What is "modest swimwear"? Can there really be such a thing?
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The Faith Fashion Fusion: Muslim women's style in Australia exhibition at the National Archives of Australia (it had its media preview on Thursday and your columnist, dressed modestly and disguised as a journalist, was there) offers its visitors the oxymoronic-sounding concept of "modest swimwear".
It can sound like an oxymoron, for when one thinks of Australian beaches in high summer the images that come to mind are (sorry to sound like a wowser) of informal but surely immodest swimwear. The bikini for all its lubricious virtues is surely, a celebration of immodesty. Then (shudder) men's budgie smugglers, as sported by a recent prime minister, are immodest to the point of being flagrant.
But, yes, it emerges from Faith Fashion Fusion that there is fashionable modest swimwear (welcomed not only by Muslim women but also by non-Muslim women who like either the idea of modesty in swimwear or the extra protection from the sun). And indeed there is a a whole "modest fashion" industry.
The exhibition is developed by the Museum of Applied Arts and Sciences (MAAS) in Sydney with advice and assistance from Multicultural NSW, Australian Muslim organisations and community members. It explores the emerging modest fashion market and the work of Muslim designers and entrepreneurs in fashioning everything from swimwear to denim to the gowns to wear for red-carpet occasions.
Lest women's modest swimwear sounds like this columnist's sexist obsession I report that on Thursday it was too the first thing that MAAS fashion and dress curator Glynis Jones wanted to talk about. Like most of the fashion-conscious world, Jones quickly became aware of Sydney fashion designer Aheda Zanetti when she, Zanetti, looking for a swimsuit that Muslim women could wear, made from a fabric that would look modest even when wet and clingy, found just such a fabric and went ahead to invent the now famous "Burqini".
Glynis Jones' ears pricked up professionally, curatorially, when she tuned in to the furore.
"I could see this was a new style of swimwear but when I looked into it I realised there was something much more interesting going on in the Australian fashion industry and I was really interested to capture that [with an exhibition like Faith Fashion Fusion].
"There was this sense that there was this emerging fashion industry and as a museum that collects fashions we are really interested in all aspects of fashion. And so I was looking at Aheda and realising how by 2011 her's was one of the most significant swimwear and sportswear companies in the world. And she actually decided to design this "Burqini". The word is her mash up of bikini and burqa. She wanted a swimsuit that was suitable for Muslim women, sportswear for Muslim women who want to play sport in Australia. She felt every Australian has the right to enjoy Australian weather, Australian sport, so by 2011 she has this company where she is exporting around the world."
Then came the worldwide interest in this designer's Burqini. The Macquarie Dictionary declared 'burqini" the new word of the year.
"So I saw this amazing story," Glynis Jones continued, "and began to to explore a broader story of this emerging modest fashion industry; something happening not just in Sydney but happening globally".
"At first we were just preoccupied with the fashion but we decided to do more than just look at women's fashions, to look at Muslim women in the community who are achieving in different fields."
Taking advice on all this she came to realise how irksome it is "for many Muslim women that they're always having to justify what they're wearing and only ever get to talk about what they're wearing when they're writers, lawyers [and have so much more to talk about]. And so a section of the exhibition highlights some notable women and their achievements".
Yes it does, and so for example one can go to touch screens and ask an array of modestly dressed Muslim women to speak about themselves.
Hijab-wearing academic and community worker Susan Carland, a late teens convert to Islam, turns out to be a straight talker. She sounds quite fed up with discussing what Muslim women wear.
"[What people wear] is such a superficial way of looking at a person. The hijab is not necessarily an indication of anyone's [piety] but unfortunately that's how it's viewed by the community."
It vexes her that people make presumptions about a woman wearing a hijab (that she must be traditional and devout) and about a Muslim woman not wearing the hijab (that she must be very western).
"It's a ridiculous dichotomy," she seethes.
She muses that modest dressing is important for all Muslims and that it isn't just a matter for women, with Muslim men allowed to dress "flagrantly".
Here one thinks that, yes, that was what was wrong with Tony Abbott in his budgie smugglers. He was so flagrant. Yuk!
"It's sometimes said," Ms Carland continued, approvingly, "that modest dress by men and women desexualises them in the public sphere, so that we're communicating with one another more as human beings and less as [sexual] objects. I can understand the merit in that. Dressing modestly is valuable as a dignified thing to do".
Dressed with dignity (no budgie smugglers, please) visitors can go to see Faith Fashion Fusion: Muslim women's style in Australia at the National Archives of Australia in Canberra until 4 September.
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