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Dalloul Art Foundation
LALLA ASSAYDI LALLA ASSAYDI

LALLA ASSAYDI, Morocco (1956)

Bio

Lalla Essaydi is a Moroccan contemporary painter, photographer, and installation artist, who was born in 1956, in Marrakesh. In 1972, Lalla moved to Paris to attend high school. After that, she...

Lalla Essaydi is a Moroccan contemporary painter, photographer, and installation artist, who was born in 1956, in Marrakesh. In 1972, Lalla moved to Paris to attend high school. After that, she returned to Morocco, got married, then moved to Saudi Arabia where she raised her two children. In the early 1990s, she returned to Paris and finished her degree in painting from École Nationale Supérieure des Beaux-Arts.

While in Paris, the artist discovered the work of orientalists such as Jean-Léon Gérôme from the 19th-century. Gérôme’s paitings represent salacious images of harems and seductive nudes, that was observed and appreciated by the Western male audience. The audacity behind his artworks portrayed a sense of fiction and inspired the Moroccan artist by exquisite artistic techniques.  

Essaydi moved to Boston in 1996, then she finished her Bachelor degree in Fine Arts from Tufts University in 1999. In 2003, Lalla earned her MFA in painting and photography from the school of the Museum of Fine Arts in Boston.

Lalla Essaydi’s techniques touch the core of traditional stereotypes, and put into question realizations about the veil, the harem, and the odalisque. Throughout her artworks, the artist expresses her vision by creating powerful photographs, juxtaposing fantasy and reality about Arab cultural heritage in-between the past and the present. The artist’ artwork is based on memorial references from her early childhood years in her native Morocco. Essaydi introduces several social and cultural interpretations of traditional Moroccan elements, including Moroccan women and their calligraphic henna tradition, amongst many other elements such as mosaic, tiles, and Islamic architecture.

The artist currently lives in New York City.

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Selected Solo Exhibitions

2024

Lalla Essaydi. Falk Visiting Artist, Weatherspoon Art Museum, Greensboro, North Carolina, USA
Lalla Essaydi: Conflicted Identities,
Jackson Fine Art, Atlanta, Georgia, USA

2022

Lalla Essaydi: Image and Text, The Patricia & Phillip Frost Art Museum, Florida International University, Miami, Florida, United States of America
Lalla Essaydi: A New Gaze, Edwynn Houk Gallery, New York, United States of America
Lalla Essaydi: Un/Veiled,
Norton Museum of Art, West Palm Beach, Florida, United States

2021

Lalla Essaydi, Hunter Museum of American Art, Tennessee, Unite States of America
By Design: Theatre and Fashion in the Photography of Lalla Essaydi, Fairfield University Art Museum, Connecticut, United States of America

2018

Truth and Beauty, Sundaram Tagore Gallery, Gillman Barracks, Singapore, Republic of Singapore

2017

Still in Progress, Leila Heller Gallery, Al-Qoz, Dubai, United Arab Emirates

2015

Lalla Essaydi, San Diego Museum of Art, California, United States of America
Lalla Essaydi, Edwynn Houk Gallery, Zürich, Switzerland

2014

New Beauty, Jenkins Johnson Gallery, San Francisco, California, United States of America 

2013

Lalla Essaydi, Miller Yezerski Gallery, Boston, Massachusetts, United States of America
Lalla Essaydi, Edwynn Houk Gallery, New York, United States of America
Boundries, Amelia Johnson Contemporary, Central, Hong Kong, China

2010

Les Femmes du Maroc, Zimmerli Art Museum, Rutgers University, New Jersey, United State of America

2009

Les Femmes du Maroc, DeCordova Museum and Sculpture Park, Lincoln, Massachusetts, United States of America

2008

Lalla Essaydi, Miller Yezerski Gallery, Boston, Massachusetts, United States of America

2006

Transgressions, Williams College Museum, Williamstown, Massachusetts, United States of America
Converging Territories, Jackson Fine Art Photography Gallery, Atlanta, United States of America
Converging Territories, The New Britain Museum of Art, Britain, United kingdom
Converging Territories, Joel Soroka Gallery, Colorado, United States of America

Selected Group Exhibitions

2024

Entangled Gaze, Jenkins Johnson Gallery, San Francisco, California, USA
Splendours Of The Atlas: A Voyage Through Morocco’s Heritage, Museum of Islamic Art (MIA), Doha, Qatar
Africa Rising: 21st-Century African Photography, Fitchburg Art Museum, Massachusetts, USA
Die Schrift ist weiblich. Bild und Text in der internationalen Kunst, Kunstforum Hermann Stenner, Bielefeld, Germany
Pov: in My Nasher Teen Era, Nasher Museum of Art at Duke University, Durham, USA

2023

Reigning Queens: Modern and Contemporary Representations of Women, Power, and Religion, Sheldon Museum of Art, Nebraska, USA
Site of a Dangerous Leap
, UK Art Museum, Kentucky, USA
Reorientation: The Space In-Between,
Sundaram Tagore, Singapore, Singapore
Framing The Female Gaze: Women Artists And The New Historicism,
Lehman College Art Gallery, New York, USA
Together/Apart: Modern and Contemporary Art of the United States,
Patricia & Phillip Frost Art Museum, Miami, Florida, USA

2022

Pedagogy, Bates College Museum of Art, Lewiston, Maine, United States of America
Spring Group Show, Sundaram Tagore, Singapore, Republic of Singapore
Portrait of a Lady, Boghossian Foundation, Brussels, Belgium
A Room of Her Own, Sundaram Tagore, Singapore, Republic of Singapore
Photography,
Jewels and Handbags, Sotheby's Dubai, Dubai, United Arab Emirates
Letters From Overseas: Zooming Into The De Molina’s Collection,
Coral Gables Museum, Coral Gables, Florida, US

