Gussie O’Connor

This final graduate collection references past, present and future struggles of the Union of Great Britain: Wales, Scotland Ireland and England. Traditional slogans, emblems, crests and phrases have been reworded and screen printed to question the integrity of our current government, the monarchy as a symbol of “Britishness” and holds a 14-year-old Tory tenure to account. As citizens, we navigate a tumultuous time in British politics and this collection represents a feeling of distinct and profound change in young people’s political and ideological beliefs. Print is imperative to “political optics” and message sending therefore it has been deployed in this collection liberally in meaning and in fabrication. Using only second-hand garments, I have placed a new meaning onto the traditional “Britishness” in order to reclaim patriotism from right-wing scare-mongers, giving our country a new meaning: of unprejudiced inclusivity and solidarity, curating a look of ‘diverse harmony’ that exists within our union today.

Using historical archives, current news and media influences, I have designed and applied prints that represent every nation within the British Isles. A Scottish landing poem, “The Goose and the Common”, featured in look one, a reworded government crest, protests the status-quo in look 2. Look 3 represents my love of graffiti, using a slogan promoted in British media in the 70s to try and hinder graffer’s influence in society. The British pound features in look 4, displaying not the crown as the unifying factor of our nation but the workers within it. Look 5, represents the bankers and bosses as the real enemy, not whoever the right wing are framing to scapegoat their own failures. Finally, quotes from writer, Thomas Paine encompasses my own moral code and beliefs in look 6.