The Art of Disguise
Disguise is a universal response across the natural world. It
is adopted as a camouflage for protection against predators, such as the owl moth,
whose markings on its wings look like the face of an owl to protect it from
birds, or some cicadas whose wings look like neem leaves.
Humans knowingly or unconsciously adopt disguises. This can
be clothing worn specifically for a job interview or to blend in at social or
professional occasions. People function in a society by creating behaviour and
language filters. Rarely do people speak their mind. Depending on whom we are addressing, we
tailor our words carefully and adopt social etiquettes suitable for addressing
parents and elders, strangers, social acquaintances, courtroom judges, or a
commanding officer. In this constant
switching of disguises, people become good at hiding their true feelings. A
smile can hide pain, extrovert behaviour can hide a shy person, comedians often
hide depression and overly aggressive persons can be disguising their
vulnerability.
Disguise can also become subterfuge. Spies are trained to blend
in with society. Codes once designed to convey secret messages, have now become
more complex with the new technological advances of steganography - hiding data
inside pixels of images, video or audio. In ancient times messages were tattooed
onto a shaved head, allowing the hair to grow again to be revealed only by re-shaving
the head.
The Arts have always communicated by the use of symbols and
metaphors. Mostly the symbols are easily understood by the viewer such as the
painting of Jehangir with a halo of divinity, standing on a globe with docile
lions and lambs resting beneath depicting the control and harmony in his empire.
Even Salim’s adoption of the name Jehangir, conqueror of the world, or Nur
Jehan, light of the world, were intended as strong messages of power. Some are more subtle such as the salt spilt
by Judas in Leonardo Da Vinci’s The Last Supper, a bad omen indicating his
impending betrayal of Jesus. Even simple flower paintings in the vanitas
tradition showing both buds and decaying flowers, depict the transience of
life.
However, art can also embed hidden messages. The Victorian artist, Walter Sickert is said
to have hidden clues to the identity of Jack the Ripper in his paintings. After
the Battle of Plassey in 1757, when the colonial intentions of the British
became clear, protest poetry became heavily disguised to avoid detection. Raja
Ram Narain Mauzun wrote ‘O gazelle, you are a witness to the death of Majnun.
The madman has died. What now will be the fate of the desert?’
Shakespeare’s plays while highly entertaining, were also a disguised
critique of the monarchy, class, gender and racism of his times. One of the most eternally relevant plays is
Julius Caesar, which we would recognize today as a regime change play. In
modern productions it has been presented as an army coup, as the intrigues of
the White House, and as conspiracy and betrayal in almost every context one can
envision.
Doublespeak, a term inspired by George Orwell’s ‘newspeak’ from
his 1949 novel, Nineteen Eighty-four, deliberately uses words to deceive,
confuse and misdirect people from the truth. Newspeak created misleading words
such as ‘ungood’ instead of ‘bad’, much as today doublespeak uses ‘collateral
damage’ instead of ‘civilian casualties’. Mostly associated with politicians
and government officials, doublespeak became the main weapon of colonisers
whose best example is the secret Sykes-Picot plan that simultaneously promised
the Arabs independence if they rose up against the Ottomans, the Jews the
establishment of the State of Israel, while France and Britain were planning to
divide up the Midde East between them. Today
‘deep fake’ uses facial recognition algorithms to create false images, spread
disinformation and create false endorsement of products by famous people.
Repeating a lie until it is seen as the truth, orders given
in a way that ensures ‘plausible deniability’ are examples of the purposeful
manipulation of language – the ultimate disguise. Native English speakers
freely use oxymorons, contradictory terms such as ‘awfully good’ which confuse
those new to English. The term ‘charming’ may mean the opposite when it’s a
response to uncouth behaviour.
Disguises can be considered necessary for survival, social
harmony, or wit and entertainment, but when the art of disguise becomes the
doctrine of deceit, truth becomes the victim.
Durriya Kazi
April 18, 2024
Karachi
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