TheJakartaPost
Please Update your browser
Your browser is out of date, and may not be compatible with our website. A list of the most popular web browsers can be found below.
Just click on the icons to get to the download page.
Winging it: Paris gallery keeps visitors apart with extension hats
Change Size
Artists wear colourful 'deconfinement hats' made of paper mache and inspired by Song dynasty headwear, for social distancing, at 59 Rivoli gallery in Paris as it prepares a general reopening later in the week, following the outbreak of the coronavirus disease (COVID-19) in France, June 3, 2020. (Reuters/Benoit Tessier)
A
n art gallery in Paris has sought inspiration in ancient China to help it enforce social distancing, by providing hats with winged extensions for visitors.
The colorful papier-mâché hats are modeled on headgear from the Song dynasty, which ruled China between 960 and 1279, with extensions just long enough to keep wearers the one metre (three feet) apart stipulated in France's COVID-19 regulations.
The first Song emperor is said to have ordered his officials to wear winged hats so that they could not gossip without being heard.
Read also: Romanian cobbler keeps people apart with size 75 shoes
"Back in the day, these were worn to prevent public officials from whispering," Dominique Pouzol, who designed the hats for the 59 Rivoli gallery, told Reuters. "And so, there was already then this notion of social distancing."
Some of Pouzol's creations carry a political message too, painted in the colors of the rainbow is a nod to gay rights.
"The hats are to protect us from COVID-19," Pouzol said. "But I said to myself perhaps they can also shield us from ...human viciousness, from small-minded people."
