From 2024 to 2025, the Musée National de la Photographie in Rabat invites us to an immersive and poetic experience, with a unique retrospective of Reza‘s work. Entitled “L’Odyssée Contemporaine de Reza”, this exhibition takes us on a visual journey, inspired by the great Sufi and Persian tradition, of the myth of the Conference of the Birds by the poet Attar.
Like the birds in the story crossing seven symbolic valleys, the visitor is invited to travel through these same spiritual stages, each representing a fundamental aspect of the human soul. Knowledge, Quest, Love, Beauty, Detachment, Nothingness, and finally, the Universe. So many themes that punctuate this photographic exploration. These valleys are not only geographical places, but emotional and philosophical dimensions, where Reza’s images confront us with the reality of our world and the depth of humanity.
The visions of these photographs translate the peace, the love as well as the truth which mixes with this initiatory journey. These photographs, taken at the heart of conflicts, suffering but also moments of grace and solidarity, bear witness to a humanist vision where beauty and tragedy coexist. Man, as the exhibition suggests, does not need walls to dream or borders to connect.
Reza’s contemporary odyssey
Be in the moment, where the event arises, where History is written, and stand as a witness, case slung over your shoulder, watching for the whispering scene. Then, when it finally reveals itself, press the trigger in an act of resistance, a duty of justice for the forgotten and the deprived.
At the heart of the most atrocious wars, the most absurd conflicts, or even in the fragile brilliance of solemn moments of peace and hope, Reza is there, capturing the moment, grasping man in his wanderings and his excesses, but also in his splendor and his fullness. Through his images, he places humanity face to face with its own paradoxes.
A photojournalist by vocation, Reza is never satisfied with reporting information or reporting current events. His fiercely committed approach rejects any neutrality in the face of tyranny and oppression which unjustly crush millions of human beings across the world. Himself having tasted the bitterness of exile, he made all the heavens his home, all the homelands a refuge, and all just causes his fight and his reason for being, with one ideal: to militate through testimony.
When a man in uniform pulls the trigger of his weapon, Reza, facing him, presses the trigger of his device. When the tear of loss falls, Reza reveals it to the world to denounce the tragedy. When the brilliance of poetry shines through chaos, it sublimates it to say: “Here is a way out! “.
In this retrospective entitled “L’Odyssée contemporaine de Reza”, we find all this, and much more. Reza invites us on a mystical wandering, on a journey through the seven valleys of the soul, a quest for absolute love inspired by the great Persian Sufi tradition. Seven valleys, seven themes punctuate this contemporary photographic journey: a quest for life, peace and hope, in the middle of arid lands and raging seas, difficult to navigate, except for enlightened minds, visionary poets and enlightened humanists.
The Musée National de la Photographie invites its visitors, through this exhibition, to immerse themselves in the poetic and humanist photographic universe of Reza. An invitation to discover humanity in all its diversity and uniqueness, in its moments of chaos, but also in its moments of grace.
Part of this retrospective is displayed outside Fort Rottembourg, in the form of a human mosaic. Why outdoors? Because Man, by nature, is free. He does not need walls to contain his dreams or limit his horizons. This mosaic of portraits, captured from the four corners of the world, is a call for acceptance, tolerance and respect. It reminds us that, in today’s world, our destinies are inextricably linked, and that the salvation of modern times is found when we see our own reflection in the face of the other.
In a mystical and poetic dialectic between East and West, Reza’s work resonates like the echo of a timeless conversation between Ibn Arabi and Rumi.
Ibn Arabi proclaims:
“My heart has become capable
To welcome all forms.
It is a pasture for gazelles and an abbey for monks!
It is a temple for idols and the Ka’ba for those who go around it.
It is the Tables of the Torah and also the pages of the Koran!
The religion I profess is that of love.
Wherever his mounts turn,
Love is my religion and my faith!”
Rumi, in subtle harmony, responds:
“Without love, the world would be lifeless.
Every atom is in love with this perfection
And rushes towards her.
Every moment resounds on all sides
The call of love.”
Soufiane Er-Rahoui
Curator of the Musée National de la Photographie
