When you get dressed in the morning, a lot of thought goes into choosing your outfit. Like it or not, what we wear says something to the world and fashion designers have been using this platform to make much-needed statements to the world. Designer Regina Jones’ Ginny’s Girl Gang’s hand-painted jackets do just that.
Jones an indigenous artist and native of Australia, who’s currently based in Macon, Georgia, was influenced by art growing up and she began painting at a young age. She became passionate about acrylic art, “Art is in our DNA,” Jones told Vogue. “Storytelling—whether it’s dance, music, performance, writing—has always been in the background of my life.”
It was only recently that she made her way into the fashion world by painting jackets after making a custom jacket for a friend. The first jacket she created was of an indigenous musician in Australia and the jacket said “Royalty” on the back. Soon after creating that jacket, she began applying other statements on jackets and made Ginny’s Girl Gang her full-time career.
The sayings on her jackets bring awareness to indigenous culture and issues and they include, “Strength of My Ancestors,” “I Pay My Respects to the Traditional Owners,” and “Existing on Stolen Land.”
Each jacket takes 20-40 hours to create and her works use acrylic paint, a fabric medium, and a thick fluid that makes the paint waterproof.
“I want what I paint to be like a moving, living billboard of what’s important to [indigenous people],” she says. “It’s about starting a conversation, whether it’s with yourself or with each other. People who wear what I put out are open to having those conversations, ” she continued.
Until June 19, Jones is producing one-off pieces and auctioning off a jacket that reads “The Future is Blak,” to raise money for Sisters Inside, a nonprofit for criminalized women and girls.
