Let Us Dance Down The Road
A collection of shirts exploring queer self-love through sensitive processes of ornamentation
The shirt as a garment is loaded with symbolic meaning of an “acceptable” way of being. It is an archetype that needs queering. Exploring the ideas of softness and vulnerability, the project applies low-tech processes of mark-making and embellishment to redundant men’s shirts to reframe their emotional meaning.
A move towards a more resourceful future is at odds with fashion’s connotation of excess and frivolity. But embellishment of clothing is deeply necessary as a means of storytelling and self-expression. Historically, ornamentation is evident even at the most challenging times in human survival – we need it to communicate hope and imagine a better tomorrow. We must then find ways to dream of a future, without simultaneously robbing ourselves of one.
The materials used in the project are all things that we consider disposable - paper clips, rubber bands, cut flowers, etc. Reframing them as embellishment changes their value perception and challenges what an object can mean to us. The symbolic nature of the motifs tells of my own journey towards understanding and loving my queer identity.
It is an offering of a more sensitive way to exist in the world, and a celebration of the joy and potential to be found in looking at things differently.
Ian Richardson
ianchristopher.richardson@hotmail.com