2021

ReOrienting the Gaze, Rollins Museum of Art, Winter Park, Florida, United States of America
A Boundless Drop to a Boundless Ocean, Orlando Museum of Art, Orlando, Florida, United States of America
Wondrous Worlds: Art & Islam Through Time & Place, Michael C. Carlos Museum, Atlanta, Georgia, United States of America

2020

Sundaram Tagore Gallery Survey, Sundaram Tagore, Singapore, Republic of Singapore
Inherent Beauty: Photographers Who Change How We See The World, Sundaram Tagore, Singapore, Republic of Singapore
Unapologetic: All Women, All Year, Scottsdale Museum of Contemporary Art, Scottsdale, Arizona, United States of America
Fact and Fiction in Contemporary Photography, Joslyn Art Museum, Omaha, Nebraska, United States of America

2019

Contextual: Visualizing Language, Cabrillo Gallery, California, United States of America
She Who Tells a Story: Women Photographers from Iran and the Arab World, Ackland Art Museum, Chapel Hill, Carolina, United States of America
Uncovered, Bates College, Museum of Art, Lewiston, United States of America
WHO? A Brief History of Photography through Portraiture, Norton Museum of Art, Florida, United States of America

2018

Witness: Themes of Social Justice in Contemporary Printmaking and Photography from the Collection of Jordan D. Schnitzer and His Family foundation, Hallie Ford Museum of Art, Willamette university, Oregon, United States of America
Summertime…, Jenkis Johnson Gallery, San Francisco, California, United States of America
Summer Show: A selection of gallery Artists and new acquisitions, Edwynn Houk Gallery, New York, United States of America
Spring Selection, Jenkins Johnson Gallery, San Francisco, California, United States of America
Convergence, Addison Gallery of American Art, Massachusetts, United States of America

2017

Alchemy: Transformation in Gold, Akron Art Museum, Ohio, United States of America
Immigrancy, Samson Projects, South End, Boston, Massachusetts, United States of America
Revival, National Museum of Women in the Arts, Washington D.C, United States of America
Feminine/Feminist, Cinnabar Gallery, San Antonio, Texas, United States of America
Embodied, University of Kentucky Art Museum, Lexington, Kentucky, United States of America

2016

Director’s Pick, Jenkis Johnson Gallery, San Francisco, California, United States of America
The Human Touch: Selections from the RBC Wealth Management Art Collection, Wadsworth Atheneum Museum of Art, Hartford, Connecticut, United States of America
Portraiture: A Group Photography Exhibition, Jenkis Johnson Gallery, San Francisco,California, United States of America
She Who Tells a Story: Women Photographers from Iran and the Arab World, National Museum of Women in the Arts, Washington D.C., United States of America
Summertime…, Jenkis Johnson Gallery, San Francisco, California, United States of America
African Art Against the State, Museum of Art, Williams College, Massachusetts, United States of America

2015

She Who Tells a Story: Women Photographers from Iran and the Arab World,vCarnegie Museum of Art, Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, United States of America
Director’s Pick, Jenkins Johnson Gallery, San Francisco, California, United States of America

2014

Language as Inspiration: Works from deCordova’s Collection, DeCordova Museum and Sculpture Park, Lincoln, Massachusetts, United States of America
Look At Me: Portraiture from Manet to the Present, Leila Heller Gallery, New York, United States of America
Altered: Appropriation & Photography, Edwynn Houk Gallery, New York, United States of America
The Human Touch: Selections from the RBC Wealth Management Art Collection, Jordan Schnitzer Museum of Art, Eugene, Oregon, Unite States of America

2013

She Who Tells a Story: Women Photographers from Iran and the Arab World, Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, Massachusetts, United States of America
Nomads: Traversing Adolescence, Kemper Museum of Contemporary Art, Kansas City, Missouri, United States of America

2011

25 Year Anniversary Exhibition, Lisa Sette Gallery, Phoenix, Arizona, United States of America

2007

ON THE WALL: Aperture Magazine 05/06, Aperture Foundation, New York, United States of America
NAZAR, The National Museum, Singapore, Republic of Singapore
The Silk Road and Beyond: Travel, Trade, and Transformation, Chicago Art Institute, Chicago, United States of America

2006

Intersections: Shifting Identity in Contemporary Art, John Michael Kohler Arts Center, Sheboygan, Wisconsin, United States of America

2005

Only Skin Deep: Changing Visions of the American Self, Museum of Photographic Arts, San Diego, California, United States of America
NAZAR, Langhans Gallery, Prague, Czech Republic
NAZAR, Aperture Foundation, Chelsea, New York, United States of America
In the Company of Women, Williams College Museum of Art, Williamstown, Massachusetts, United States of America

2002

Almost Home, Fuller Museum of Art, Brockton, Massachusetts, United States of America

2001

Group Photography Show, The Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, Massachusetts, United States of America

Awards and Honors

2012

Awarded a Medal Award by the School of the Museum of fine Arts (SMFA) in Boston on the occasion of Fine Arts Gala Celebration

Collections

Ramzi and Saeda Dalloul Art Foundation, Beirut, Lebanon
The Fries Museum, Leeuwarden, The Netherlands
The Brooks Museum of Arts, Memphis, Tennessee, United States of America
The Williams College Museum of Art, Williamstown, Massachusetts, United States of America
The New Britain Museum of American Art, Connecticut, United States of America
The Colorado Museum of Art, Colorado, United States of America
The Hood Museum of Art, Dartmouth College, Hanover, Germany
The Kresge Art Museum, Michigan, United States of America

LALLA ASSAYDI Artwork

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