I forgive you

July 6 – November 5, 2017

Leila Alaoui is a French-Moroccan photographer and video artist born in 1982 and died in January 2016 during terrorist attacks in Ouagadougou.

Endlessly crossing geographies as numerous as they are diverse, she explores the construction of identity, cultural diversity and migration, especially in the Mediterranean area.

Photography and video are used in turn to represent social realities through visual language that sensitively combines documentary aesthetics and visual arts. 

Observer and humanist, Leila Alaoui invites us to participate in the joint project to watch and listen to each other’s stories, shared in a singular intimacy which annihilates distance, removing any idea of exoticism and making us empathise with those being filmed or photographed. This is illustrated by the 10 large photographs from the series Les Marocains through which the artist paints the majestic portrait of the different Moroccan communities, or the images of the No Pasará series, and the video Crossings, confronting the dreams and aspirations of young Moroccans imagining an El Dorado on the other side of the Mediterranean, with the harsh reality or the impossibility of crossing over.

“I Forgive You”, an exhibition of the artist’s photographs and videos organised with the Leila Alaoui Association and Galleria Continua, is the sensitive, humanist response to the terror that led to the death of the young Leila Alaoui.