Le Cube is an old apartment transformed into an art centre situated at 2, rue Benzerte, 1er étage, Rabat Tél : +212 6 61 18 64 41
[email protected] http://lecube-art.com/en/lespace/
I met the director and founder Elisabeth Piskernik in this Feburary when I was researching artist spaces in Rabat. Le Cube has run an artist residence and exchange program since 2005 and is an exhibition space for Moroccan and foreign artists. It has set up a residence program with several international partners based in Morocco such as l’Institut Français, le Goethe-Institut, Instituto Cervantes, Istituto Italiano di Cultura, l’Ambassade d’Autriche, l’Ambassade de Suisse, l’Ambassade d’Espagne, l’Ambassade des Pays-Bas, MACECE.
Unfortunately Elizabeth was away on vacation due to the quietness of Ramadan (a restful period), however I was fortunate to meet once again Gabrielle Camases and after being shown round the space she kindly sent me some new links for independent art spaces in Casablanca to expand on my knowlege of whats happening in different areas of Morocco. The spaces are as follows….
L’Atelier de la Source du Lion: http://www.lasourcedulion.com/
https://fr-fr.facebook.com/lAtelier-de-La-Source-du-lion-175105772607895/
Espace Darja https://fr-fr.facebook.com/page.espacedarja/
L’uzine https://www.facebook.com/uzine7/
L’Atelier de l’Observatoire http://www.atelierobservatoire.com/
and the Fonds Roberto Cimetta: http://www.cimettafund.org/
Also part of the team at Le Cube is Driss Benabdallah (founder) and Wafaa Mali (artistic projects and communication), with the space open from Tuesday to Friday from 2.30pm to 5.30pm and also by appointment.
You can join their Facebook group « Le Cube – independent art room »
The exhibition when i visited was called Curator’s Zone – Masnaâ Saghir, dans l’intimité, with artists Ismaël, Fakhri El Ghezal et Randa Maroufi, curated by Jeanne Mercier.
For the 4th edition of the curator’s zone Le Cube invited the independent curator and co-founder of the platform Afrique in Visu, Jeanne Mercier. With the desire to extend the existing connections between Rabat and Casablanca, Jeanne Mercier proposes for Le Cube an exhibition linked to the festival MASNAÂ in Casablanca. The 4th edition (9-16th May 2016) of this event is dedicated to the contemporary creation of two cities, Casablanca and Tunis, through the presentation of projects of artists from the two countries in the fields of visual arts, film, music and performance.
Masnaâ Saghir (Mini Masnaa in Darija), taking place at Le Cube, presents three artists whose work explores the relation to privacy at different scales. Dealing with space, even with the one of Le Cube – an old apartment transformed into an art center – the exhibition includes photographic proposals and video works by ismaël, Fakhri El Ghezal and Randa Maroufi.
The curator Jeanne Mercier is co-founder and chef editor of Afrique in visu. In 2005 she realized a thesis on “Les Rencontres Africaines de la Photographie” (LHIVIC-EHESS) and works on new practices and forms of dissemination of photography in North and West Africa. Today she divides her time between Afrique in visu and consulting activities for cultural programming in the field of contemporary photographic practices and the issues of professional photographers in Africa. Currently she writes for various artistic and photographic journals, L’Oeil de la Photographie and Diptyk. In 2015 she was the curator of the “Rencontres Internationales de la Photographie” in Fez. In June/July 2016 she is invited by the City of Lisbon and Africa.Cont/CML. to attend a curatorial research residency.
“Masnaâ” is an annual festival founded and directed by David Ruffel.
ismaël is the invited co-curator of the edition 2016 to be held in Casablanca from 9-16th.
More information about the festival and its program:
