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Politics

Crafting Resistance: How Contemporary Craftivists are Using Their Handiwork to Voice Dissent

June 13, 2020Craftivism, Crafts, Politics, Pop Culture5

“Spin. Spin with full understanding. Let those who spin wear khadi. Let those who wear khadi compulsorily spin. Full understanding means the realisation that spinning symbolises non-violence. Reflect on it. It will become apparent.” – Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi, Sevagram, March 28, 1945

Back in the early 1920s, in pre-independence India, MK Gandhi had devised a sartorial strategy to non-violently revolt against the colonial rule. Spearheading the Swadeshi movement was the understated khadi, and, the charkha (wheel), that spun khadi, became the nation’s symbol of unity, self-reliance, empowerment, and liberation. It represented the end of dependence on foreign material, and khadi became “the livery of India’s freedom”, in the words of Jawaharlal Nehru.

Gandhi’s politicisation of craft — using it as a mode of protest against British imperialism, was instrumental in unifying Indians in their fight for freedom, both in form and spirit. This was perhaps our country’s earliest known forms of ‘craftivism.’ 

Craftivism: Then and Now

Coined by writer Betsy Greer in 2003, the term craftivism “promotes the symbiotic relationship between craft and activism”. As a concept, craftivism isn’t new, even though the term may have garnered mainstream recognition only since the turn of the 21st century. In the early 20th century, British suffragettes used handiwork techniques like embroidery, fabric appliqué and collages to create decorated banners amplifying   powerful messages about feminist issues. In the latter half of the century, Argentinian women started a campaign to protest the disappearance of their children during the military dictatorship that started in 1976. The Mothers of the Plaza de Mayo (Madres de Plaza de Mayo) wore white head scarves embroidered with the names and the date of births of their lost children; the shape of the scarf symbolising baby diapers, and the colour white symbolising peace.

Today, craftivists all around the world stand to challenge the politics of capitalism, social injustice, terrorism, fast fashion, climate change, and misogyny, using creativity as a weapon of peaceful resistance. 

In the United States, the 2017 Women’s March saw a sea of protesters wearing pink hats as a symbol of solidarity against Donald Trump’s sexist and offensive comments on women. Started by Krista Suh and Jayna Zweiman, the Pussyhat Project movement called on knitters, crocheters, and sewists to craft pink “pussyhats” that went on to become a  major material cultural phenomenon across America.

In Makassar, Indonesia, artist Fitriani Dalay is well-known for her work in yarn-bombing — an art form that involves decorating objects or structures in public spaces with knitted or crocheted yarn or fiber. She uses her art as a tool for political commentary, focussing on concerns like women’s safety and consumerism. 

Recently, the Anti-CAA and NRC protests held across India, had protesters use the traditional Indian art form of rangoli to design messages resisting the discriminatory laws. Some protesters painted calligraphy of revolutionary poetry on scarves.

In Melbourne, Australia, artist, researcher, craftivist, and community development worker, Tal Fitzpatrick, runs multiple community craftivist projects around the themes of “social, political and environmental justice”. She uses the techniques of quilting and patchwork as modes of rebellion. 

These are some of the many ways in which craft — an activity traditionally dismissed as a trivial pastime for lonely women, is being used to spark important, meaningful, and actionable conversations for a better, more equal world.

The Effectiveness of Craftivism as Tool of Dissent and Action

During the second-wave of feminism, several women rejected domestic crafts like knitting and sewing, for being “apolitical, conservative, and mundane.” Craft scholar, Kirsty Robertson, in her essay titled, “Rebellious Doilies and Subversive Stitches,” in Extra/Ordinary: Craft and Contemporary Art, points out how craft’s role in the history of activism is “often trumped by a need to quash still-perpetuated, gendered, stereotypes of crafting.” She further argues that craftivism is often criticised not just on the level of gender, but for also being passive and futile.

The ethos of craftivism are that of “gentle resistance”, but that doesn’t mean the efforts are ineffective. In the U.K., in 2015, Sarah Corbett and her community of craftivists at Craftivist Collective presented the board members of Marks & Spencer personalised, hand-embroidered handkerchiefs, urging them to pay their staff a living wage. Moved by the campaign, within less than a year, M&S had made an announcement to fairly pay its workers.

In several parts of the world like India and Palestine, the slow craft movement intrinsically helps preserve a region’s culture and heritage, while also providing employment and financial opportunities to many skilled artisans. It resists the paradigm of mass-production that hugely contributes to environmental damage and labour exploitation. 

One of my earliest encounters with the craftivist movement was in the summer of 2018, right about the time I had decided to give up fast fashion for good. It was then that I came across the wonderful work of Bryony Porter, popularly known by her Instagram handle, Tickover. Her work focusses on “exposing the fashion industry” through embroidery as a medium. She tells me that she believes embroidery to be an effective means of activism because it is tangible. “Thread has a rich history of conveying messages, and it’s as quick as picking up a needle and immortalising what you stand for. It carries with it emotion, love, care, and anger. It’s a political act that doesn’t demand perfection, that is inherently human. It contradicts the fast and unappreciative nature of social media, and has depth in its ability to raise awareness by sparking thought and conversation.”, says Porter.

