EVALUATION

My final outcome uncovers the travelling influences from the underground cultures, not only across the world but through generations. I have used three photographic collages to represent this movement of fashion and culture. The first collage is a collection of images taken by Jamel Shabazz, a street photographer based in 1980's Brooklyn, New York. His photographs highlight the distinctive fashion that mixed designer with sportswear of the youths in that era. The second collage is another collections of film photographs, however this time they are from the 1980s Lewisham, London. The majority of these images are of my family members and close friends of my mother's yet despite travelling 3465 miles, the influences in fashion have many similarities to that of what Jamel Shabazz captured, highlighting the international movement of the subcultures. The final collage is a group of images from 2013 Lewisham, London. Once again the similarities are rife, not only from the London collage but going all the way back to Brooklyn. This highlights the generational travel of this tiny fashion and culture.

One iconic brand that flowed through all three collages and had one of the strongest influences within the movement is Adidas. For this reason I decided the most relevant way to display the collages was to print them onto Adidas branded t-shirts. This helps the viewer to make the connection to fashion and look deeper into the collages to notice the brands and statement pieces that had travelled through time and age. From the sheepskin coat, buckets hats and shell toe trainers to the gold chains, oversized glasses and high waisted jeans.

To show the relevance of the collages to the youth cultures of today to a further extent, I created three very intricate stencils of my own personal street photography which dives into the raw fashion and influences of the urban subcultures of today. By hanging these stencils in front of the t-shirts it gives the viewer the chance to physically look into the subjects of the stencil and see their influences and inspirations shining through in bold colours.

I tried to keep the materials I used as relevant as possible to the subculture I was looking at. By using Adidas T-shirts the iconic branding and focus on fashion is kept alive. The transfers add a retro look to the T-shirts as they loose a bit of colour when heated and gain a yellow hue which I feel is very effective and relevant. I focused highly on the stencilling technique as stencils are something that is used a lot in graffiti and street art, which is a big part of the Hip Hop culture. On top of that, by having control over what I cut out in the stencil gives me the power to outline the iconic brands within the image and help the viewer to focus on the statement garments within the image.

What I found the most challenging was trying to get a high quality finish on the T-shirts. As my plan to get them professionally printed fell through I had to compromise and try and do my best with the facilities I had at home. Because of this the transfers had to be cut in half and printed in two pieces resulting in a slight line in the middle of each collage. On top of that, I had to use an iron to heat the transfer paper meaning it was hard to disperse even heat at the right temperature resulting in cracking and some blurring. The most physically challenging aspect of the piece was the stencilling. As I chose to use quite thick paper/card I had to add a bit more pressure when cutting with the scalpel, this tired my wrist out a lot quicker than usual and blunted the scalpels a lot quicker. If I were to improve the finish of my piece I would use dye sublimation technique to transfer the collages onto the t-shirts instead as it is more professional and permanent, it also leaves less room for mistakes, cracking and blurring.

What I enjoyed most about this project was working with real people and finding out about real influences that have travelled, not only through time but also through the generations within my own family. Not only did I discover a lot about other people and their background, but I learnt a lot about myself and discovered a lot of similarities between me and my parents' influences from when they were my age. This has definitely inspired me to work with real people and create beauty by exposing natural patterns within every day life in my future projects.

STENCIL IMAGES

TSHIRTS

When printing the t-shirts there were a couple of dilemmas, firstly as I wanted to print the image in A3 I had to find a print shop that had an a3 Inkjet printer to print the collage onto the heat transfer paper. I managed to find a print shop, called them and made sure they'd be open for when I could make it. Unfortunately, when I reached the shop they had shut 2 hours early with no reason or warning. I then had to think of plan B. I realised I was going to have to cut the collages and paper into a4 sheets and print each image in two halves. This means that the print isn't as seamless as I first hoped. On top of that as I had to now print them at home I only had an iron to use instead of a heat press meaning it was hard to gage when the heat transfer was ready to peel off creating a few cracks in the image. 

TSHIRT INSPIRATION

One of my biggest inspirations for the design of the t-shirts is a art movement/collection called T-shirt Party founded by Cieron Magat. The simple boxy, bold and colourful yet almost tacky designs on the t-shirts are really effective and create a authentic and almost retro feel to the t-shirt.

PRINTING

I first tried printing my collages onto A3 card to hang behind the stencils, however, I felt that using the same material for both layers was a bit boring and didn't represent the fashion element to the project that I was looking at. Therefor instead, I decided it would be more appropriate to print the collages onto Adidas t-shirts using heat transfer paper.

When in Lewisham, I found these t-shirts which I felt were perfect, they donned the famous three stripe and clearly state that they are Adidas. I also feel that the design is very 80s and has an almost retro look to it. There is also more than enough space underneath the logo to print an a3 sized collage.

CUTTING INTO FABRIC

After doing a couple of trials of cutting into different types of fabric using a scalpel, I realised I wasn't getting the quality and detailed result I was after. The stretch and fibres of the fabric made it hard for me to cut a straight line at particular angles also leaving it hard for me to stop the fabric from fraying. Instead I decided that keeping it simple and cutting the stencils into a3 white card would allow the viewer to focus on the intricate detail, therefore resulting in the inspiration collages standing out and bringing colour through the stencil.

COLLAGE INSPIRATION

When walking around Lewisham, passing the windows of black hair salons, you will always see a hairstyle collage, whether its shape ups for men or cornrow styles for women, they are always bright and vibrant with catchy slogans to attract your attention. These inspiration collages gave me the inspiration to collate Jamel Shabazz's photography, as he is one of my biggest influences for this project so far and create a collage in a similar style.

Once I created this collage I knew that it was the perfect layer to have behind my stencils, not only is it bright, colourful and bold so it would catch the viewers eye through the stencils, but it brought the influences of the people in the stencils together, almost as if you are looking inside the person to reveal their inner inspirations and influences