Lalla A. Essaydi was born in 1956 and grew up in Morocco and Saudi Arabia. She now lives in the United States, where she earned a B.F.A. at Tufts University and an M.F.A. from the School of the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston in affiliation with Tufts University. Essaydi’s work has encompassed painting, mixed media, and video. Recently, she has devoted herself to photography and sumptuous explorations of the image of women in Islamic society. In her photographs, she often combines Islamic calligraphy with representations of the female body to address the complex reality of Arab female identity. This work also references her Moroccan girlhood: she looks back both as an adult woman who is caught somewhere between past and present, and as an artist exploring the language in which to “speak” from this uncertain space. “In my art” Essaydi says, “I wish to present myself through multiple lenses – as artist, as Moroccan, as Saudi, as traditional, as liberal, as Muslim. In short, I invite the viewer to resist stereotypes.”
Her work has been exhibited internationally and in the United States in group shows including 8th International Photography Gathering (2004), Le Pont Gallery, Aleppo, Syria; Through Arab Eyes (2005), Fries Museum, Leeuwarden, the Netherlands, part of Nazar – Photographs from the Arab World at the 11th Noorderlicht Photofestival and at FotoFest, Houston; Girls on the Verge: Portraits of Adolescence (2007), Art Institute of Chicago; Routes II (2009), Waterhouse and Dodd, London; and Art of Today (2010), Museum of Fine Arts, Boston. Essaydi has also exhibited in many solo shows, including Lalla Essaydi (2013), Miller Yezerski Gallery, Boston; Universe (2012), Sharjah Calligraphy Biennial U.A.E.; Lalla Essaydi: Revisions (2012), Smithsonian’s National Museum of African Art, Washington, D.C.; and Lalla Essaydi: Les Femmes du Maroc (2011), National Gallery, Fes, Morocco. Her work is represented in a number of collections, including Maramotti Collection of Contemporary Art, Reggio Emilia, Italy; The Louvre, Paris; Williams College Museum of Art, Williamstown, Massachusetts; British Museum, London; The Art Institute of Chicago; Fogg Art Museum, Harvard Art Museums, Cambridge, Massachusetts; and several private collections. The artist is represented by Howard Yezerski Gallery in Boston and Edwynn Houk Gallery in New York City.
