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Khayma

2019

Project with Alexandra Anzid Kollárová, anthropologist

Khayma, seffa, henna

 

Tighmert is an oasis in South-West Morocco where they create patchworks from old Melfa, large batik fabrics imported from Mauritanië that women wear. The patchworks were one of the last products the caravans brought to Morocco and are made in the form of tents or shelters to protect from the sun. During a wedding for example, two families join to create a Khayma, a tent, in the courtyard.

By knocking on doors in the oasis and asking (using a recording in Darija) for a piece of old melfa and to stitch together, we connected to the women of the oasis and their tradition. After a week of collecting and collectively stitching, we used this khayma as a backdrop for a marhouf. A marhouf is a meeting where women come together to eat and celebrate, which was organised for this occasion by Soukaina Dabbah and Rachida Dabbah, two women of the village. 

Khayma came to being during Caravan Tighmert , a cultural laboratory in the oasis of Tighmert.

Read 'On Representation, Cultural Appropriation and the Ethics of Artistic Collaborations in the Postcolonial Context of Morocco' written by Alexandra Kollarova, published in The Journal of Culture vol. 9 / No 1 / 2020 Institute of Ethnology, Faculty of Arts, Charles University.

P 43-45: The Khayma Project

 

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