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The polysemic form - Editorial Assignment
cultural appropriation in fashion
I was so lucky to work with María Corte https://www.mariacorte.com/
on this project for school.
Firstly, I had to think about a shape and a lot of illustrations that I could do with it. I got to look for an article and do a series of 4 paintings and do a whole project with them, they had to be connected, and I only had to use a palette of 3 colors.
Here when I chose my shape, it was a red dot. With this in mind, I decided to draw an Indian girl with her typical Bindi on her forehead.
From this drawing, I began my illustrations on cultural appropriation, referencing the article written by Lux Lancheros. , "I LOVE WHAT OFFENDS YOU: the cultural limits of fashion".
Bindi.🔴
This was the first illustration that I did in this series.
In the article, they talked about how celebrities use this symbol from Indian culture as a fashion symbol, and they also showed examples of it.
I tried to convey how white people almost always use this type of culture as something enjoyable and wear costumes to try to look like them without thinking about whether it is disrespectful to these people.
Sexy?.🔴
In this illustration, I'm making a reference to that time when Victoria’s Secret came out with their "sexy little geisha."
Again reinforcing the idea of how companies take aspects of other cultures and sexualize them.
Fashion?.🔴
This one was a representation of "Nazi Chic", in the article, they explain how Asian people think of the clothes that Nazis wore as something cool, so some idols wear clothes similar to them.
Superiority?.🔴
In this final piece, I demonstrate how, most of the time, the models used in magazines, advertisements, and other media are white or European people with those fine features dressed in traditional clothing from other cultures. And also, in one of the images that I saw when I was doing this search, I found one that portrayed black people as inferior; that was the one that inspired me to show this reality.
From the sketch to the final view
Creative process
FIRST SKETCHES
COLOR PALETTE
COLOR TEST
FINAL VIEW
1/3
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