When a garment factory in Bangladesh collapsed, the public cried out against sweatshop conditions and the deadly price of fast fashion - but fashion, it turns out, has been costing people their lives for a very long time.
On today’s show, from poisoned dyes to mercury tainted top-hats, the history of dangerous fashion. Also today, the surrealist origins of the childhood game with the macabre name - Exquisite Corpse.
We'll speak with a member of the punk band, Mission of Burma, who's leading a surrealist games night in Portsmouth, New Hampshire next Thursday.
Listen to the full show:
Fashion Victims
Alison Matthews David is Associate Professor of Fashion at Ryerson University in Toronto. She details the bizarre, frequently macabre toll of clothing in her book Fashion Victims: Dangers of Dress Past and Present.
A Green Welcome
BackStory producer Jess Engebretson explains how the Statue of Liberty gained new meaning in American life – as a symbol of immigration – as it developed its distinctive green patina, with help from political scientist Peter Skerry.
You can listen to this story again at PRX.org.
Surrealist Games
Roger Miller is one of the founders of the influential punk band Mission of Burma and of the Alloy Orchestra, an experimental ensemble that provides live scores to silent films. He's also a writer and visual artist.
He will be leading a night of surrealist games next Thursday at 3S Art Space in Portsmouth.
You'll find his soundtrack for surrealist games and more at this link: A Surrealist Soundtrack
Song Exploder - Bjork
From a rock and roller and surrealism to a musician and composer whose work has been described as surreal. Hrishikesh Hirway, creator of the podcast Song Exploder delves into “Stonemilker”, a song from Björk's 2015 album, Vulnicura.
You can hear this episode again, and catch up on past episodes at SongExploder.net
