'Princess Hijab'

I came across an article the other day about a young graffiti artist nicknamed ‘Princess Hijab’. Their identity is unknown and strong feelings clearly displayed on the Paris metro.  What Princess Hijab is doing is what "she" calls "hijabisation," the act of adding black Muslim veils on half-naked women, and men, on the metro's fashion advertisements. As you may or may not know, in secular France, especially with the recent Sarkozy governement's Burqa Ban, this is a major act of political art, a potent formula of vandalism and discussion points. The Burqa Ban became apparent when people feared the true identity of those underneath the veil.

She is quoted as saying "If it was only about the burqa ban, my work wouldn't have a resonance for very long. But I think the burqa ban has given a global visibility to the issue of integration in France," she says. "We definitely can't keep closing off and putting groups in boxes, always reducing them to the same old questions about religion or urban violence. Education levels are better and we can't have the old Manichean discourse any more. Liberty, equality, fraternity, that's a republican principle, but in reality the issue of minorities in French society hasn't really evolved in half a century. The outsiders in France are still the poor, the Arabs, black and of course, the Roma."