These positively zinging paintings are a sure-fire guarantee, to blow any hints of oncoming Autumn depression right out the window. My friend Zahia discovered the work of Fatiha Edahhriz about a year ago in the souk of Taroudant, in southern Morocco. One painting stood out amongst a collection of rather more conventional Moroccan scenes. It turned out that Fatias’ husband had exhibited one of his wives paintings with his own. Zahia asked if she could see more and was invited home to meet Fatiha.
She is a young housewife, with a daughter and son to take care of, so painting is confined to evenings and whilst the kids are at school. It was as she watched her husband paint that Fatiha, began to feel the irresistible desire to have a go herself. Hussein encouraged his wife and within no time her own style bloomed.
If you ask her what she paints Fatiha will tell you ‘ Beauty, it’s beauty that I want to paint’ Each painting becomes another child, she is sad when it leaves home, but each departure leaves space for a new creation.
Fatihas paintings are a joy, the simple colourful events of everyday life in Morocco are the raw material she transforms into her highly decorative tableaux. Weddings, births, baptisms, the bread sellers, the water carriers all serve as inspiration.
Zahia has brought Fatihas’ painting to a Parisian audience and already many of her friends (myself included) has fallen under her charm and felt compelled to purchase.
A selection of them are on sale at Zahia Hebbirs’ new gallery 12 : Passage Thièrè, Paris 75011. Tel 00 33 (0)6 16 39 63 10, email: zahiaa@free.fr
Absolutely stunning. I wish I could buy one, but which one would be the question.
ReplyDelete