“Human beings, wherever we are, have creative urges for self-expression,” says Brooklyn-based photographer Jessica Antola, who has spent the last 10 years capturing images of people from all over the world in their traditional dress. In 2004, Antola visited the mountainous Chin State of Burma, where she encountered women with facial tattoos who wore bright woven tunics. At the time, the country was still cut off from tourism and outside influence, and Antola wondered how local traditions—and the fashion that accompanies them—might change when the borders opened up. “In the back of my mind, I had the feeling that this was not how it was always going to be,” she says. Since then, Antola has traveled from the highlands of West Papua, Indonesia, to the villages outside Kaolack, Senegal. She’s most interested in places where new materials and ideas are mixing with existing customs to create fascinating frontiers of fashion. “This is a color study, an identity study, a study of where I’ve been,” Antola says.
(Published in the October 2013 issue of AFAR. Read the extended interview with Jessica Antola here.)
