MARIA WHO? BUTTER x OPNSRC x NICOLE OLIVERIA
Maria Who? Live at Butter Parramatta (Image: Nicole Cadelina @ni.muy)
On Sunday, 15 December, Butter Parramatta and opnsrc.co teamed up for one final hurrah in 2019 to showcase the works of recent design graduate, Nicole Oliveria. A night of fashion, food, and good music, the pop-up exhibition explores themes of Filipina femininity and cultural identity in the contemporary suburbia of Filipino diaspora.
Aptly titled Maria Who? - a nod to the fictional Maria Clara of Noli Me Tangere - Nicole’s collection marks her final Honours project as a Fashion and Textiles student at UTS. Hybridising streetwear material together with delicate lace, Nicole reflects on the malaise of harnessing a double identity as a Filipina-Australian - the liminality between not feeling Australian in Sydney, but not quite Filipino either in the Philippines. In conjunction with the exhibition, Maria Who? featured photography by Jade D’Amico depicting Filipina models adorning Nicole’s work, with the help of stylist Namika Parajuli (@namikap).
This discourse between Western and Eastern hemispheres interact beautifully in a visual survey of modern and traditional feminine values. Blending in cultural costumes like the filipiniana and barong into culottes and buttoned-up shirts, these cross-cultural costumes also reflect Nicole’s up-cycling practice as a fashion designer - as did the exclusive bucket hats sold in promotion of the exhibition, sewn together from canvas-printed streetwear posters.
Close details from one of Nicole’s filipiniana dresses. (Image: Jade D’Amico @jadedamico)
On top of this, Nicole adds another layer of meaning to her fashion line by screen-printing vignettes of the titular Maria Clara from the iconic Jose Rizal novel in Tagalog and English. Continuing the theme of diasporic double identity, the writing describes the female heroine’s mestiza features - from her European eyes, down to her black hair. Aficionados of Filipino culture will recognise Maria Clara as the epitome of femininity in the Philippines, with costumes such as the Maria Clara gown named in her honour. In this respect, Nicole’s clothing line produces a greater dialogue between other dualities - specifically, the past and present, modernity and tradition, casual wear and formal wear.
Fellow Filipinas flaunt the Maria Who? collection in style. (Image: Jade D’Amico @jadedamico)
With a packed crowd at Butter’s upstairs venue and music mixed by The Western’s own Ian Esky, Maria Who? truly felt like a celebration of culture and community in fashion and diaspora. You can view more of Nicole’s works on her Instagram account @nicoleoliveria.
