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Regragui Bouslai
- Morocco - Born : 1963 in Chiadma.
Regragui Bouslai was born in 1963 in Chiadma, along the coastal stretch north of Essaouira. He never attended an art school. His visual vocabulary was formed where he grew up, out of stories told aloud, seasonal festivals and the ceremonies that structure life in the countryside. Painting came later, as a way of holding on to all of it.
His canvases are worlds crowded with presences. Animals gather by the dozen, tangled together until they cover the surface entirely; elsewhere hybrid figures — half human, half beast — stand shoulder to shoulder. Nothing is ever alone: every creature depends on its neighbours. Behind them one senses the Atlantic countryside of his childhood — argan trees, red earth, wild flowers — carried over as colour and movement rather than described.
Bouslai belongs to the group of self-taught Essaouira artists first shown in the late 1980s, now one of the most recognisable chapters in Moroccan art. His work has travelled to France, Denmark, Switzerland and Spain, and has been presented at the Marrakech Biennale, at MACAAL and at the Institut Français in Tangier. His pieces are held in private and institutional collections across Europe. BLOC 9 is pleased to present him in Casablanca.
Regragui Bouslai
- Morocco - Born : 1963 in Chiadma.
Regragui Bouslai was born in 1963 in Chiadma, along the coastal stretch north of Essaouira. He never attended an art school. His visual vocabulary was formed where he grew up, out of stories told aloud, seasonal festivals and the ceremonies that structure life in the countryside. Painting came later, as a way of holding on to all of it.
His canvases are worlds crowded with presences. Animals gather by the dozen, tangled together until they cover the surface entirely; elsewhere hybrid figures — half human, half beast — stand shoulder to shoulder. Nothing is ever alone: every creature depends on its neighbours. Behind them one senses the Atlantic countryside of his childhood — argan trees, red earth, wild flowers — carried over as colour and movement rather than described.
Bouslai belongs to the group of self-taught Essaouira artists first shown in the late 1980s, now one of the most recognisable chapters in Moroccan art. His work has travelled to France, Denmark, Switzerland and Spain, and has been presented at the Marrakech Biennale, at MACAAL and at the Institut Français in Tangier. His pieces are held in private and institutional collections across Europe. BLOC 9 is pleased to present him in Casablanca.
