Harem #5 2009

Lalla Essaydi made this photograph, Harem #5, in 2008, and I'm thinking about how she uses henna. The process of applying it is ancient, laborious, and deeply personal. Look how the model blends into the photograph. It’s a trick of the eye, of course, but it’s also a meditation on pattern, identity, and place. The blues and yellows in the background, with the arabesque design, feel both opulent and constrained. It’s like being wrapped in a beautiful puzzle, each piece perfectly placed, yet the overall picture feels like it could shift at any moment. It makes me think of Miriam Schapiro’s Femmages – collages that celebrate women’s domestic crafts. Essaydi takes that idea and blows it up, making it monumental, turning a photograph into a living painting. It’s about beauty, yes, but also about the layers of meaning we bring to what we see. There is no single answer.