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Barbershop: “Good Hair/Bad Hair” Smack Down (This Time it's Personal)
This is an interactive multimedia installation that celebrates the social and cultural significance of two Black institutions, the barbershop and beauty shop. They are explored for their historically social and cultural relevance to the African American community, through narratives of barbers, beauticians, patrons, and artists young and old. Walk through a fully replicated set of the barbershop; with old school barber chairs, clippers, razors, and hair products. Stand along the wall of a beauty shop circa 1950's with authentic jars of hair preparations, singed curling irons, crimping irons, and antique hair dryers. Scan the photos depicting the subtle nuances and artistry alive within these shops then and now. This exhibit focuses on the issue of Black hair as it relates to identity, social consciousness and self, and the stigma created within the black community about so called "good hair" and "bad hair" that continues today. It’s an educational forum that explores the range of Black hairstyles as "classifiers" and of what the Black Diaspora consider beautiful. Learn how beliefs about hair texture, curl, and kink defined what was termed as "good hair" and "bad hair." See the evolution of Black hairstyles, Black consciousness, and Black pride. Hair type, styles, management, and treatment are discussed from the process, to the perm, to the natural.
I found the picture below a few weeks ago, a really cool shot of an O.G. barber shop in Egypt...I like all the razors hangin on the wall...and the way the child is curiously looking at the cameraman.
