Amid historic levels of anti-Asian violence, it’s crucial this Asian American Pacific Islander Heritage Month to not just rally against racism, but to uplift stories of joy that show the fullness of the AAPI experience.
Welcome to Unbuttoned, a conversation with grown-up creative people about how they made it, their process, and any advice they’d give to those dreaming to create something of their own.
In 2021, the terms diversity, equity, and inclusion have become common buzzwords in the handbooks of corporate brands; virtue-signaling as companies’ market to marginalised folks, or to convince those folks to buy their products as if they support our communities. The past few years have prompted widespread reckoning across many industries including fashion, with people of colour and those from other marginalised backgrounds taking to social media to tell the truth about the treatment they face.
Agency founder and casting director Nafisa Kaptownwala started doing the groundwork of representation before it was splashed across the front page of every publication. She founded casting agency Lorde Inc in 2013 as a company that could represent people she wanted to see in fashion and media; people who had stories to tell but no platform.
Kaptownwala’s path to becoming a casting director wasn’t straightforward. Of growing up as a child of South Asian Muslim immigrants in Canada, she said, “I knew I was coming out of the gate with a body of experiences I couldn’t articulate. I needed the tools to talk about my experience with racism, casteism, and classism.” She wanted to apply theory to the work she was eager to see in the world, but she wasn’t sure what medium she would choose. After a stint in college studying journalism in Vancouver, she switched schools and programs and pursued a major in art history at a liberal arts college in Montreal, where she learned the theory she needed to tell the stories the world wasn’t yet hearing. At the foundation of Kaptownwala’s work is storytelling -- her casting isn’t just about getting QTBIPOC in front of the camera, she is confronting classism and casteism as well.
Teen Vogue spoke to Kaptownwala about the nuances of representation, pivoting from casting fashion to film, and how the media landscape has changed over the past several years.
Teen Vogue: What was it like growing up in Canada as a young South Asian person?
Nafisa Kaptownwala: I grew up in East Vancouver and it’s really interesting. Americans have a very different contextual understanding of what the South Asian diaspora looks like and what the makeup of a low-income community in Canada looks like. It’s easy for people to have assumptions of what my experience might have been like, but truthfully I don’t really relate to a lot of South Asians from America. I relate more to South Asians from Canada and the UK. Partly because our communities are quite marginalised and are either poor or working class. I grew up in a dense working-class area of mostly new migrants and I grew up super poor. I think that’s really important to talk about because when you grow up with nothing you’re dealing with a whole new set of obstacles, especially when you want to step out and work in a creative field. The means that people take to survive are so much more visible and the values take precedence. It really took me a long time and I felt like I had a lot more stumbling blocks to work through and pass to be able to get where I’m at today.
My motivation really came from wanting to see representation of folks like me. Not even necessarily Brown folks -- I don’t relate to the Mindy Kalings of the world, she went to Yale and had more access than I could have ever imagined. I’m really interested in seeing folks who came from the gutter and made things happen with absolutely nothing, and what it means to be truly resourceful.
I think a lot of Pakistani, Bangladeshi and Muslim South Asians can relate to my story. I have friends from home whose families are lower caste or working caste like mine. We grew up adjacent to a lot of gang violence, drug dealing and crime. It was so hard to make ends meet. Being in the suburbs of Vancouver, London or Toronto in the 1990s and 2000s, it was a really common scene for South Asian youth to be involved in those kinds of things. Especially Muslim South Asian youth because of Islamophobia, casteism and racism; a lot of members of our communities have darker skin as well. It’s so important for me for those stories to be told. People don’t talk about poverty that exists in our communities and the intersection of casteism and racism.
TV: When did you start your casting agency Lorde Inc? What did the first few years look like?
NK: I didn’t set out to be a casting director, it sort of happened accidentally. I love people, I love photographing people and I find culture really fascinating. I had some ideas in the back of my head -- like, “Oh I want to shoot something, and I have some friends I want to shoot but all of these white photographers I know never shoot talent of colour and I want to shoot them and show how beautiful they are.” I didn’t know what casting even was, I didn’t understand anything about that world. A close friend of mine had just gotten signed to a modelling agency and he was telling me about the racism he was dealing with at that agency, and another friend was signed to a different agency that had no models of colour besides her. So I decided that I would start my own agency. I started Lorde in 2013, one year after graduating from college.
TV: How has it been to see the industry attempt to shift to become more inclusive?
