La courte échelle
Guest-curated by Yto Barrada, Mateo Lopez and Carlos Garaicoa
Meriem Bennani, M'Barek Bouhchichi, Yaima Carrazana, Johanna Castillo, Juliana Góngora,
Dania González, José Manuel Mesias, Mazenett Quiroga and Santiago Reyes Villaveces
Online viewing room
July 1 to August 8, 2020
M'Barek Bouhchichi
Etude pour un monument (Diptych), 2019
Burnt wood
203 × 24 × 24 cm
Unique
Courtesy of the artist and Selma Feriani Gallery, Tunis
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Etude pour un monument was realised for Bouhchichi’s first solo exhibition at Selma Feriani Gallery, Tunis in 2019, entitled Les Mains parallèles. The artwork creates liaisons between spaces and forms, more precisely the form of the ladder that we find in Berber and sub-Saharan architecture. The artist adopts a simplified and geometric form by questioning the impact of monuments today and their ownership by authorities. Forms are catalysts for these questions, in which they blend, connect, separate and overlay. The artist renders his relation to history more complex, from both a synchronic angle, concerning his relation to the different people and contemporary voices that are invoked, and a diachronic viewpoint, through his participation in a history of forms, in the long term.
Furthermore, the use of burnt wood connotes a violent act, paradoxically, it can also be seen as a method of preserving the material; some cultures acknowledge that burning a material is an offering of a second life. Placing both pillars side by side creates an exchange, where one element dominates the other. (extract of exhibition essay, text by Karima Boudou, 2019)
Biography
b. 1975, Akka, Morocco
Lives and works in Tahanaout, Morocco
M’barek Bouhchichi gives shape to modes of expression that move from the individual discourse towards broader social, poetic and historic systems. There is an individual voice that enables a re-writing of the self that runs throughout his work. It’s a thought process unfolding in acts that the artist signifies with the exchange between the idea and the experience of the work. His artworks propose a dual reading that depends on the artist’s personal understanding, and a reading that is guided by thoughts that are open to being shared and interpreted.
Bouhchichi graduated from the Centre Pédagogique Régional, Rabat, Morocco.
The works of M’barek Bouhchichi has recently been exhibited at biennials at international institutions including Dak’art, 13th edition of the Biennial of Contemporary African Art, Dakar, Senegal / Savvy contemporary, Berlin, Germany / MUCEM, Marseille, France / Kulte, Rabat, Morocco / His work is included in prestigious collections, including The Museum of African Art Al Maaden (MACAAL), Marrakech, Morocco and The Centre Pompidou, Paris, France.