Vintage clothing as a social experiment

Kallol Datta's structural experiments in period clothing reveal a lot about the people they clothed and the societies in which they were created

What about a vintage piece of clothing makes it so distinctive to touch, feel and embrace? Its lived experience adds mystery to its existence long after the wearer is gone, as a repository of memories, tensions, challenges and everything else associated with human life.

This fascinating world of clothing is part of Kolkata-based Kallol Datta's ongoing investigation into the native clothing practices of South-West Asia, North Africa, the Indian subcontinent and the Korean peninsula, which is on show at the city's Experimenter gallery in an ongoing show titled Volume 3 Issue 2.

Referred to as structural experimentations, Datta's current studies are not exquisite clothes hanging out for display but chrysalis, which contains intangible remnants of a body that these once adorned.

"Older pieces of clothing contain metadata, secrets, and hidden messages. That's what fascinates me. I enjoy deconstructing the garments stitch by stitch and discovering indigenous construction and pattern cutting methods, manipulation of textiles, and so much more," says Datta in an interview with Deccan Herald.

The exhibition was seeded at SOAS, London, followed by a residency at Aomori Contemporary Art Centre, Japan, in 2021, which led to the use of traditional garments worn after the war, especially in the Tohoku region in Japan. Datta studied the archives of photographer Kudo Shoichi, where the kakumakis documented by him, were similar in form to the chador worn in Iran.

"With Volume 3 Issue 2, the intrinsic behaviour of the textile has changed after the original form has been deconstructed and then further reconstructed. But its 'wholeness' is still intact. Each donated garment collected via clothing drives held in Aomori (Japan) and Kolkata has associated incidents, milestones and memories.

"The donations have been supplemented by on-site interviews, online conversations, letters and family albums. I hope the observers of the works would look and relook at the objects for what they are and aren't," he adds.

For Volume 3 Issue 2, Datta has focused his research on the period 1945-89, exploring the native wear of the Late Showa Period in Japan and old Indian sarees.

Datta grew up in South-West Asia, where "the billowing kanduras and abayas [long loose garments] in black and white" formed his first memories of the time spent in the region.

"During my years at design schools in Kolkata and London, I kept shrouding and swaddling dress forms by layering pieces and cocooning them in a manner wherein the body ceased to exist. I realised a few months after graduating that I would be a clothes maker," he said.

While the structural experiments throw up endless possibilities of tactile engagement with memories, the understanding of societies that these clothes reveal is enlightening.

"I found parallels between the Japanese women donning the kakumaki to work with the Iranian women wearing chadors to work. During the Late Showa Period, there were numerous imperial edicts by the emperor introducing fabric rations and curbing personal agency in women's wardrobes by prescribing suitable, modest styles for them, including colours, discouraging the adoption of western clothing and even appropriate wedding kimono patterns. These reminded me of the ordinances by the Ayatollah prescribing appropriate clothing for working Iranian women — no makeup, cosmetics, perfumes, only navy blue, brown or black chadors," he said.

Defining his most emphatic conclusion based on the studies, Datta said, "I may sound like a broken record, but it bears repeating: veiling predates Islam. Veiling was popular in the Korean Peninsula and Japan until the recent past. Every dominant majority, culture, region and nation has used clothing as a tool to oppress, dominate and subjugate minorities."

(The writer is a New Delhi-based journalist, editor and arts consultant. She blogs at www.archanakhareghose.com)