working on this piece, given the ironic title “burqa.” interesting to look at the history of the burqa, and turn away from how it has been “codified” by regimes of power of recent times:

“While the burqa is often associated with the Islamic faith, its history actually predates Islam by thousands of years. The earliest known instance of women veiling their faces is found in the Assyrian empire, which dates back to 5000 BC.

Although not all women veiled their faces during the empire, the veil developed as a way to keep aristocratic women separate from the masses, especially the slave women and the prostitutes. If slave women or prostitutes were found veiling their faces, they would be publically lashed. Other cultures favoured the veil for upper class women: the Byzantine Christian women of Persia, the Rajput women in India, and many in classical Greek society.

Islam started in Mecca, through the teachings of the Islamic prophet, Mohamed (570 – 632 A.D.) As the religion spread, it came into contact with other customs and cultures. Often times the local customs were adopted and made part of the Islamic faith, not the other way around. Face veiling was a custom adopted by Islam, not organic to it. For the first 100 years of Islam, Muslim women did not veil their faces.”

Note: this is a prototype and the white chiffon will be finished in lace.