Like Leigh Bowery, he
Like Leigh Bowery, he turned himself into an object of art by creating full-body suits that covered every inch of his skin. He called them his “Garbage Gods”, which looked like Transformers crossed with samurai warriors. The recent announcement that gallerist Jeffrey Deitch is now representing the Rammellzee estate points to a belated appreciation of the work. Deitch – instrumental in the careers of Keith Haring and Jeff Koons – is planning a retrospective in LA this autumn. Y ou can see Afrofuturism expressed in dynamic form in the spring 2022 collection by London-based designer Duro Olowu, inspired by the work of the jazz musician Sun Ra, who many consider the godfather of the movement. Sun Ra has been a touchstone for numerous Black designers in the past few years, including Grace Wales Bonner, who has said she is drawn to his philosophy of “ecstasy and escapism, refashioning or redefining your relationship with history”. Born Herman Poole Blount in Alabama in 1914, Sun Ra developed a persona to accompany his avant-garde compositions, wearing golden robes and mixing science fiction with ancient Egyptian motifs. “It was so ahead of its time,” says Olowu. “His influence permeated through the 1950s and 1960s. It was non-genderspecific clothing, way before glam rock in 1970s London. He’d wear capes and chain mail, and totally reinvented himself, picking Egypt as his adopted country. He created a whole aura around the work, like Prince did with Paisley Park, and Elvis with Graceland. But with him, there was no commercial entity, it was all about integrity. He was offering an elevation of African American music, art and culture when people craved it. He took Egypt as a part of Africa and made that into a representation of all of Africa. He also There is nothing minimalist about Afrofuturism in fashion. It makes a statement, joyous and bold PHOTOS FROM TOP: AFRICA FASHION AT THE VICTORIA AND ALBERT MUSEUM, LONDON, 2 JULY 2022 – 16 APRIL 2023, PHOTO BY NABIL ZORKOT; MARVEL STUDIOS/ENTERTAINMENT PICTURES/ALAMY 48 CENTURION-MAGAZINE.COM
PHOTO AFRICA FASHION AT THE VICTORIA AND ALBERT MUSEUM, LONDON, 2 JULY 2022 – 16 APRIL 2023; ALCHEMY COLLECTION, THEBE MAGUGU, JOHANNESBURG, SOUTH AFRICA, AUTUMN/WINTER 2021. PHOTO BY TATENDA CHIDORA, STYLING + SET: CHLOE ANDREA WELGEMOED, MODEL: SIO A look from South African designer Thebe Magugu’s 2021 Alchemy collection, on view at the V&A this summer; opposite, from top: a look by late Malian designer Chris Seydou at the London exhibition; a scene from 2018’s Black Panther referenced the ancient Dogon people of Mali, who were a major influence on Afrofuturism.” Egypt has long been a touchstone for Afrofuturist chic, from the costumes for the movie Stargate to the styling of recent pop videos by Janelle Monáe, whose debut album The ArchAndroid saw her begin telling tales of sci-fi mythology that continued with her new book of fiction, The Memory Librarian: And Other Stories of Dirty Computer. While Egyptian space travel is part of the late Sun Ra’s DNA, Olowu channelled the spirit in a more abstract way, with eye-scorching zigzags of colour on his blouses, skirts and dresses. It’s as if an electric current of freeform jazz has been fed through traditional African kente cloth. O lowu’s fashion shares common ground with Senegalbased artist and designer Selly Raby Kane, whose work is part of this summer’s landmark Africa Fashion exhibition at the V&A in London. “She is known for her science fiction and cosmological inspirations,” says the show’s curator Christine Checinska. “You can see it in her distinctively futuristic cutting, stitched and padded embellishments, and cartoon-like slogans. She creates a mythical, almost surrealistic world that is all her own, rewriting what it is to be feminine and fashionable.” There is nothing minimalist about Afrofuturism in fashion. It makes a statement, joyous and bold. The aforementioned Tokyobased design master Issey Miyake has frequently incorporated African print in his work, and there are intriguing overlaps between Japanese and African design: the indigo and white tie-dye of the Nigerian adire craft is all but identical to the shibori of Edoera Japan. Miyake has a whole department at his HQ that deals with research and development in the fashion industry and has a claim to being the most advanced in the industry: he employs professors of mathematics as well as garment alchemists. The current season of his Homme Plissé label is the apogee of his genius. The industrially heat-pleated polyester is machine-washable, packs into a minuscule amount of space, and lasts for decades. While Japanese designers are known for their obsession with black, the new Homme Plissé Basket print series, inspired by the weave of African craft objects, brings graphic clout to already expressive silhouettes and textures. Last November, the Met in New York installed Before Yesterday We Could Fly: An Afrofuturist Period Room. Part of it tells the story of the African diaspora, but a lot of it is also linked to another diaspora – that of Seneca Village, now known to all as Central Park. Until the 1850s, this was a predominantly Black town within Manhattan. Then the city seized it, in an echo of the Famine Clearances in Ireland of the same period, and the Highland Clearances in Scotland in the late 18th century. To accompany the launch of the installation, local jewellery designers Ron Anderson and David Rees, who create under the label Ten Thousand Things, produced a range of Afrofuturist pieces, including gold hoop earrings with circular swoops of handcut luminescent blue lapis. “We spent a lot of time researching in the ancient African and Egyptian rooms at the Met,” says Rees. “We intertwined elements of African beads with ancient Egyptian symbols.” Unsurprisingly, the designers cite Sun Ra as a major influence: “We drew a straight line from him to George Clinton and Missy Elliott, and saw that Afrofuturist vocabulary has always been relevant in the culture.” As with all things Afrofuturist, there’s a poignant element to the work. “Ultimately,” explains Rees, “we wanted to make jewellery as elegant as possible to honour the memory of Seneca Village, and create pieces that we thought the people who lived there might want to wear today.” ¬ CENTURION-MAGAZINE.COM 49
