Photographer: Mandla Shonhiwa
Art Director: Kenan Petersen
Model: Esther Cupido
CREDIT
Photographer: Mandla Shonhiwa
Art Director: Kenan Petersen
Models: Esther Cupido, Ben Moyo
A LAZY SUNDAY. – WOKE & BROKE LOOK BOOK
Owari writes… A day where she doesn’t comb her hair, where he laughs without resignation, in a place that is their own. Knowing that they may very well have to hang their humanity at the door when they leave for work that looming Monday morning.
We feel this calmer setting allows us to look at our couple as human beings and not as objects that vacillate between the stereotypic roles of ‘poor’ and ‘lit’. As if that is the only narrative arc that is accessible to this demographic.
It is our job as artists to create pictures, and thus we must ensure that this picture does not compromise on intersectionality. Woke & Broke seeks to unpeel the layers of our intellectual identity and its relationship with currency.
We live in such a time where those two aspects of our lives are traded quite publicly, one at the expense of the other. There are moments when in order to alleviate ones proximity to poverty one is faced with the ideation of sacrificing ones culture for capital.
In a more recent example, Western Cape Premier Helen Zille threatened the livelihoods of UCT students by stating “If this woke bunch hate being UCT students so much, pls help them out of their misery and withdraw their funding.”
It is as if when something is unjust, we should leave it be. We should not speak of that which is unjust.It is a sweeping of dust under the carpet mentality.
Where the house worker is paid and instructed to hide the dirt of the house in peculiar places, and then publicly humiliated for their inability to clean the house.
This illustrates how easily those in power can take the wind out of ones sails simply because they do not agree with how you choose to assert your identity as a human being.
In order to explore this humanity, we’ve decided on shooting the look book in such a way that it told a short story of a young creative couple in the city, going about their day on a lazy Sunday.
The editing process was of the utmost importance. We made sure that we maintained an open dialogue with model Esther Cupido who edited her own photographs and had control over which images were left in the look book.
It’s imperative that we aren’t simply creating images that depict people with power, we should give them the power to curate themselves in a manner that they feel empowered by.
Otherwise, we end up with a one sided narrative that does not encompass the full spectrum of our identities.
Erasure being such a huge part of our social history we understand the importance of crediting everyone involved with the look book so as not to perpetuate the ideation that certain people are unworthy of being noted.
We believe that everyone on set influences the final product and has to be respected accordingly.
Recommended Playlist: We recommend listening to Flōyu’s soundcloud playlist while looking through the look book.
