On November 25, the seminar “Contexts for Creation: The visual arts” took place in Rabat. It was organized by the Moroccan-Spanish Circle of Friendship and Casa Árabe, with the cooperation of the Embassy of Spain in Rabat, the Institute of Spanish-Portuguese Studies, the Legacy of Al-Andalus and the Cervantes Institute in Rabat.

 

The seminar was officially opened by the Moroccan Minister of Culture, Mohamed Amine Sbihi, who wished above all to highlight the cultural proximity between Spain and Morocco, and the countries’ shared history, with examples of enormous importance, such as the School of Fine Arts in Tetouan and the new Museum of Contemporary Art. As for Aziza Bennani, president of the Moroccan-Spanish Circle of Friendship, she praised the importance of the seminar and underlined the privileged role that art can play as a cutting-edge path towards dialogue, peace and the construction of common identities. Eduardo López Busquets shared Ms. Benani’s view of the situation and mentioned the intense activity which Casa Árabe carries out in this sense, as a basic instrument for bilateral relations, also in the realm of culture.  The words by Spain’s Ambassador to Morocco, José de Carvajal Salido, highlighted the importance held for the civil societies in both countries by the exploration of new forums and spaces for cooperation, like the seminar “Contexts for Creation: The visual arts.” As for Javier Galván, director of the Cervantes Institute in Rabat, he celebrated the fact that the seminar was going to be held in the rooms of the Cervantes Institute, a space which is also open and available for exchange initiatives like this.

The seminar was structured around three dialogue panels (Perceptions of Current Art / Crossing Glances in Current Art / Spaces for Dialogue), in which subjects related with current events in the art world and the people working in that world were analyzed, attempting to point out what common concerns exist between professionals from Spain and Morocco. In addition to other topics, they examined matters such as the role of museums in today’s societies and their relationship with both the public and the work by creators; describing their viewpoints of the contemporary times and the moments of disruption existing in both countries; concepts of the masculine and feminine, views of gender and stereotypes related with artistic practice and how they are received by the public; models for artistic exchanges and dialogue, and the case study of the Med-Occ Association, with more than 15 years of experience working in this direction; the importance of education for art and culture in Spanish and Moroccan societies, which share a lack of attention paid to this matter by both public and private institutions, etc. 

 

The participants in these dialogues were Farid Zahi (art critic), Santiago-Bruno Olmo García (art critic and exhibition curator), Rachid Benlabbah (researcher), Nuria Medina (Casa Árabe’s Culture Coordinator), Bouchta El Hayani (artist), Marina Rodríguez Vargas (artist), Safaa Erruas (artist), Miguel Cereceda Sánchez, (theorist and art critic), Fatiha Benlabbah (Director of the Institute of Spanish-Portuguese Studies and Secretary General of the Circle), Diego Fernández de Moya (artist and exhibition curator), Zara Fernández de Moya (project coordinator and communication director of the MED-OCC Association) and Abdelkrim Ouazzani (artist).

 

Taking advantage of their visit to Rabat, the seminar participants paid a visit to the new Mohammed VI Museum of Modern and Contemporary Art  and its very first exhibition, “1914-2014: A Century of Creation.” This museum is a long-awaited project that has finally become a reality, offering visitors a broad overview of what Moroccan art has been like since the early twentieth century. This first exhibition, which occupies every room in the museum, is divided into four parts, which correspond to four periods which document the changes and development of modern and contemporary art in Morocco: 1) From the early twentieth century to the late 1950’s, with examples of the first easel paintings, the Orientalist mirror, the influence of Western painting, the first photography, by Sultan Moulay Abdelaziz, and the early years of the Schools of Fine Arts in Tetouan and Casablanca, created by Spain and France, respectively; 2) The decades of the sixties and seventies, which initially meant a consolidation of these two schools of painting, but gradually the uprise of a generation known as the pioneers, who were closely linked to a search for identifying reference points of their own, as opposed to those of colonization, with special attention placed on Jilali Gharbaoui (1930-1971), Ahmed Cherkaoui (1934-1967) and Ahmed Yacoubi (1923-1987); 3) The decades of the eighties and nineties, represented by artists who created a distance in terms of the need to identify their own cultural roots, so as to delve more into the exploration of new territories in culture and art, with a more notable individual specificity; 4) The fourth period includes those works produced from the end of the twentieth century and up to the present day and includes pieces by well-known artists from the contemporary art scene. This last section is complemented by another showing of installations by current artists, in the basement level, where there is a more industrial feeling than in the rest of the exhibition rooms, as it was initially designed to be the building’s garage.