WHITE LIES
Apparel against racial gaslighting
2023
Graduation project
Design Academy Eindhoven
Cum Laude
When you’re told your experiences with racism must have been imagined or misunderstood, you have been racially gaslit. The resulting fear of being seen as crazy for your ‘wrong’ perception of the world makes you doubt your reality. The protest T-shirt was once born of necessity to voice political causes and inspire confidence in its protesters. However, modern fashion has turned real activism into superficial symbols of ‘wokeness’ to be bought and sold. Jonah Attalla aims to reclaim the T-shirt's political power by designing for the individual, not the masses. Each shirt visualizes someone’s personal story of being racially gaslit. It speaks their feelings of anger and demands for change, while revealing a hidden societal problem that repeatedly silences the BIPOC community.