The Emancipation Support Committee of Trinidad and Tobago (ESCTT) launched its 2024 Pan-African Festival on Africa Day, May 25, at City Hall, Port of Spain.

A media release said this is the largest Pan-African festival outside the continent of Africa.

To kick off celebrations in this closing year of the UN International Decade for People of African Descent, the Ewa Afrika fashion experience takes place at Queen’s Hall on June 2 from 5 pm.

This year’s incarnation, Ewa Afrika 24...the Folk Lure promises to be game-changing. Featuring designers all commemorating their Afrocentric indigenous style, it will be staged in the hall this year, as opposed to the customary open-air experience in the Garden Theatre, a release said.

Models will showcase the artisanal fashions of some 20 design houses, interwoven with stellar acts the likes of Charmaine Forde, Ataklan, Deon Baptiste, Conrad Parris, Abeo Jackson and Wasafoli TT.

A statement from ESCTT said, “Ewa Afrika 24 takes on yet another visioning and expression for our Afro-fashion conscience.

"Last year, we proclaimed resonantly Sankofa Style, as our underlying theme, as we re-evaluated our past African style ethos, as we sought to identify a present Afro-Caribbean fashion ego and as we aimed to forge a future New World African trademark. This year we brand our tribute to African style as 'the folk lure' ...On first hearing, it sounds like folklore.

"That is intentional, for it brings to bear a certain mythological aspect intrinsic in our art expressions embedded in our post-emancipation selfhood."

Richard Young, creative director of Ewa Africa, said, “We have crafted a rich folkloric subculture resplendent of our African heritage, replete with traditional references. And so too, our Afro-Caribbean fashion storytelling is brimming with those inspirations and influences...

"We are claiming unapologetically our idiosyncratic style template, adding a notch to the global totem pole of recognised trademarks.

"This Afro-Caribbean style owes much of its ethos to its reliance on our folk traditions...The lure of the folk bespeaks our indigenous expressions manifesting organically."

In keeping with this year's ESCTT’s theme of "moving forward with our heads up," he said, "We look upwards and outwards to an Afro-futurist Caribbean fashion identity steeped in the belief that ‘I am because we are,' which is rooted in the compulsion to our unique folk psyches.”

Executive chair of ESCTT Zakiyah Uzoma-Wadada was confidence of the value of this initiative, boasting of the national pride of its identity branding as well as the prestige of its status regionally.

The prelude of creative entrepreneurs begins at 4 pm, the presentation of designer collections begins at 5 pm and the post-show buyers’ gallery at 7 pm.

Tickets are available at the Emancipation House, on Bergerac Road, Maraval, online at the Queen’s Hall website or at the Queen’s Hall box office.

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