The Moroccan born artist has a kinshipwith the subjects in his art works that goes
beyond mere words. On the evening I interviewed him in October at London’s
Somerset House, it was some 20 minutes to 7:00 p.m. when exhibitions would
closed for the day. Hajjaj asked to postpone the interview while he sat to watch a
run of Rock Stars with one of the featured artists who had arrived to see the
work.
What at first might seem like courtesy from one artist to another soon took on the
form of solidarity and appreciation of each other’s gifts which could be lost on
the many who trooped in to see La Caravane.
“If you go anywhere around the world, you’re going to find incredible artists”
Hajjaj explains “they’re known local and they’re surviving what they do, on what
they have and for me they’re the real artists.”
Rock Stars: Volume Two is a set of nine screen installations of different artists
that includes a soul singer, performance poets and a belly dancer all of whom
perform their art in a sequence of short recorded clips that build into a montage
that is looped.
Each artist is dressed by Hajjaj in outfits of bold patterns and colours, and
framed by cans of popular everyday products from brands that would be
immediately recognisable most people, even when labelled in Arabic.The first volume of Rock Stars, which also featured a diverse group of artist-
friends, was shown in the Los Angeles County of Art (2014), New Jersey’s Newark
Museum (2015) and Memphis Brooks Museum of Art (2016).
La Caravane will also continue beyond the annual art fair and through the winter
season at the Somerset House until January 2018 and Hajjaj is aware of just how
significant his homecoming exhibition will be not just for himself, “I knew I had
to carry the flag for 1.54 and the African continent. This was important. So
whatever comes here had to be museum standard of work.”
La Caravane occupies all three rooms that make of the Charles Speechlys section
of the gallery. The first is a selection of works from Kesh Angels, perhaps the best
known of Hajjaj’s works, a series of stylised photographic prints depicting
Moroccan women in djellaba and posed behind motorcycles. Each photograph has,
for a frame, stacked cans of consumer products commonly used in Morocco with
descriptions in Arabic as well as in English from carbonated drinks to processed
food.
If ones perception of women in traditional Islamic and some Arab societies is that
of female disempowerment, Hajjaj’s harmonised vision of glossy aesthetic,
Moroccan traditions and street culture not only disrupts such notions, but
reconstitutes them into singular, complex images.
“Kesh Angels is a classic type of work that became popular on social media,”
Hajjaj says. “It’s like a 20 year story that I’ve been shooting. I’ve only probably
showed only 10 percent of the work.”One food brand Hajjaj has used to frame his work goes beyond any commentary
on consumerism or decorative value.
Some of the brands Hajjaj has used to frame him work could be read as
commentaries on global consumerism and some are simply decorative, except one
for canned tomatoes called Aisha which has a deeper significance: “I use them a
lot because my mum, God bless her, she liked them a lot. Her name was Aisha so
as to keep the memory.”