A Royal Palace in Morocco 

Jean-Joseph-Benjamin Constant made this painting of a Moroccan palace using oil paints and a variety of brushes. He was among many nineteenth-century European artists who took inspiration from North Africa. The painting imitates the way architecture of the time deployed craft techniques like patterned tile work, textile design, and ornate plaster and woodwork. The artist painstakingly details the qualities of the materials - the colors, textures, and patterns. In particular, the artist's brushwork itself mimics the labor-intensive processes of the artisans who made the Palace. But the view it gives us of an exotic, opulent, and indolent lifestyle raises questions about the nature of labor. Who exactly would have made all these beautiful things, and under what conditions? Though Constant’s painting celebrates the look of craft, it ultimately detaches it from the social realities in which it was made.