Lalla A. Essaydi grew up in Morocco, and lived in Saudi Arabia for many years. Currently, she resides in New York City. She received her MFA from the School of the Museum of Fine Arts in May 2003. Essaydi's work is represented by Schneider Gallery in Chicago, Howard Yezerski Gallery in Boston, and Edwynn Houk Gallery in New York. Her work has been exhibited nationally and internationally by galleries and museums, and is in the permanent collections of The Art Institute of Chicago, The Huston Museum of Art, and The Clark Museum in Boston, among others.

Her art, which often combines Islamic calligraphy with representations of the female body, addresses the complex reality of Arab female identity from the unique perspective of personal experience. In much of her work, she returns to her Moroccan girlhood, looking back on it as an adult woman caught somewhere between past and present, and as an artist, exploring the language in which to "speak" from this uncertain space. Her paintings and current body of work titled, Les Femmes du Maroc appropriate Orientalist imagery from the Western painting tradition, thereby inviting viewers to reconsider the Orientalist mythology. She has worked in numerous media, including painting, video, film, installation, and analog photography. "In my art, I wish to present myself through multiple lenses as artist, as Moroccan, as Saudi, as traditionalist, as Liberal, as Muslim. In short, I invite viewers to resist stereotypes."


*The Schneider Gallery carries all works by Lalla Essaydi from the two series, Converging Territories and Les Femmes du Maroc, including new works completed in 2008

jennifer@schneidergallerychicago.com or (312)988-4033*