Is fashion a synonym of cultural appropriation?
Fashion is an art mastered by only a few of us. Fashion is drawing its inspiration from every single thing seen, heard or touched, which means it is actually very hard to create new things.
To be different, each artist has its approach. Some fashion designers are drawing their inspiration from their culture, which is such a good idea, so it allows people to know better what their culture looks like.
Anju Modi, an indian designer is a great example of it. She created her clothes according to her culture, and what beauty seems to her. Furthermore, her fashion show took place in the Lakme fashion show in India.
Sometimes, fashion designers are running out of ideas, and to differentiate themselves from all the others, they are drawing their inspiration from other cultures:
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| Christiano Siriano, Spring 2017 |
To be different, each artist has its approach. Some fashion designers are drawing their inspiration from their culture, which is such a good idea, so it allows people to know better what their culture looks like.
Anju Modi, an indian designer is a great example of it. She created her clothes according to her culture, and what beauty seems to her. Furthermore, her fashion show took place in the Lakme fashion show in India.
Sometimes, fashion designers are running out of ideas, and to differentiate themselves from all the others, they are drawing their inspiration from other cultures:
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| Dior, Spring/Summer |
This is called cultural appropriation. It is defined by "the unacknowledged or inappropriate adoption of the customs, practices, ideas, etc. of one people or society by members of another and typically more dominant people or society" (source: wikipedia).
It is really disrespectful to demonstrate cultural appropriation in whatever you are doing.
John Galliano, fashion designer for the Maison Dior has been doing this for a while:
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| Dior, Spring/Summer 1997 |
But he definitely ain't the only one:
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| Marc Jacob |
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| Marc Jacob |
On the first picture, Marc Jacob drew his inspiration from the rave culture, and on the second one from the arab culture. It is even more disrespectful when his models are white, and not from the culture he has been inspired of.
One last example of cultural appropriation in fashion is Jacquesmus. Jacques Mus is a young french designer, really talented and "avant-gardist", especially with his tiny bags and his enormous sun hats. He has, in February 2018, presented his collection "Morocco", inspirated by the Moroccan souk. When he has presented it in the Paris FashionWeek in 2018, none of his models was moroccan:
To conclude this article, the only thing to remember is that no matter how great fashion collections can be, if there is any sign of culture, there's a risk that designers demonstrate cultural appropriation in it. They need to be careful whenever they are drawing their inspiration from any culture that isn't theirs so that they could stop hurting people with that.
I wish people would be more woke about it, so that's the reason that made me write about this.
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