INTERNATIONALLY KNOWN Moroccan painter, Mahi Binebine, displays his work at the archaeological museum of Silves this month, in a new exhibition entitled Máscaras (masks).
Through this exhibition, the museum intends to highlight the Algarve’s historical links with the southern Mediterranean, exploring the heritage that joins the area with Morocco and North Africa.
The works of Binebine are the bridge between the two Mediterranean borders, two different worlds which do, however, share many periods of common history. The connection is often unknown despite the proximity of the areas and this exhibition aims to open the way for each to discover the other.
The artist, who was born in 1959 in Marrakech, currently lives and works between Marrakech, Paris and Madrid. As well as being a painter, a writer and a poet, he is also a mathematician.
His masks represent the living world that is constantly evolving. These are intense images reflecting the intense words written in his books. The colourful African masks have a luminous magic, while revealing emotive issues such as oppression, injustice, anguish, fear, hunger, hope and dreams. They are part of Africa’s history, but also part of the Algarve’s history.
This is the first time the exhibition has come to Portugal and includes 30 original pieces by Mahi Binebine. The work will be on display at Silves’ Museu Municipal de Arqueologia and at the Igreja da Misericórdia until September 18, and it is then hoped that the exhibition will move on to Lisbon, although the venue is yet to be confirmed.
