWU. See Sudanese Women’s Union (SWU) Sy, O.  11, 99, 193 ‘System Error’ collection  62 Taha, A. M. M.  33–4 tailor shops  96–9 Takkusanu Ndar  92 tattoo culture  38 Taylor, R.  158 Tchatcho, R.  12 technology  42–3 textile surfaces  16–17 depth-ontology of  91, 103 Thomas-Fahm, S.  64, 124 Thompson, A.  1, 3, 131, 210, 212 Thompson, T.  62–5, 74 n.2, 75 nn.14, 22 Thrift, N.  188 Tiffany Amber  65, 123, 125, 129, 130 Tinubu, M. E.  157 Titton, M.  61, 76 tobe. See white tobe torco  50 ‘tradi-moderne’  10, 98 tradition  56, 210, 213 n.2 and African fashion  31, 212–13 ‘traditional’  210, 213 n.2 Chinese clothes  113–15 transcended forms, in fashion design of Gozel Green  132–4 trans-worlding  149–50, 158 the nation  158–63 ‘trans’ in  163–4 tribal identity  174 Tukki Mode  101

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Index Tulloch, C.  5 tuned spaces  128 twentieth-century-style subcultures in Johannesburg  169–71 Udé, I.  153–4 Ukpo, Y.  62 #umswenko  172–3 UNIA. See Universal Negro Improvement Association (UNIA) uniform/pluriform  158–63 Universal Negro Improvement Association (UNIA)  53 urban space  92–3 Vaughan-Richards, A.  134 Venkatesh, A.  55 Verger, P.  46, 47, 57 nn.1, 4 Versace  71, 149 ‘Versage’  71 Victorian fashion  53–6 Vinken, B.  1 violence  36, 41 Vlisco  134 Vogue magazine  153, 154 von Pezold, J.  116–17 Wainaina, B.  208 walking theory  93 Wass, B. M.  49 ‘Water House’  48 ‘Wet’, ‘Dry’ and ‘Harmattan’  70 white tobe  15, 29–32, 40–1, 43, 212 and activism  32–7 cultural recognition  35 political function  33 political power  31, 32, 40 for protected status of women  33–5

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public order laws and  35–6 as Sudanese identity  34–5 transformation to consumer-driven fashion  38–9 visual symbolism of women in  35, 39 Williams, D.  191 Wokam, J.  13 Wolof  10, 92, 93 women movement  33 Sudanese  29, 31–3, 35–6 equity  31, 33 sociopolitical rights  39 tattoo culture  38 violence on  36 Women’s Awakening Society  35 worlding theory  187 Xhosa culture  174 Yamamoto, Y.  62, 64, 70, 73 Yaoundé  12 Yokkaat  101 Yoruba  13 Afro-Brazilian style  50 architecture  48 beadwork’s appearance  212 dress culture  49–50, 58 n.8 male and female traditional dress  56 sartorial styles between Africa and Americas  48–51 traditional culture  212 Young fashion, Johannesburg  171–2 Zaria Rebels  134 Zulu  169–70, 174, 213 cosmopolitanism  176 migration  175 Zuluness  18, 167, 168, 174, 176, 178

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