L’éveil de la mémoire (Memory Awakens)

In 2018, a workshop entitled «Creation of portraits of Moroccan figures who have brought Moroccan culture to the world» produced portraits of leading figures such as Mohamed Choukri, Fatima Mernissi, Mohamed Khair-Eddine, Tayeb Saddiki, Aïcha Chenna and Mohamed Zafzaf, all created by the applied arts students of Lycée Mohammed V.

 In 2022, the list expanded with new creations of significant national and international personalities like Abdelkebir Khatibi, Edmond Amran El Maleh, Boujemâa Ahkour, Ismail Ghazali, Houssein Miloudi, Lhaj Belaid, Orson Welles, Haim Zafrani, Meriem Meziane…

 Today, the list is finally complete, with recent works featuring Hindi Zahra, Mohamed Rouicha, Fairuz, Ahmed Charkaoui, Naima Samih, Jilali Gharbaoui, Gabriel Garcia Marquez, Fadaul, Mohamed El Habachi, Najet Maalla M’jid, Larbi Benbarek, Walter Gropius, Younes Megri, Asmahan and Mahmoud Guinia-the latter with seven monochrome portraits in the seven colours of the Gnaoua.

 This series of portraits pay tribute to the women and men who have raised awareness of Morocco’s culture well beyond its borders. “L’éveil de la mémoire” (Memory Awakens) is a collective exhibition that highlights the work of lycée students from the three last graduating years-2018, 2022 and 2023-under the direction of Mustapha Rafik, painter and long-standing essential figure of the Essaouira cultural scene.