From April 8 to June 30, 2025, the Musée Mohammed VI d'Art Moderne et Contemporain in Rabat will have the honor of presenting the exhibition “Tahar Ben Jelloun: De l'écriture à la peinture”, a retrospective celebrating the literary and pictorial talents of one of the greatest contemporary intellectuals.

 

Tahar Ben Jelloun is a writer, poet and painter, winner of the 1987 Prix Goncourt for his novel La nuit sacrée. This exhibition will highlight forty works produced by the artist in recent years, accompanied by a precious selection of manuscripts from ten of his most memorable novels.

“I started drawing before I learned to read and write. The switch to painting came about when an Italian friend encouraged me and allowed me to express myself on large canvases. I immediately took this work seriously and moved from what I called “the pain of the world”, which I wrote about in my novels and poetry, to “the light of this same world” in my attempts to paint and give the other side of what constitutes me. Right from the start, this need for light was what guided me, helping me to see the sometimes hidden side of the world. Because, as in my daily life, I feel concerned by the violence of the world and also by its hopes, hence this search for the world in a certain joy, with colors that dance and sing if you take the trouble to listen.” Tahar Ben Jelloun