"Whenever I've been down, I've always turned to art to express myself. But during the lockdown, nothing really worked. I tried going back to all my unfinished projects and hobbies - crocheting dolls, learning to play the guitar, putting together a 1000 piece puzzle, none of it worked. I even tried saving my favourite documentaries and TV shows for the weekends just so I had something to look forward to; that didn't work either.
The highlight for my days pre-quarantine has always been dressing up. If I was having a bad day, I'd wear my favourite red dress. If I had a meeting to get to, I'd draw on the best cat eye, slap on red lipstick and strut to work. Yes, working in pyjamas can be fun but dressing up for work has a power of its own.
Music and dancing has always inspired me. It would have this butterfly effect on me and my thoughts and it lead to something new and unexplored. And that's exactly what happened with this project. One day, I was listening to Harry Styles, admiring his album art cover and all I could think about was the blue bellbottoms that lay in the back of my cupboard, wondering when I'd get to wear them again, or all the other 'fancy' looking clothes that are probably not going to see the outside world for a while. That's when the idea struck me to recreate album covers. I'm not a content creator, a model or a professional fashion photographer; it's a project I started so I could play dress-up and distract myself from the mundaneness of quarantining. But it became so much more for me . I'd noticed that many of my close friends haven't really seen me enjoy or have fun because my expressions have always been contained out of fear of judgement from the outside world. Through this project, they see me doing things I wouldn't be most comfortable posting on my personal Instagram profile.
This was something I started out of boredom, that helped me let loose and enjoy life a little, which then continued to spiral to a wide range of thoughts on identity. What inspired to keep exploring this was was my inability to let down my sky high boundaries.
It made me look closely at women in music, specifically the evolution and the possible bumps they have faced along the way. Was Cyndi Lauper really too different looking to be taken seriously? Why was there an issue when Miley Cyrus came into her own, while Britney Spears and Christina Aguilera had it differently (they weren't Disney kids but part of the Mickey Mouse Club)? What was the struggle of staying relevant as a Spice Girl? It's also made me rethink my shopping habits. Not that it was bad previously, but I'm more conscious of the clothes I own and ways that I could upscale them instead of discarding or replacing. I've realised that you can pair your clothes however you want to 'match current trends' - I've been jumping through different eras of music with the clothes I currently own. The big positive that has come out of it is that I'm gonna have shorter 'What do I wear today?' morning sessions in front of my cupboard once I return to 'normal' life."
-Millniece Pinto
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