ELIZABETH ARIHO

Boys Will Be Boys is the first collection that I created. It was a collaborative project that was used as a way to challenge the narrative of black men in the media. It was inspired by Kehinde Wiley's oil painting works entitled "Lamentation". Wiley is actively advocating for the narrative of people of colour in the media to be changed. He does this mainly by taking famous portraits of highly raked figures from history and parodying them to show a person of colour, usually black. through this, I saw the powerful influence that the media has over our perception of people and how it was so foreign for me to to see a person of colour in a high social calibre and understanding that this would irrefutably affect how people of colour are seen. From this, I looked to challenge the hyper masculine tone that looms over the black community. In showing black men as sensitive and happy but not stripping them of their masculinity title allowed for the label and assignment of masculinity to be broadened and more inclusive.