Q&A with Mous Lamrabat 

What chat to Belgian-Moroccan photographer Mous Lamrabat ahead of his new exhibition in Marrakech

Moroccan born Belgian raised photographer Mous Lamrabat has a penchant for imaginative visual storytelling that has seen him shoot cover for GQ Arabia & Italia, Fucking Young, Vogue Arabia and collaborate with WhatsApp. But his well deserved commercial success only scratches the surface of the cultural importance of his work. His dream like images are the product of an artist straddling the contradictions of navigating Europe with foreign origins. His new series Homesick lays bare Lamrabat's own homesickness as he attempts to evoke the joyful feelings of wholeness being in Morocco fills him with. We sat down with him to discuss the role identity has on his practice and what to expect at the exhibition.

Your work explores the process of navigating diasporic identity. At this present moment, how easy is it to feel both Moroccan and Belgian?

It's not easy, because apparently - if I listen to the people - I'm not Moroccan and I'm also not Belgian.  When I'm in Belgium, I'm not recognised as Belgian. And if I'm in Morocco, the mainstream crowd will also not recognize me as Moroccan. This has been a struggle for a long time, but there's a whole new group of people - called immigrants - and they all feel the same way about this topic. So, it feels like you belong more to those people who don’t really have a place, or aren’t accepted. Accepted is maybe a harsh word, because I do feel accepted, I’m just not accepted as part of them. Now, as a grown person, it’s more, ‘I am who I am’. I am Moroccan, Belgian, Muslim, African, Arab. I'm all of these things, and I have accepted that. I feel like the best thing is to go through life with this philosophy. Everybody wants to be unique. Well, this is your uniqueness. You're more than one. You're a bit of an outsider, which is also fine. It's acceptance. It is what it is, and that’s also how I get to create my work. If you navigate it in the right way, you can use it to your advantage, because you’re part of more than one world which means that there is more than one place to get inspiration from. That’s how I approach it.

Some of your images are quite dreamlike. What is your process for coming up with a photo concept?

I am a dreamer. So for me, sometimes taking these photos are also my escape from reality. Most of my work I create to cope with things, and when I take those photos and I see the results, I find my place. It's happy, it's colourful. Most of my ideas come from imaginary moments. It’s just trying to build a world within to mentally escape to. And when you work or create often, it’s easy to truly believe that you live in that place. It’s like how people sometimes have second life games or a metaverse – sometimes you lose track of what the reality is. I sometimes have this when I have these periods of creating, and I’m really diving in deep. I lose track of which world is real and which is not. But it’s also my escape. I feel like I need it for my sanity to escape every now and again.

What would you like people who see this exhibition to feel?

I learned from past exhibitions that people look at my work and feel some kind of emotion. When they look at the work, they always make some kind of cocktail or what they see and how they feel, based on where they are in life. Someone who is very sad or has experienced something tragic is going to look at the photos and feel something different to a person who feels happiness. That’s also why I don’t like to give a lot of explanation to the work – I have listened to so many people looking at my photographs, and everybody has a really different definition of what they see. And that’s the beauty of it, I think I always start with positivity. That’s why you have the colours, the humour. I want to make people smile, I want to give them that nostalgic feeling every now and then. Nostalgia is one of the most amazing feelings you can have, it always feels so summery. I’m happy if visitors to the exhibition feel something. That’s also why I’m going to be there at Loft Art Gallery, so I can share in and listen to what they feel. Maybe their interpretation of the photos, what they feel, is more important than what I felt when I created it.

What is the first thing you want to tell everyone about Morocco?

Morocco is a magical place. There is something there in the soil that creates ease. Something that inspires creativity, something that inspires or triggers freedom, and this is something that I always chase. This is where I found it. I don't think it's because I'm Moroccan that I felt this. I know so many people who have gone to Morocco for the first time and then come back to Europe. The second time visiting Morocco, it was to live there. I don’t know what it is, I always tell people that life is easier there in every aspect. They haven’t invented the hamster wheel yet. I feel that in Europe and the West, from the moment you start working you enter a hamster wheel. In Morocco, this is yet to exist, the hamster wheel isn’t there yet.


Homesick, Mous Lamrabat at Loft Art Gallery, Marrakech
30 January – 15 March 2024

Article by Martyn Ewoma

 


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