dreams for the taking

Nakeya Brown’s Hair Stories

I like to think of my work as inclusive to all Black hair styles/types – kinky, straight, synthetic, human, weaves, wigs, and tracks, because we as collective wear all. It’s in our beauty shops, hair salons, and bathroom cabinets. It’s a part of our history. It’s a part of contemporary culture. It’s a part of our conversations. It’s a part of our daily lives. 

I’ve been told many times “your hair is your face”, so it’s something that we must tend to, and care for. It’s something that we must treat with sensitivity when describing, but should not allow it to incite insecurities. In my eyes, it’s the single most visible and powerful feature on the black female form and I enjoy creating work about it because it is so dynamic. I make photos that display the illusory beliefs of beauty in a visually stimulating way. I want them to be a catalyst for discussion about us and our experiences. — @NakeyaBrown

Key to the various ways Lang presented his designs was an evident distraction from commercial elements, which led to an accumulation of symbolic capital to his label. This makes Lang part of a long line of fashion designers who were – and are – involved in sponsorship of the arts and engage with art through their marketing and retail channels … Lang kept the art world close by with various creative collaborations with stylists, photographers, architects, and contemporary artists, such as Louise Bourgeois and Jenny Holzer. The label’s New York flagship store functioned as the built embodiment of this minimalist aesthetic, lined with LED installations by Holzer and sculpture by Bourgeois, forming a crucial part of the architecture … As a branding strategy, this enables a luxury brand to construct an artistic identity that contributes to an obfuscation of commercial operations. Although the stories about his New York shop have taken on mythical proportions, when it is placed into context it was not in fact a rarity as the minimalist spaces of contemporary art galleries had a major influence on store design during that period. Rem Koolhaas argued that minimalism even became ‘the “single signifier” of luxury, aimed at minimising “the shame of consumption”’.