WUNRN
Website Link Includes Multiple Exhibition Photos.
Morocco
–Berber Women & Their Culture – Art, Weaving, Jewelry, Photos, Carpets +
Berber history spans thousands of years across much of North Africa. This exhibit focuses specifically on Berber women from the Rif Mountains in Morocco’s north to the Sahara in the kingdom’s south and examines how their mastery of traditional arts such as weaving, jewelry, and basket making has helped sustain an ancient culture that is uniquely African and Mediterranean. The survival of a culture depends on the transmission of language, but also on certain, essentially feminine, skills, such as weaving or, in the northern region of the Kingdom, pottery.
Why was Berber art dismissed as "rural" by
Moroccan national museums? Björn Dahlström, Curator: It is a rural art. But the Berber tribes have been
fighting for the recognition of their culture, and recognizing a specificity in
a country creating a modern state was not deemed possible. So, instead of
defining this production as "Berber", they named it "rural"
in opposition to the production that was city-oriented and therefore mostly
Arab-oriented in terms of inspirations. Times have changed now, and the Berber
identity and language are recognized within the new constitution of the
kingdom.
The Berber Museum in Paris, situated at the
heart of the Majorelle Garden, beloved
property of the Fondation Pierre Bergé – Yves
Saint Laurent, houses a collection of
Berber
art.