Ewa Afrika has made a distinctive mark on the calendar of African fashion presentations, outside of the continent. Our showcase has become the biggest Afro-fashion event in the region, I dare say, with its post-production television airing accessing regional viewership. Ewa Afrika holds its own as a prestigious celebration of our African fashion aesthetic and has become the premier Afro-inspired fashion event in the Caribbean.
Ewa Afrika 24 takes on yet another visioning and expression for our Afro-fashion conscience Last year we proclaimed resonantly ‘Sankofa Style’, as our underlying theme, as we re-evaluated our past African style ethos, as we sought to identify a present Afro-Caribbean fashion ego and as we aimed to forge a future New World African trademark. This year we brand our tribute to African style as ‘the folk lure’. Indeed, on first hearing, it
sounds like folklore. That is intentional, for it brings to bear a certain mysticism intrinsic in our art expressions embedded in our post-emancipation selfhood. We crafted a rich folkloric subculture resplendent of our African heritage, replete with traditional references. And so too, our Afro-Caribbean fashion storytelling is brimming with those inspirations and influences.
At this juncture, as we continue to assert our brand identity in the 21st-century Caribbean fashion zeitgeist, we are claiming unapologetically our idiosyncratic style template adding a notch to the global totem pole of branding nomenclatures. For, just as there is French Style, Italian Fashion and Bespoke Tailoring, there is the Caribbean Aesthetic, a significant quota of which is Afro-Caribbean style. This Afro-Caribbean style owes much of its ethos to its reliance on our folk traditions. The fashion cognoscenti of the world are in awe of our distinctive, newfangled offering. So, it
becomes incumbent upon us to claim and define assertively this cultural confidence as expressed through our fashion expressions. They are manifold, overflowing with iterations of our miscegenation however anchored fundamentally in our overwhelming African history. The lure of
the folk bespeaks our indigenous expressions manifesting organically. We are drawn to this inherent source of creativity to define who we are. I am fascinated by this soulful incarnation of our sense of self wanting to find space in our fashioning. Moreover, This trend has become the prevailing universal philosophy – the unearthing of indigenous selves transposing itself through artistry and artisanal practice.
So in keeping with this year’s ESCTT’s theme of ‘moving forward with our heads up’, we look upwards and outwards to an Afro-futurist Caribbean fashion identity steeped in the belief that ‘I am because we are”, which is rooted in the compulsion to our unique folk psyche.
