Techno Dandy: A Suit of Disagreement
My Techno Dandy can be seen as a warrior, inspired by nineteenth-century French and English redingotes and medieval armour. This redingote is covered with black computer keys and forms a second skin on a tailored black cloth. Its elbows have separate covers made from knee guards that I also worked on with computer keys. These allow me to bend my arms easily while moving and give the costume the impression of armour. It has an accompanying top hat that is also studded with keys, and a modified walking stick. Inside the redingote is an additional cover or ‘shirt’ made with computer cables hanging to the knees, which is inspired by medieval chainmail. The shoes are comical and worn with socks woven from coloured cables. The shoes and socks are also intended to complement the subversive nature of the garment, which forms an allegory of a body in auto-recovery from diverse technological injuries. The Techno Dandy is a person who dons the outfit for a parade and therefore performs several characters. He embodies hope for the future, where access to technology is more widespread in Africa, and the Democratic Republic of Congo in particular. My performances in Cape Town (as a start) will also highlight imposed systems, and my adaptation to them. Aligning myself with the strutting Sapeurs of the DRC, I observe and am observed, I participate and, through sartorial performances, emphasize my own self-determinacy. Cape Town has many politically, historically and socio-economically loaded spaces, so where I choose to perform is vital to the meaning of the work. By constructing my own paths through the city, or following well-known pedestrian routes, I will have the opportunity to practise further autonomy and identity reinvention (De Certeau 1984).