"We wanted to celebrate the incredible African fashion scene today," Elisabeth Murray, who helped design the exhibition, told AFP.

"Obviously it's impossible to sum up a fashion continent, so the point of the exhibition is really to give insight into the glamor and politics of the fashion scene," she continued.

Established in 1852, at a time when the UK was expanding its empire, the V&A Museum is dedicated to art and design.

But, notes curator Christine Checinska, "African creativity has been greatly excluded or misrepresented due to the historical divide between art and ethnography museums that results from our colonial roots and entrenched racist principles."

In recent years, anti-racist movements including Black Lives Matter have pushed the United Kingdom to reflect on the relationship to its colonial past, from the collections of its museums to statues and monuments.

'Africa Fashion' is the largest ever exhibition of African fashion in the UK.

The exhibition presents the works of around forty creators CARLOS JASSO AFP

It opens with the era of independence, years of liberation and great political, social and cultural transformation.

political clothing

When dressing can be a political act, like the Prime Minister of Ghana Kwame Nkrumah who, in 1957, displayed himself in a kente loincloth, a colorful and thick traditional fabric.

Just after announcing the independence of the country, he thus abandoned the European costume in a symbolic gesture.

Even today, the choice to wear a particular color or pattern takes on specific meanings.

Aso oke, ankara, bogolan... A wide range of fabrics are produced on the African continent with a wide variety of materials and techniques.

As the sculptor El Anatsui once said, echoing the artist Sonya Clark: "Cloth is to the African what monuments are to Westerners".

Fabrics that are reinvented with up-to-date tastes like adire, an indigo-dyed fabric traditionally produced in southwestern Nigeria and now popularized by brands such as Maki Oh, Lagos Space Program and Orange Culture.

On two levels, the creations of emblematic designers of the mid-20th century, including the Nigerien Alphadi, the Malian Chris Seydou or the Nigerian Shade Thomas-Fahm, rub shoulders, alongside contemporary designers such as the Nigerian Bubu Ogisi, whose IAMISIGO brand highlights honor fabrics and techniques from the continent.

The minimalist aesthetic of the brands Katush, based in Kenya, or Moshions in Rwanda, contradicts the presuppositions of an African fashion that is overflowing with colors and patterns.

In this very eclectic catalog, "there is a link that connects all of this, it is the passion for culture", stylist Artsi Ifrach told AFP.

Stylist Artsi Ifrach created a creation especially for the CARLOS JASSO AFP exhibition

"The idea is to provoke people's memories (...) to make them feel something", adds the creator.

The gamble paid off with the piece he made especially for the exhibition, designed from a trench coat typical of the British wardrobe and transformed into an oversized golden burqa.

© 2022 AFP