Tribal art with local flavor

For this Saturday’s Fashionably Fair runway show, part of Second World’s sixth annual New England Culture Fest, Parker and wardrobe stylist Vanessa Guzman called upon a mostly local roster of graffiti artists, painters, and jewelry designers to contribute work with tribal and urban themes.

“Fair trade means giving people a chance to retain their culture while making a living and while connecting with the world,’’ says Parker, whose group focuses on sustainable development. “What we’re attempting to do is show fair trade in a local context.’’

To fit with the “Ancient Meets Urban’’ theme of this year’s Culture Fest, the runway show will feature vintage clothing restyled with tribal art and graffiti by participating designers. The models’ attire will also include body paint, copper masks, and metallic cuffs, and even chunks of cotton from the Boott Cotton Mills Museum in Lowell, which has working power looms.

“Lowell is one of the birthplaces of the American Industrial Revolution,’’ Parker says. “The labor rights people fought for in Lowell - we want to advocate around the world.’’

We asked participating designers about their work.

The New England Culture Fest takes place Saturday from 2-10 p.m. at the Enterprise Bank parking lot on Middle Street, Lowell. (Rain date Sunday.) $10 entrance (free for children under 12). Fashionably Fair runway show starts at 8 p.m. For more information, call 978-455-6025 or go to www.second-world.com.

Among the masks that she’s lending to the Fashionably Fair show, the one named “Ghost’’ is the “most visually stunning,’’ she says. Eight months in the making, the copper mask is a meticulously rendered reproduction of a sparrow’s skull.

Now that the mask is finished, Schwartzman, 27, has begun thinking about its character, something she does for all of her pieces.

“I feel like ghost is going to be a bold sort of personality,’’ she says. “When you put him on, because he covers so much of your head you become this bird. Birds are a symbol of freedom, particularly small birds. You can put on this mask, and the question is, who do you want to be?’’

Then she adds: “Even though it’s a skull, he’s going to be fun at parties.’’

After she was asked to give a tribal feel to old clothes for the show, Pedersen researched tribal patterns for inspiration. Instead of using the browns she found in many of them, she decided to go for brighter colors “to give it a little more rhythm.’’

Before working on the clothing, for which she used a water-soluble acrylic paint combined with a textile medium, Pedersen admitted it would be a challenge to keep the patterns simple. “I tend to be complicated,’’ she said, “but I’m going to try to keep it to a minimum.’’

“Everyone in the group does something different,’’ Fadayz says. “Some people work with kids, some people design clothes.’’

The group contributed around 15 T-shirts made by some of the members. One shirt Fadayz made that reads “Only those who wanna be 4gotten akirameru’’ (akirameru being the Japanese word for “give up’’) hearkens back to his first street dance competition.

“I was watching the other people, and I froze,’’ he says. “Those dudes had been in the game for a while, and I was just starting. A guy came up to me and said, ‘You’re watching those people get better, and while you’re sitting around, you’re not getting any better.’ ’’

“We’re bringing graffiti art to the public in positive ways,’’ Mehigan says. Among them is a mural project in Maynard that included contributions from 11 graffiti artists.

In his own work, Mehigan’s favored subjects include animals and cartoons. For the Fashionably Fair show, Mehigan says he’ll be using clothing as he would a canvas, only stenciling and spray painting messages about fair trade.

“I can’t say I’ve done art related to fair trade before,’’ he says. “But the political climate in general is of interest to me.’’