CHENNAI: More often than not, representation is writ large in its absence. It is not until you see someone sporting a T-shirt that says ‘Naan veezhven endru ninaithayo’ or ‘Arivu peridhu’ or ‘Ini oru vidhi seivom’ that you realise that our Bharathiyar and Periyar have had little space amid Che Guevara and Bob Marley. Well, not Kumar, Srivatsav Raj and Raghavendar. For Angi Clothing was born out of their need to fill this void, at least in the arena of urban fashion. Over the years, the brand has managed to hold its ground and evolve in parts, scripting a sartorial success with the story of representation.
“In Chennai, I saw a lot of people wearing Che Guevara and Bob Marley shirts. What we thought was that Bharathiyar was as rebellious as Che. Yet, people do not look at him or his work as ‘cool’. We started out wanting to make Bharathiyar and Thiruvalluvar cool,” narrates Raghavendar, a fashion management graduate who plunged into the start-up world with trusted friends to execute this dream. The going, as it always goes, did not go easy. The men, though in their mid 20s, were not taken seriously when they wanted to portray the cultural figures outside of the textbook-front stereotypes that we are used to. Roping in Jagadeesh as in-house artist did further things along, he says.
When Angi was opened to the public in 2013, the initial collection had only the Tamizh staples in people, games and the arts. Over the years, it has grown by merchandise and audience. But it was the pro-Jallikattu protests of 2017 that got more people to take stock of this enterprise. While many bought their Jallikattu-themed T-shirts (a winner from their early collection), it raked up some choice opposition too with people blaming them of appropriation.
Some even took offence to the Tamizh slogans being written in English, says Raghav. From being reliant on exhibition stalls and Madras Market corners of yore, Angi now has its own base. “People of the Tamizh diaspora have this identity crisis, growing up in Europe, Canada and the US with ‘white’ friends. But after hearing the stories of the language and culture from their parents and grandparents, they seem to want to establish Tamizh as their identity. Lately, they have been our biggest customer base,” he explains.
With the success of Angi, the creators of the brand had another question coming up: Why so serious? Steeped in Periyar’s philosophies and Bharatiyar’s verses, there was little room at Angi for modern Chennai-esque themes. Body Soda was the answer to this and much more. “We started it a week before the release of Bigil with T-shirts for the movie.
Thalapathy oda aasirvathathula dhan aarambichathu (It started with Thalapathy’s blessings),” quips Raghav. Body Soda is now home to other very Tamizh sentiments that one would be hard put to find elsewhere — ‘Macha! Goa Polama’ comes with the memorable board sign from Venkat Prabhu’s Biriyani, the word ‘Gethu’ on a pair of glasses is embodiment of the local idea of cool. Perhaps it’s the ‘Tamizh Timir’, it looks like they cannot go wrong with this.