Rachid Koraïchi’s “Jardin d’Afrique”:
between art installation and humanitarian project

On June 8, the “Jardin d’Afrique” (“Garden of Africa”) was officially opened on the southern Tunisian coast, near the port city of Zarzis, a burial site for the many people who have lost their lives in the Mediterranean Sea while trying to reach Europe.

The project was conceived by Algerian plastic artist Rachid Koraïchi (Ain Beïda, 1947), whose work was presented at Casa Árabe in the exhibition “This Long Journey into Your Eyes” in 2019. Koraïchi has been preparing this initiative since 2018, when he acquired 2,500 square meters of land in order to create a “cemetery for the nameless,” who this year, according to IOM‘s estimate, amount to more than eight hundred (compared with three hundred and fifty last year). The opening ceremony was presided over by Audrey Azoulay, UNESCO’s Director General.

This place with white walls and ceramic-tiled corridors, similar to those in the Tunis “medina” from the eigtheenth century, includes a space where bodies are washed before burial and a chapel for religious services may be held. On its dome we can see the symbols of the three monotheistic religions. The graves, approximately two hundred in number, are surrounded by jasmine, bougainvillea, bitter orange trees and gallant nightshades. At the entrance, a 120-year-old olive tree welcomes visitors. Throughout history, the idea of the garden has always been linked with the vision of an idyllic, peaceful place, usually located in the Far Beyond, where flowers and trees grow in abundance. Koraïchi claims to have wished to recreate “a paradise on Earth.” The project was designed, completed and financed by Koraïchi, through close collaboration with local craftsmen, as he usually does in his work. Wherever he goes, he attempts to draw from indigenous cultural traditions, promoting dialogue with the wider global community.

This all-encompassing work of art reflects all of Koraïchi’s artistic and personal sensitivity. The artist descends from a family of the Sufi order of the Tijaniyyah, who originated in Mecca. As he said in an interview with Casa Árabe’s Culture Coordinator, Nuria Medina, during the exhibition “This Long Journey into Your Eyes,” he spent a long time in life tracing his ancestors. While in the West it is relatively easy to trace back lineages, thanks to the fact that churches and priests have always recorded births and deaths, Arab culture is based on oral tradition, making it difficult to discover an individual’s genealogy accurately. After all, everything may get retold in different ways. Despite the traveling, nomadic spirit that characterizes him, Rachid has a clear sense of what home means and the importance of knowing about one’s roots and bonds with others. To bury these bodies, stripped of their own subjectivity and expelled from “human” status, means to restore a space of presence for them on this land. Each corpse that arrives at the gates of the “Jardin d’Afrique” is not only given a “home,” but also a distinctive sign that rescues it from the anonymity to which the sea has condemned it. A DNA test is carried out on every body, the results of which will be recorded on the gravestone, along with the date and place of the shipwreck. This information is essential for relatives to be able to locate them one day. By doing this work, the artist helps keep these individuals alive, at least in our memory, among those of us who continue down life’s path, because to Rachid humankind is a chain.” He himself suffered the loss of his older brother, Mohamed, who set sail on a boat for Europe after the Algerian war and was never heard from again.

As art historian and exhibition curator Ana Martínez de Aguilar has stated, “instead of focusing on denunciation, like other artists, [Koraïchi] speaks to us about harmony and the cosmic order, of beauty and transcendence” (“This Long Journey into Your Eyes,” 2019). The Algerian artist views criticism as just a moment within the process of creation. It is a moment which must necessarily be resolved through a synthetic gesture that reveals another horizon of meaning in which a reorganization of common living becomes possible. To Rachid, art brings into the present a different world and, by virtue of its ecumenical character, addresses the entire “community of human beings” with no distinction in terms of race, origin, culture and religion. From this time on, the artist has assigned management of the garden-cemetery to the organization by the same name, “Le Jardin d’Afrique,” run by the president of the humanitarian “Red Crescent” organization of Zarzis and Médenine, Dr. Mongi Slim, with the hope that it will be able to continue promoting his art while investing further resources in the project’s expansion.