In the current turbulent political climate globally, people are widely protesting for correction and justice. From the Black Lives Matter movement in the West to protests against the discriminatory conduct and policies of India’s ruling political party, it stands to reason that this is the era of dissent. The message is loud and clear — “We will not be silenced!”

But if one is still struggling to find their voice, craft might be the tool they’ve been looking for.

Some more craftivists and craftivist groups you must know about: Chawne Kimber, Hannah Hill, The Yarn Mission, Cat Mazza, Gina Adams, Badass Cross Stitch, Coronavirus masks and craftivism

The Aesthetic of Resistance: Do Protest Tees Actually Benefit the Causes They Represent?

June 11, 2019Politics, Pop Culture9

Fashion can be an important vehicle to steer change as long as it doesn’t stop at T-shirt activism.

It was at the Spring 2017 Paris Fashion Week showcase in September 2016, that Maria Grazia Chiuri, the then newly appointed, and the first ever female artistic director at Dior, presented her debut collection for the house. The collection’s army of romantic dresses in tulle and lace were, in every sense of the word, “feminine” — an aesthetic that has been Dior’s signature since its inception. What came to define the pulse of the show, and Dior’s stance for several seasons to follow was, however, a white slogan tee that read, “WE SHOULD ALL BE FEMINISTS” — the title of Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie’s TED talk and book.

Soon after this statement tee made its runway debut, the rest of the fashion world saw a ripple effect as perhaps a response to the era’s tumultuous political climate. In the following (fashion) season, designers Prabal Gurung and Christian Siriano showcased similar slogan tees with politicised messages like, “People are people”, “I am an immigrant”, “Revolution has no borders” and “The future is female.” From celebrity soirees to high streets, protest (slogan) tees seemed to have cultivated fashion’s “it” trend status, consequently trickling down to fast fashion stores around the world, a space where their popularity continues to soar.

The History of Protest Tees

To think that it’s only the troubled political scenario of present times that has inspired fashion to speak out is far from true. Fashion has almost always been intertwined with politics. T-shirts, specifically, have long served as a powerful canvas for political messaging. Back in 1977, queen of punk, Vivienne Westwood, with her partner Malcolm McLaren, created what was possibly one of their most controversial pieces — a shirt with a red Nazi swastika, an inverted crucifixion, along with the words “DESTROY” and the lyrics of the Sex Pistols song, ‘Anarchy in the U.K’. In the 80s’, Katharine Hamnett, with the launch of her brand of political slogan T-shirts, became the forerunner of a culture of resistance. Some of her creations include, “Choose Life”, “Save the Sea”, “Make Poverty History”, the iconic, “58% don’t want Pershing” T-shirt that she wore to meet Margaret Thatcher in 1984, and, more recently, “Cancel Brexit”. 

Feminism Becomes Fashionable

One of the best modern-day examples of how a political movement has turned into a fashionable pop-culture phenomenon is feminism. Historically speaking, feminism, as Andi Zeisler, author of the book, ‘We Were Feminists Once’, describes, was thought to be “the realm of the angry, the cynical, the man-hating, and the off-puttingly hairy”. Today, feminism has become trendy and cool. Zeisler attributes this to what she calls “marketplace feminism” — “branding feminism as an identity that everyone can and should consume.” We now have the likes of H&M, Forever 21 and She-in cashing on the trend with their feminist tees (and jewellery, socks, tote bags…the list goes on). Let’s not forget that these brands with their merchandise emblazoned with catchphrases about women empowerment are the same ones that have society’s poorest women working for them in sweatshop conditions at extremely low wages.

Commercialising Social Issues

Using fashion as a medium for expression, whether personal or political, is an individual choice, and, history is proof that it has effectively given the silenced and the marginalised a voice. However, the commercialisation of social movements in today’s image-obsessed culture comes with the risk of important messages getting reduced to Instagrammable moments; a fact that creators are very well-aware of. In an interview with Grazia magazine, Hamnett, on being asked whether political fashion faces the danger of becoming gimmicky, said — “It’s definitely cool to look as if you care.” 

Brands today are increasingly using “woke-washing” tactics to appear socially conscious, and to appeal to the millennial and Gen Z market. It’s eventually left on us consumers to judge the legitimacy of their claims. It is left on us to call them out when they vaguely state that they are “dedicating a percentage of proceeds from each sale” to a noble cause — we would really like to know what percentage.

This isn’t to suggest that protest tees are all a sham. We know that protest dressing can spark a debate about important world issues. Protest dressing can even spur positive change. But as long as it doesn’t come with an essential follow-through on the message, it isn’t protest; it’s merely a great photo-op.

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