Deconstructing Fashion & Queer Performance

Dismantle Me, presented at Queer Fashion Week in April 2015 and Rainbow Fashion Week in August 2015, used the repetition of textiles to challenge race, gender, and white privilege. We applied these themes to the unique gender performances of our 13 queer models. 

Our apparel designs combined the historical dress of Rupi’s Scottish and Trinidadian roots. We challenged race relations by combining bandanas (referencing its use in race riots and groups such as the Black Liberation Army throughout American history), with items that symbolize white privilege and class, like tartan and preppy plaid button-ups. We embraced the androgynous feel of apparel born from the American hip-hop style and challenged the traditional gender-norms of the kilt and class of the Royal Stuart tartan.

Rupi says, “I wanted to use fashion as a tool to focus on how we as queers perform our experiences of race and gender in the world. For me, the idea of queer fashion is rooted in a concept where the model’s queerness becomes a performance in itself. These expressive embodiments of identity made it impossible for me to create a queer fashion performance without acknowledging the bodies (each model) that wore them. We articulate characteristics of our queerness through performative behaviors that are inspired by, but also separate from our gender identity. By embracing gender within a queer embodiment, we remove the performance from traditional expectations and redefine the space as ours.”

The show premiered two of Rupi’s unique concepts: the bandana built into a shirt collar, and a tie drawn through a hoody. We expanded on the bandana theme, dressing several models in bandana-patterned pants and throwing the bandana textile into other aspects of the outfits. Bandanas were used during historic protests as early as the Black Liberation Army and are still seen at race riots sparked by the assassinations of Trayvon Martin and Michael Brown.

Rupi notes, “The bandana textile embodied its performance in wear during our recent race riots sparked in Ferguson and #iftheygunnedmedown. The performance of wearing bandanas around the face dates all the way back to the groups such as The Black Liberation Army. I wanted to express the role fashion plays in race-based crimes. I built the bandana into a high collar in order for the viewer to observe from a side profile what looks like a bandana tied around the face. This is then contrasted with the aesthetic privilege of Royal Stuart tartan.

“It’s important that we don’t forget the historical roots of our fashion styles because it’s the acting out and working through the reasons behind fashion performances that can really broaden society’s definitions of the performativity of race and gender.”