NK: When I think about the time I started Lorde in 2013-2014, I think about 2 Brown Girls -- Zeba Blay and Fariha Roisin’s podcast -- and gal-dem, the publication out of London. We were being critical of the media because we were people who worked in media and felt like our voices were being excluded. And now our voices are being commodified. It feels really disingenuous; it’s really just giving brands optics, while they don’t have to do any deep work or make radical changes to the structures of their businesses. Had I known that was going to be the wave of change, that representation was going to add to the culture, I probably would’ve rethought my approach. But capitalism does what capitalism does, it doesn’t matter how you put out the work or what work you put out. Eventually, capitalists will get their hands on it and exploit it.
TV: What is your approach to working within a capitalist structure while having radical ideology?
NK: To be a legitimate abolitionist means to take a serious L; to not have your means be within a capitalist structure, however that can be achieved. For most people, especially people who live in metropolitan cities that are as expensive as New York, it’s not possible. I reckon with that every day: figuring out ways of how to continue the work that I do but do it with as little harm or impact as possible. A part of that means accepting that there are always going to be people who are going to copy your work and exploit you. If that means I’m not going to make as much money as all of these capitalist casting directors, then that’s the L that I’m choosing to take. I have to figure out what my values are.
Now in the age of Instagram, so much of this work for people is rooted in immediate validation: a tag on Instagram from a cool photographer or a brand. If you keep chasing that validation, you’re going to lose your sense of self, your values, your relationship to spirit. The work is going to be more about feeding that machine and that really harms the world. And to actively say, “I’m not going to participate in that, I’m going to have boundaries around that,” means that your work might not soar as high in a capitalist system.
TV: How has life as a casting director been through the pandemic?
NK: I started the first half of the pandemic really resenting my work and resenting working in fashion. I truly do not believe that the world needs any more material goods. To be a part of an industry and a system that amplifies shopping, materialism, buying things, and unhealthy body image, we’re exhausting ourselves. So I felt really spent for the first half of the year, having a true reckoning of myself and of my work. What am I trying to do in this world? Do I think that this is even important? Truthfully, I don’t. I felt like I lost myself and I lost my values. And values can evolve too. I have no shame in admitting that the thing I started in 2013 is not as important anymore and I’m ready to shift a bit. So I had to take time to decide what that shift looks like. I started to work for a casting agency freelanced to learn more about casting for film. I started to revisit the concept of representation; I think the way it’s iterated in fashion is harmful. What can I do with the work that I started to shift peoples’ focus back to the important parts, the parts that activate us and create change? To me, that’s telling stories - whether that’s through editorial, documentaries, film. So I’ve been doing a lot of that sort of casting and it’s made me a lot happier with the work that I do. What are really important stories? What are films and documentaries that have inspired me to move and be active? To look at casting more from that lens has been really helpful, it has reactivated my sense of purpose in this work.
I think there really is a way for a lot of us creatives to pivot in a way that is considerate of our changing environments: a pandemic that is a climate crisis, and the upcoming crises that we are bound to be confronted with. If there’s one thing we learned this summer, these industries weren’t built to support Black people, Indigenous people and Brown people. How do we rethink our world and our businesses? I had a moment of really feeling like we can live in a world that is equitable and community-centred and oriented. I’ve been thinking about what that looks like and how I can encourage that in the work that I do.
TV: What sort of rituals do you practice to stay centered?
NK: I’m trying to remind myself to be present. When I do have that space of mind to concentrate on being present, I find journaling really helpful. Baths, especially if you’re a water sign [laughs]. Checking in with friends and family; connecting hearts is super important for me. I like to do my prayers before bed. Lately, I’ve been doing rituals for solstice and some full moons -- rituals of gratitude and writing down things I want to call in and things I want to release, things that are no longer serving me. Leaving offerings for ancestors and people that have passed, especially this year. Every time a person passes they become an ancestor. I lost a loved one to Covid this year so it’s been really important to me to have that connection through prayer. It’s hard to connect with folks as we’re all experiencing grief. So to have that space to connect with an ancestor on your own is important for me.
TV: Who in your community do you look up to?
NK: I really look up to my friends Mriga [Kapadiya] and Amrit [Kumar] who do the brand Norblack Norwhite. Thanu [Thanushka Yakupitiyage] is such a boss queen, she’s so humble with the work she does and she’s such a beam of light. I really appreciate her. I really look up to Mo [Mohammed Fayaz] as well; Mo is one of the few people I know who is genuinely so community-minded and genuinely approaches the work they do thinking about people and what is best for the collective and I think that is awesome.
Pix - LOUISIANA MEI GELPI